Guard Your Heart - Part 2, Proverbs 4:10-27J. Josh Smith, MacArthur Boulevard Baptist Church, attended July 25, 2010
We spend a lot of time and money protecting things valuable to us. Advertisers take advantage of this. How much time do we spend guarding our most valuable possession – our heart?
The things of greatest value deserve the greatest protection.
Since the heart is the source of everything we think, feel, do, and desire, and since God sees our heart and judges us according to the condition of our heart, the heart is worthy of the greatest protection.
How do we protect our heart? It involves our attitude and our activity.
The attitude – Proverbs 4:23 encompasses two kinds of guarding. We want to keep the bad things out as well as keep the bad things in. We can think of it as a security guard, keeping things out, and a prison guard, keeping things in. We need to do both. Watch your heart and watch outside your heart.
This should be the priority of our life, “…above all things…” Above all else, value the condition of your heart and actively pursue a heart that is pleasing to the Lord. Choose by faith to believe that it is more important to guard your heart than anything else in life.
The activity – What we must do to guard our hearts.
1. Encounter God through His Word – This is our primary tool. Neglect of the Word is neglect of the heart, it is foundational. This is basic; we can’t look for the “advanced” tools. Be consumed with the Word of God.
Since God alone sees the heart, and since God alone can change the heart, we must seek to be changed by God through the power of His living Word. See the Word as a means to meet with the One who alone can see, discern, and change your heart.
Read it – this is embodied in the word “hear” from Proverbs 4:1, 10, 20. This must be daily, systematic and consistent.
Obey it – the word “hear” doesn’t just mean an external hearing but also an inward applying as seen in Proverbs 4:2 and Proverbs 4:4.
Internalize it – Proverbs 4:4, Proverbs 4:21 and Psalm 119:11 encourage meditation, memorization thus the Word is always available. We need a library in our head and heart.
We are always looking for steps and solutions. The Bible isn’t like that though. The solution to our problem isn’t steps and principles but God! Steps don’t change you, God does, even if we don’t know it or recognize it. When David wrote Psalm 119, at best, he had the Pentateuch. He didn’t find “steps” to solve his problems in Genesis. He found God in Genesis.
The popular technique of “bouncing your eyes” when you see something that may make you lust is an example. Although this is a fine technique, not looking won’t keep us from lust. You can lust without looking, it is your heart that must be changed, by God, through His Word.
When we look for principles or steps we are also assuming that we know our problem. We don’t always know our root problem. We may be looking for a solution to a problem we don’t even have. When we are in His Word God will heal us from within, the Word of God is active (Hebrews 4:12).
2. Encounter God through His ways – This is an active pursuing with everything we have, including our eyes, feet and mouth. If we are not engaging in the work of God we are only partially guarding. The activity is helping to guard your heart. An active pursuit of the way of God protects our heart. It must be a holistic pursuit of Him, His ways and ministry.
Mouth – Proverbs 4:24. The mouth reveals the heart but it also affects the heart. We make things worse by continually talking about our issues or problems. The mouth feeds the heart, and vice versa, they feed off each other. Whenever we are grumbling, complaining, criticizing, and gossiping we feed the condition of our heart, it makes it worse.
Eyes – Proverbs 4:25. What your eyes see affect the way your heart feels. The more we look at things we shouldn’t changes our heart, which will be manifested eventually. There is a figurative meaning also in that we need to focus on His way. If it were just literal we would need to wear a neck brace to keep our eyes looking straight ahead. Our focus determines our direction.
Feet – Proverbs 4:26-27. Don’t let our feet take you where you don’t want your heart to go. At least four times in Deuteronomy (Deuteronomy 5:32, 17:11, 17:20, 28:14) we find a verse almost exactly like Proverbs 4:26-27, in which Moses says, “Don’t turn to the right or left, turn your foot from evil”. The Promised Land is right there, if you just walk the way I told you to walk you are going to get it but they didn’t do it. Hebrews 12:2 references this as he talks about fixing our eyes on Jesus.
Primary ambition of our life should be to guard our heart and allow, by guarding, the life of Christ to be continually manifested through us. Keep your heart healthy.
NOTE: These are my notes, taken as I listened to the sermon live. Any errors, misunderstandings or misinterpretations are my responsibility entirely and not the fault of the preacher.
We spend a lot of time and money protecting things valuable to us. Advertisers take advantage of this. How much time do we spend guarding our most valuable possession – our heart?
The things of greatest value deserve the greatest protection.
Since the heart is the source of everything we think, feel, do, and desire, and since God sees our heart and judges us according to the condition of our heart, the heart is worthy of the greatest protection.
How do we protect our heart? It involves our attitude and our activity.
The attitude – Proverbs 4:23 encompasses two kinds of guarding. We want to keep the bad things out as well as keep the bad things in. We can think of it as a security guard, keeping things out, and a prison guard, keeping things in. We need to do both. Watch your heart and watch outside your heart.
This should be the priority of our life, “…above all things…” Above all else, value the condition of your heart and actively pursue a heart that is pleasing to the Lord. Choose by faith to believe that it is more important to guard your heart than anything else in life.
The activity – What we must do to guard our hearts.
1. Encounter God through His Word – This is our primary tool. Neglect of the Word is neglect of the heart, it is foundational. This is basic; we can’t look for the “advanced” tools. Be consumed with the Word of God.
Since God alone sees the heart, and since God alone can change the heart, we must seek to be changed by God through the power of His living Word. See the Word as a means to meet with the One who alone can see, discern, and change your heart.
Read it – this is embodied in the word “hear” from Proverbs 4:1, 10, 20. This must be daily, systematic and consistent.
Obey it – the word “hear” doesn’t just mean an external hearing but also an inward applying as seen in Proverbs 4:2 and Proverbs 4:4.
Internalize it – Proverbs 4:4, Proverbs 4:21 and Psalm 119:11 encourage meditation, memorization thus the Word is always available. We need a library in our head and heart.
We are always looking for steps and solutions. The Bible isn’t like that though. The solution to our problem isn’t steps and principles but God! Steps don’t change you, God does, even if we don’t know it or recognize it. When David wrote Psalm 119, at best, he had the Pentateuch. He didn’t find “steps” to solve his problems in Genesis. He found God in Genesis.
The popular technique of “bouncing your eyes” when you see something that may make you lust is an example. Although this is a fine technique, not looking won’t keep us from lust. You can lust without looking, it is your heart that must be changed, by God, through His Word.
When we look for principles or steps we are also assuming that we know our problem. We don’t always know our root problem. We may be looking for a solution to a problem we don’t even have. When we are in His Word God will heal us from within, the Word of God is active (Hebrews 4:12).
2. Encounter God through His ways – This is an active pursuing with everything we have, including our eyes, feet and mouth. If we are not engaging in the work of God we are only partially guarding. The activity is helping to guard your heart. An active pursuit of the way of God protects our heart. It must be a holistic pursuit of Him, His ways and ministry.
Mouth – Proverbs 4:24. The mouth reveals the heart but it also affects the heart. We make things worse by continually talking about our issues or problems. The mouth feeds the heart, and vice versa, they feed off each other. Whenever we are grumbling, complaining, criticizing, and gossiping we feed the condition of our heart, it makes it worse.
Eyes – Proverbs 4:25. What your eyes see affect the way your heart feels. The more we look at things we shouldn’t changes our heart, which will be manifested eventually. There is a figurative meaning also in that we need to focus on His way. If it were just literal we would need to wear a neck brace to keep our eyes looking straight ahead. Our focus determines our direction.
Feet – Proverbs 4:26-27. Don’t let our feet take you where you don’t want your heart to go. At least four times in Deuteronomy (Deuteronomy 5:32, 17:11, 17:20, 28:14) we find a verse almost exactly like Proverbs 4:26-27, in which Moses says, “Don’t turn to the right or left, turn your foot from evil”. The Promised Land is right there, if you just walk the way I told you to walk you are going to get it but they didn’t do it. Hebrews 12:2 references this as he talks about fixing our eyes on Jesus.
Primary ambition of our life should be to guard our heart and allow, by guarding, the life of Christ to be continually manifested through us. Keep your heart healthy.
NOTE: These are my notes, taken as I listened to the sermon live. Any errors, misunderstandings or misinterpretations are my responsibility entirely and not the fault of the preacher.
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