THE HEART
EXPLORING THE
WILL OF OUR SPIRIT
Nowadays, when more people than ever are treated for depression,
and having the scientific community published that antidepressants are little or
not effective, the lack of knowledge that man has of it self, as an individual
and as a community becomes even more
evident. An afflicted heart is, in addition, the first cause of the
majority of illnesses, not only of the emotional. As it says in Proverb 14:10
…The heart knoweth his own bitterness; and a
stranger doth not intermeddle with his joy… We need a harmonious interior life between our spirit and our soul
because our intellect discerns the spiritual and the feelings. The Master and
spiritual doctor of our souls, the Lord Jesus Christ teaches in
Matthew 5:8 …Blessed are the pure in heart: for
they shall see God...
God loves us, even though humanity lives a life project separated
from Him, in its overall; so we suffer!. We have to open the door of our heart
to God, something which is expressed better in the Bible when it talks about
circumcision of the heart, which leaves our heart accessible and impossible to
hide from loving God and our neighbour. God calls on our door and sends His Son
Jesus Christ who opens the door of His Heart to us; if we receive Him.
Man has evolved mentally but his heart has not changed, and will
not. God knows and weighs our hearts even before the world’s creation. Man’s
heart is still the same as in the beginning because this is how God has designed
it, and this is the reason why God talks to the heart, in other words, to our
spirit, with a message that transcends time,
The Gospel, the good news for the
heart. No other Word has the power to transform man’s heart than the Cross of
Christ and the Kingdom of God.
WE HAVE ACCESS TO GOD’S HEART
When the Lord tore the veil of the Holy Place when dying on the
Cross, the veil that He was really tearing was His heart’s. That work that we
know through the Biblical story, in place and date, is really the first action
that God did of His own will when He loved us in Christ eternally; an eternal
work done in the eternal heavens, for eternal life. When God the Father suffered
the death of His Son, He was tearing His heart, was circumcising his heart, and was
leaving it accessible to prayer in the name of His Son, Yahshua,
and to man’s repentance; any man who inviting Him, would also tear his heart in
love, when loving the Messiah eternally, the Son, the Lord, from the Cross.
Although in the New Testament, the Greek word “Kardia” is usually identified in
many Texts with our psychical life, however the heart, spiritually, symbolizes
our spirit, and it is really a lot more complex, as it also is our
cardiovascular system, that we will also look at in a basic way, as a spiritual
parallelism.
Although the Law places the veil before the presence of God, and
therefore it must be fulfilled to gain access, through the priest and through
the blood of the “sacrifice”; now by grace and by the Blood of Christ, we have
…therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus,
20By a new and living way, which he hath consecrated for us, through the veil,
that is to say, his flesh; 21And having an high priest over the house of God;
22Let us draw near with a true heart in full
assurance of faith, having our hearts
sprinkled from an evil conscience, and our bodies washed with pure water. Hebrews 10.
The relation between God and us is of such a great emotional
depth that it cannot be understood. Speaking as a man, when we are in love,
we live an experience that drives all our senses, what we call
passion; The Passion of the Christ, for his “wife” we can see reflected in the
Songs of Solomon. That Passion would take him straight to the Cross, which He
saw from the heights, and before the foundation of the world 1Peter 1:20, having
drunk the glass of bitterness, full of the vinegar from the sponge of the roman
soldier, “so that the Scripture would be fulfilled”, that myrrh that was offered
to Him when He came to this world.
This love story between God and man is the centre of attention
in celestial life, as well as of our earthly one, and its so deep that when one
falls in love with the Spirit of God one cannot live without Him, life can no
longer be conceived without that Prince of Peace of Isaiah 9:6, Prince Charming
who gave His live for our soul in the Eternal Spirit and has gone to prepare
places for us to take us with Him, after the Lamb’s marriage. Yes, you are also
invited to that marriage, but to that marriage one participates in the altar, as
bride, as Church, to marry That Prince of the Spirit and of the soul for ever;
the bride-price, our sins, and by faith, our fruits of the heart, and the good
deeds which have no value for our salvation but keep us in the right Way.
When the Lord talks, he doest it to the heart; he did it from the
Cross and through His work. This way, we see, that spiritual talk is not only
the audible, but that which touches the heart through His Spirit, through His
Presence, through dreams, etc. The Lord talks with authority because He has
given his heart to gain ours. An example of a man who spoke to the heart was
Joseph, in Egypt, Genesis 50:21, when he spoke to his brothers who had sold him
as a slave, now saving them from the famine.
The Bible Texts with a grater spiritual depth about this subject
are in John’s Gospel, Chap. 13:31 to Chap. 17 inclusive. In these, the offering
of the Lord for us is exposed, the offering of His heart. Christ’s work
transforms our heart, which can emanate Godly love for others, after accepting
Him, as He teaches in John 13:34 …A new commandment I
give to you, that you love one another, as I have loved you…
TEACHING IN
THE CARDIOVASCULAR ANATOMY
The heart’s anatomy shows
as a spiritual parallelism in it’s composition as well as in it’s functioning,
like almost all the structure of the man, because the design is God’s. The heart
is mainly a pump which pumps blood. The blood is the life of the body, and
according to the heart’s rhythm, it pumps faster or slower. Spiritually, the
cardio system is made of three parts, the heart, the conjunction of veins and
arteries, and the blood, but act as one same thing. The same way, the Lord
relates with us through the three Persons of the Trinity, the Father, the Son
and the Holy Spirit, being one. The same way as the heart beats according to the
rhythm of life we are living, our spirit will emanate love of God according to
its mood, of this, our spiritual heart, our spirit. Now, that mood depends
deeply on the relation we have with God and of how our heart is, if our
conscience is in peace, in the peace of Jesus Christ, if our life is guided to
the fruits of the love for God and for our neighbour. Depression is the opposite
state of enthusiasm; therefore if we live for Yahshua, there is no place for
depression.
To finish with the
physical heart, and with a simple explanation, our spirit is the one that pumps
our spiritual life, the fruit of the Christian heart which is God’s love; I mean
a spirit which has been born again from the Holy Spirit, John 3:3. To pump God’s
love we have two ventricles, one where the blood enters with oxygen,
symbolically the Holy Spirit, and another one which brings the blood back from
our body, our own essence which we have to purify with the oxygen that the Lord
brings through breathing, prayer, worship and praise. Curiously we have some
valves called sigmoid which are triple and allow the communication between
auricles and ventricles of each side of the heart. These triple valves,
spiritually are precisely prayer, worship and praise to our God, who gives us
life. Without them the flow of blood is not possible, without them our relationship
with God does not work and we do not provide life, in other words, Godly love to
give to others.
The heart represents our
spirit in action, as well as our brain symbolizes our mind, and our body our
soul. Although God gives us the life, now I refer to physical life as long as He
wants, in the spiritual sense, we can pump life of the flesh, from the world, or
of the Spirit. It all depends on whether we have been born again, if we have
received the Holly Spirit and His heart purifying fire. Because we shall know
them by their fruits, the fruits of the Christian heart are: That love called
Charity “God’s love” according to the dictionary, sanctification, justice and
good works as well as repentance. Galatians 5:22 revels the fruits of the
Spirit: …love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness,
temperance. In another part we read about the heart of Christ: …I will have
mercy and not sacrifice… Matthew 9:13 or …mercy triumphs over judgment… James
2:13b. Jesus teaches that the most important of the Law is: Justice, mercy and
faith. Matthew 23:23. The heart that seeks justice is a source of joy and
courage to man. The Christian heart is a just and brave heart.
In the comments of the
following twelve Biblical Texts, we will look at a deeper view of the essence of
the heart which follows God.
BIBLE TEXTS
GENESIS 6
5And Yahweh saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that
every imagination of the thoughts of his heart
was only evil continually. 6And it repented Yahweh that he had made man on
the earth, and it grieved him at his heart. 7And Yahweh said, I will
destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth; both man, and beast,
and the creeping thing, and the fowls of the air; for it repenteth me that I
have made them. 8But Noah found grace in the eyes of Yahweh.
Yes brethren, the nature
of the human heart is evil, because man thinks, that on his own, without God, can
live happily under the free will. God’s salvation, although it’s for the soul,
which will receive a new body in the resurrection, must begin in the heart which
is the helm of our lives, so that man cedes the governing of his life to the
author of life, our loving Father. If we live like Noah we find grace before His
eyes and are blessed, if we receive His salvation plan, His Son Yahshua.
1SAMUEL 10
And the Spirit of Yahweh will come upon thee, and thou shalt prophesy with
them, and shalt be turned into another man... ...9And it was so, that
when he had turned his back to go from Samuel, God gave him another
heart: and all those signs came to pass that
day.
The Holy Spirit comes to
us, once we have been born again and turned into another man, changing our spirit,
our heart and are counted amongst the prophets of the Most High God, because we
are a nation of kings and priests before our God his Father, and He is the King
of kings. Revelation 1:6.
PSALM 141
Set a watch, o Yahweh, before my mouth; keep the door of my lips. 4Incline
not my heart to any evil thing, to practice
wicked works with men that work iniquity: and let me not eat of their dainties.
This Psalm shows us the
intention of a heart that loves God, a prayer keep our will and thought, that
our heart won’t be carried out by the flesh nor by the world. …And lead us not
into temptation, but deliver us from evil...
PROVERB 4
23Keep thy heart with all diligence; for
out of it are the issues of life.
Spirit and motivational
power of man. In a vision of today, and in the field of computers we could say
we are like programs and the programmers at the same time, we have a purpose in
life and we must find it, God reveals it when we change our heart, otherwise the
enemy may use our program for evil uses. The heart is also like an ark where
feelings and knowledge is kept.
JEREMIAH 17
9The heart is deceitful above all things,
and desperately wicked: who can know it? 10I Yahweh search the
heart, I try the reins, even to give every man
according to his ways, and according to the fruit of his doings.
Deceitful and wicked heart
if not born again. Tests the heart to make it attached to God. The Lord warns
that if we do not walk by His hand, our own heart will deceive us to seek for the
things of the flesh. Our heart, being our spirit must feed from the Holy Spirit.
Every day we must pray to the Lord that His Holy Spirit may guide us, and that
each decision of the day we bring before Him.
DANIEL 10
12Then said he unto me, Fear not, Daniel: for from the first day that thou
didst set thine heart to understand, and to chasten
thyself before thy God, thy words were heard, and I am come for thy words.
Daniel is a faithful
example of a disciple who lives in a personal friendship with God, in the love
and honour of his God and Father. If we imitate Daniel in these terms, the Lord
will show us His thinking and will share it with us.
MATTHEW 6
19Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth
corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal: 20But lay up for yourselves
treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves
do not break through nor steal: 21For where your treasure is, there will your
heart be also.
We must bring our ideas
and project before God, not leave them hidden in our hearts, but ask God in the
name of Yahshua, Jesus Christ if they are His or not, and if they are not we
must reject them. Try for your self, be like Gideon, Judges 6, who prayed to God
for signs to know if he would bless him before he went to war against the
Midianites. We must pray for things before we take big decisions of our life. God
always talks to us, but we must seek Him in prayer, and once the answer is
received, obey.
MATTHEW 15
16And Jesus said, Are ye also yet without understanding? 17Do not ye yet
understand, that whatsoever entereth in at the mouth goeth into the belly, and
is cast out into the draught? 18But those things which proceed out of the
mouth come forth from the heart; and they
defile the man. 19For out of the heart proceed
evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness,
blasphemies: 20These are the things which defile a man: but to eat with unwashen
hands defileth not a man.
This is a revealing Text
because it shows us how we may know the people who we talk to. What ever is in
their hearts comes out of their mouths, you only need to listen. By the way an
action that not many know, nor want to do. They say that this is the reason why
we have two ears and one mouth, to listen twice what we speak. James 3 reminds
us to be prudent because the tong is double edge sword.
ACTS 4
32And the multitude of
them that believed were of one heart and of one
soul: neither said any of them that ought of the things which he possessed
was his own; but they had all things common. 33And with great power gave the
apostles witness of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus: and great grace was upon
them all.
Here is the prayer: that
all brethren may be of on heart “Spirit” and of one soul. I think Christianity,
with so many denominations will have to give account to God of why there has to
be so many different groups. If we compare religion manipulated by man to submit
others, to obtain profit or to dominate their souls, which we know of, as well as in
other religions, with a large part of Christianity, this is what is called
apostasy, 2Thesalonians 2:3, that had to come, this is the religion called
Babylon, this one has expiring date, Revelation 18. We must teach disciples to
know Jesus Christ, Yahshua alive, that they may establish a personal relation
with God in which they depend on the Word, which is the Verb of Life of the
Holly Spirit, so that their hearts may be comforted and don’t depend of human
structure, but all those of good will, understand that the Church are all of us
who have believed in the Son of God and are waiting for His return, having
transformed our hearts and working in them every day so that we emanate God’s
Love between us, where the Kingdom of God is until He comes.
ROMANS 2
28For he is not a Jew, which is one outwardly; neither is that circumcision,
which is outward in the flesh: 29But he is a Jew, which is one inwardly; and
circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit,
and not in the letter; whose praise is not of men, but of God.
Crystal clear. The word
Jew, if we understand it as a member of the people of God, is who has taken off
his flesh of his heart, which means that has brought out his spirit to love,
like Yahshua does love us, in a truly and brotherly way. As we read Paul, to be a
Jew or a Christian, if both have accepted Yahshua, is the same thing. Messianics
must have this point clear, as well as every Christian denomination, whether
they are Catholic in their many branches or Protestant in as many as they have.
1PETER 1
22Seeing ye have purified
your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit unto unfeigned love of
the brethren, see that ye love one another with a pure
heart fervently: 23Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of
incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever.
Being born again of the
Spirit, as Peter says, and as we have been reading, this way our soul is
purified and our heart can love fervently. This is the attitude that I expect from
a brother or sister, who is my friend, not a submission, condemnation or
accusation hierarchic order, as I hear and as they write to me, brothers from
around the world, in reference to their churches; what a disgrace. If your
brethren, whether elders, bishops, deacons, they all consider each other priests
of the Lord, and true friends, thank God and work not to loose that friendship
spiritual relation. If on the contrary you live in a Babylon system, run, in
case the wrath of the Lord finds you inside. …And I heard another voice from
heaven, saying, come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her
sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues. Revelation 18:4.
1JOHN 3
17But whoso hath this world’s good, and seeth his brother have need, and
shutteth up his heart from him, how dwelleth the
love of God in him? 18My little children, let us not love in word, neither
in tongue; but in deed and in truth. 19And hereby we know that we are of the
truth, and shall assure our hearts before him. 20For if our
heart condemn us, God is greater than our
heart, and knoweth all things. 21Beloved, if
our heart condemn us not, then have we
confidence toward God. 22And whatsoever we ask, we receive of him, because we
keep his commandments, and do those things that are pleasing in his sight.
This is the last of the
twelve Texts, but I think it needs no comment.
CONCLUSION
God’s heart and His
Presence are in the Ark of the Covenant who is Yahshua. Now we have
access to His heart, to His presence because He loved us, if we receive Him in
our hearts. The veil has been torn so that we may come to Him without fear, in
Christ.
...A double minded man is unstable in
all his ways... …purify your hearts, ye double minded. James 1:8 and 4:8. So if you
are unstable in your ways and double minded, purify your heart through the
triple spiritual valves: Prayer, worship and praise.
Heart: Blessed are the pure
in heart... Matthew 5 ...and I will give them a heart of
flesh... Ezekiel 11:19. It is really
referring to the spirit, although some times it may seem to refer to our soul,
it refers to our spiritual feelings, and depending on the Text, to spiritual
discernment, although it might seem to be referring to the mind. The power of
life and the will, the feeling of wanting and loving God and our
neighbour. The
heart is the place where the work of salvation of Jesus Christ begins, therefore
the Gospel is the specific Word for the heart, where conscience is placed. God's heart is
infinitely more spiritual and full of love
than ours, but He changes it for one like
His, in the new birth of the Spirit. ...Of
the abundance of the heart the mouth
speaks... Matthew 12:34. So we cannot hide
from our real feelings. You talk Christ, you
have Christ, you talk the world, you have
the world which is death.
Genesis 6:5, 1Samuel 10:9 Psalms 7:9,
Matthew
15:19, Revelation 2.23. Taken from
Spiritual Dictionary.
I would like to finish
referring to the words of Jesus in John 14 because they seem to me the best
which talk to our heart in the hope of His return: ...1Let not your
heart
be troubled: ye believe in
God, believe also in me. 2In my Father’s house are many mansions: if it were not
so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. 3And if I go and
prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto
myself; that where I am, there ye may be also… AleluYah, Maranatha,
Amen, even so, come Lord Yahshua.