A New Heart
Psalm 51:10 Create in me a clean heart, O God, and put a new and right spirit within me. Do not cast me away from your presence, and do not take your holy spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of your salvation, and sustain in me a willing spirit.
I remember a time in my life when I was completely unteachable. A time when I was so proud, and yet so damaged, that my heart was as hard as stone.
There’s nothing worse than a hard, unteachable heart. It stops you from receiving the healing wisdom that God has for you. That’s why God wants to give us a clean heart. That’s why God wants to put His Holy Spirit in us.
To heal us from the inside out. To do some radical heart surgery, to remove the diseased tissue, and replace it with healthy tissue.
I remember the very first heart transplant, by a surgeon Dr Christian Barnard on the 3rd of December, 1967. The heart recipient only survived for 18 days, such was the state of the technology and medical knowledge back then.
These days, whilst not quite a routine operation, heart transplants almost always succeed, adding years of healthy life.
And that’s the key. It’s not just life, but healthy life, vibrant life, abundant life that we’re looking for here. And that’s the sort of life that God wants you to lead. But you can’t have it with a diseased heart. And just as King David, after committing murder and adultery, prayed for a clean heart, a right spirit, an infilling of the Holy Spirit – what we discover elsewhere in God’s Word is that that’s exactly what God wants to do for us.
A new heart I will give you, and a new spirit I will put within you; and I will remove from your body the heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. I will put my spirit within you, and make you follow my statutes and be careful to observe my ordinances. (Ezekiel 36:26-27)
In other words God wants to give you a new heart – taking the heart of stone, the diseased heart out, and replacing it with a healthy heart of flesh. And not just a new heart. When we have a new heart, when our heart is soft and healthy again, it will be open to receive a new Spirit, the Holy Spirit – so that we can receive the wisdom of God.
How’s your heart? Hardened by years of abuse? Hardened by pain and unforgiveness? Scarred by the hurts that you’ve suffered in the past? Damaged to the point that it’s difficult, almost impossible, to receive the healing wisdom of God?
Well, today I have some good news for you. God wants to give you a new heart and a new Spirit. All you need to do is to believe His Word and ask Him for it.
He is ready, willing and able to heal your life, to replace your heart, to fill you with His Spirit and to open you up to receive His wisdom into your heart.
That’s God’s Word. Fresh … for you … today.
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