The heart is sacred. It’s the centerpiece of who we are as human beings and core of everything we do. Scripture tells us that out of the “overflow of the heart, the mouth speaks.” Jesus reminds us that it’s not what goes into a person that makes her unclean, but rather what comes out. In other words, the heart is less like a river, and more like a cistern, a deep fountain from which the inner self expresses our true nature outwardly.
It’s easy to disguise our hearts by focusing on our exterior lives. We’ve become professionals in decorating our outward self and presenting it squeaky clean not only to God, but to everyone around us. We mask our secret thoughts, hidden motives, and personal disappointments – even to ourselves. “The heart is deceitful above all things, who can know it?”
God doesn’t focus on the exterior life. He studies the heart. Above all things God is in constant pursuit of the human heart because He knows the greatest secret of all: The moment He has your heart, He has you.
A friend recently went through a year of chemotherapy and the subsequent recovery only to find out months later that the cancer had returned more aggressively. He described the news like crossing the finish line of a marathon, only to discover the finish line had been pushed back more miles.
That kind of news can not only hurt, but cripple the heart. It’s in those moments of devastation when we discover the type stuff our hearts are truly made of; who we really are.
I’ll never claim to fully understand how God works in the world. I’ll never claim to know His thoughts, for His ways are higher than my ways. But I do know God will do anything to capture and re-capture your heart. I sometimes wonder in those moments of devastation, when we’ve finally crossed the finish line, if God allows the threshold to be pushed back, just to re-capture our hearts – just to make us little bit more like Jesus. It’s the in ashes that God is able to transform, heal, and create something even more beautiful than before.
Maybe you’re in the fire right now. Maybe you just got out of the fire but you’re praying, longing, and waiting in the ashes. It’s up from the ashes that God is doing his most beautiful work. It’s in these times that God wants your heart. His desire is to spring up like a deep well from within you, starting from the inside. Once He has your heart, He has it all.
-Jordan Frye, Urban Rescue