“…Break up your fallow ground, and sow not among thorns. Circumcise yourselves to the Lord, and take away the foreskins of your heart…” – Jeremiah 4:3.
We Christians seem to have a lot of tendencies. We tend to remember the time, the place, and the pew of when we first confessed Jesus as our Lord and Saviour, but we also tend to forget about the first principles of our faith: how to love one another and follow the commandments of God. We tend to make our sowing, almsgiving, and work in the house of God the pinnacle of our Christianity, which are of course good things, but we also tend to forget that our relationship with God is what is most important to Him and should be to us too. We tend to pray, or even go into fasting, with a genuine desire for God’s intervention in our lives and situations, but we often overlook an important aspect of our lives: the aspect that can either propel or hinder our answered prayers, that can beautify or belittle our good works before God, and that is ever before the eyes of the Lord. We Christians are good at offering our praise, our worship, our time, our tithes, and our sacrifices, but it’s high time that we offer up unto the Lord OUR HEARTS. Whether we are seasoned Christians or newly born again, we cannot afford to be near to God with our lips yet afar with our hearts. We are in the end times. We cannot afford to risk our eternity with Christ because of stony hearts. As Hosea 10:12 says, “break up your fallow ground, for it’s time to seek the Lord…”
“… Break up your fallow ground: for it is time to seek the Lord, till he come and rain righteousness upon you” – Hosea 10:12.
We often mistake our work for God and our relationship with God as one and the same, when in fact, they are two separate things. Using our relationships with people as an analogy, you may be doing things for them without actually knowing (or wanting to know) them in depth. In fact, you may not be doing those things from the heart, but only to fulfill your own interests or get something in return. However, when you have a close relationship with someone, it goes beyond what you do for them: you reach a level of intimacy with that person, and attain a desire to spend quality time with them. So also is the case with God. God wants us to know him beyond the works and beyond the blessings, through Jesus Christ our Saviour. The key to us developing a stronger relationship with God is through the REGENERATION OF OUR HEARTS, where through a changed heart we can indeed worship God in spirit and in truth (John 4:24). No wonder why to obey is better than sacrifice (1 Samuel 15:22)!
Like being born again, the regeneration of the heart is a definite moment when God touches you, removes your stony heart, and replaces it with a heart of flesh (Ezekiel 11:19; 36:26). Such a heart is tender, willing to hear and obey His voice, and a fertile ground for the Word of God to prosper. It is only with a heart of flesh that we can truly forgive AND forget. Really, we Christians ought to have regenerated hearts to be truly born again (Romans 10:10). The heart is arguably the most spiritual aspect of our bodies, which links the body, soul, and spirit together. As Ezekiel 11:19 shows, the heart is the seat of our relationship with God. Indeed, it is only through a regenerated heart that we can worship God in spirit and in truth, and fulfil His commandments (Romans 2:28-29). This explains why God is so interested in our hearts. But, for what God is interested in, so is the enemy…
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