CONCERT OF PRAYER

Pray Week 808

“Tender Heart”

2 Samuel 24:10-15 (NKJV)   And David’s heart condemned him after he had numbered the people. So David said to the Lord, “I have sinned greatly in what I have done; but now, I pray, O Lord, take away the iniquity of your servant, for I have done very foolishly.”…

—————————————————————————————-

Even though David sinned many times God still referred to him as a man after His own heart.

According to the Bible, the heart is the center not only of spiritual activity, but of all the operations of human life. The heart is where our ‘personal life’ character exists such as honesty or purity.  The heart is also considered the source of our conscience.  Note that David’s heart condemned him and he repented.

Our hearts are naturally wicked and must be changed and regenerated before we can willingly obey God.  Our hearts are regenerated by the Spirit of God after we accept His free gift of salvation through Jesus Christ.  This is when an all out war breaks out and our heart becomes a battleground.  A war is fought between our heart’s desire to love and serve God and our flesh’s desire for compromise with the sinful things of this world.

…but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members. – Rom 7:23

We will fight this war until we die.  We may lose a battle every now and then as David did, but we continue to wage war against sin.  God knows very well how weak we are, which is why He looks at our heart.  He knows if our heart’s desire is to be faithful to His Word and to not compromise with the world.

Our heart needs to remain tender to the conviction of God’s Holy Spirit in order to be effective in fighting this war.  Our heart loses tenderness when we allow it to become calloused. Just as our skin develops a callous from repeated abrasion, so too our hearts become calloused when we try to have it both ways: living a life with one foot in the world and one in the kingdom of God.  A half-hearted attempt to serve God is not a heart after God’s own heart at all.

Hardness of heart evidences itself by consistent compromise and having an unrepentant attitude toward sin.  The hardened heart harbors sin and does not acknowledge or confess it.  If you find yourself drifting away from the Word and fellowship within the Body of Christ your heart is becoming hardened.  If you resist the conviction of the Holy Spirit and can only see the presence of sin in other people then your heart is being hardened.

May you have a heart after God’s own heart as David did.  May you recognize that purity of heart precedes the power to overcome the trials and temptations of this life.  May your heart be tender and yielding to the refining presence of Jesus.  May your heart manifest His purity and presence as you bring His pure light into the darkness of this world.