The Heart Speaks

“And you shall remember the whole way that the Lord your God has led you these forty years in the wilderness, that he might humble you, testing you to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep his commandments or not.” - ‭‭Deuteronomy‬ ‭8‬:‭2‬ ‭ESV‬‬

Have you heard of the saying ‘you are the sum total of every decision you’ve made’?

I understand the premise; that everything we have done and every decision we have made - good or bad - have led us to the point we are at now. And I think that whilst in some way this is true, I think we are ultimately defined by the decision we make to follow or to not follow Christ. This is the biggest, most life changing decision we will ever make.

That decision is continuously revealing itself; we show that decision in what we do, or do not do. What we do in public, but more importantly what we do in private. What we do when no one is watching, more so than what we do when everyone is watching.

God has always been about the motives of the heart and has told us often how we as humans can deceive and be deceived  because of what we see. How we can applaud and be moved by what someone does, but how He sees and is moved by the motivate of the heart the action sprung up from (1 Samuel 16:7).

He spoke about this with the Israelites and their sacrifices (Malachi 1:8), in the wisdom of Solomon (Proverbs 28:14), and Jesus speaks about it in relation to the Pharisees (Matthew 12:34, Luke 6:45) . To God, your actions speak, but your heart’s motive speaks louder.

Whilst what we do is important, the heart we do it with is more important. Christ has purified our hearts, replaced our hearts of stone with flesh and made His home there (Hebrews 10:22, Ephesians 3:16-18).  We must continue to walk in alignment with this reality. With the new heart He has given us.

We will not live perfectly in this life, but we can assess our actions, our heart’s alignment and choose to choose life daily (Deuteronomy 30:19).

We are the sum total of our decision to follow Christ. Our decision should be the heart posture behind our daily actions. Being led by the Spirit and not the flesh (Galatians 5:16).

And be grateful for our God, Who is gracious to us when our actions and motives misalign.