Where’s your heart? That probably sounds like a silly question. It’s right where it’s always been, in my chest. We talk of giving our heart to someone, or having a heart, but it’s still right there pumping away and it hasn’t moved an inch. “Well that’s different,” we say. In that case we are speaking metaphorically, it’s our love that we are giving or our feelings that are hurting. The ancient Greeks spoke of splagchna when they talked of such things. The King James Bible translates this word as “bowels” as in tender bowels of mercy. I think they were getting closer to the truth. When we hurt over someone or pine for someone we feel it in the pit of our stomach, in our splagchna.
Ultimately such feelings come from our mind, having the attitude or an emotion of love and compassion. Paul asked the Philippian church if there was any tenderness from being united with Christ (Philippians 2:1, and actually he says a lot more well worth reading.) As Christians we need to feel what God feels. We need to love what God loves and to feel anger over what angers God. To have a heart for God like King David did requires for us to actually have the mind of Christ. When we see things from God’s perspective, we understand how he sees the world and how he sees us, we will then begin to feel as God feels.
If our heart is set on our own thoughts, worries and ideas we will not have the heart of God. If the source of knowledge that feeds our heart is only from the world around us, we will not have the heart of God. If our heart is shaped by the media, culture or traditions that we are raised with we will not have the heart of God. We must let him renew our minds, we must let him give us new eyes to see with and yes we need a new heart, God’s.
Don
Ultimately such feelings come from our mind, having the attitude or an emotion of love and compassion. Paul asked the Philippian church if there was any tenderness from being united with Christ (Philippians 2:1, and actually he says a lot more well worth reading.) As Christians we need to feel what God feels. We need to love what God loves and to feel anger over what angers God. To have a heart for God like King David did requires for us to actually have the mind of Christ. When we see things from God’s perspective, we understand how he sees the world and how he sees us, we will then begin to feel as God feels.
If our heart is set on our own thoughts, worries and ideas we will not have the heart of God. If the source of knowledge that feeds our heart is only from the world around us, we will not have the heart of God. If our heart is shaped by the media, culture or traditions that we are raised with we will not have the heart of God. We must let him renew our minds, we must let him give us new eyes to see with and yes we need a new heart, God’s.
Don
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