Shift in the Spirit: Time to Check What Is In Your Heart!!
"Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength." Deuteronomy 6:5 In Hebrew, the heart (lev or levav) is the center of human thought and spiritual life. We tend to think that the heart refers mainly to our emotions, but in Hebrew it also refers to one's mind and thoughts as well is the heart is the seat of intelligence. The heart is the only moving organ in the body, and strong emotions cause the heartbeat to race. When the heart stops beating, a person is dead. Because the Hebrews were a concrete people who used physical things to express abstract concepts, the heart was the metaphor of the mind and all mental and emotional activity. Other interesting physical terms are also used - when we read "inmost being" the Hebrew often is literally "kidneys" (Prov. 23:16), and the life was understood to be in the blood (Genesis 9:4). Understanding that the word "heart" often meant mind and thoughts often helps clarify the meaning of passages. For instance:
"These commandments that I give you today are to be upon your hearts." (Deut. 6:6) means These commandments are to be in your minds, a part of all your thoughts. "The heart of the wise instructs his mouth and adds persuasiveness to his lips." (Prov. 16:23) means The wise person's mind considers his words so that he can speak persuasively. One more lesson we can learn from the meaning of heart is from the greatest commandment, to "love the Lord with all your heart." It means we are to use all of our thoughts as well as our emotions to love the Lord. In the Gospels the phrase "and all your mind" is there to emphasize that fact, but from Moses' time it would have been understood that way. As Paul says, we must "take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ." (2 Corinthians 10:5). Just as a healthy human heart is at the center of the body and absolutely essential for physical life and health, so too a healthy spiritual heart (intellect, emotion, will) is at the center of one's inner being (soul) and is vital for a healthy soul, serving as the "fountain" of all moral attitudes and actions. Our spiritual heart thus controls out actions and our actions determine our habits, which in turn determine our character. When God measures the ''worth'' of a man's life He puts the measuring tape around his heart, not around his head. Be a man after God's Own heart (Acts 13:22) We must continually "post a guard" at the doorway of our heart, so that every avenue for sin's entry is blocked. Delight yourself in the LORD; And He will give you the desires of your heart. (Psalm 37:4 The “heart” commonly refers to the mind as the center of thinking and reason (Pr 3:3; 6:21;7:3), but also includes the emotions (Pr 15:15, 30), the will (Pr 11:20; 14:14), and thus, the whole inner being (Pr 3:5). The heart is the depository of all wisdom and the source of whatever affects speech (Pr 4:24), sight (Pr 4:25), and conduct (Pr 4:26, 27). Thou hast put gladness in my heart, More than when their grain and new wine abound. (Psalm 4:7 I will give thanks to the LORD with all my heart; will tell of all Thy wonders. (Psalm 9:1 The Hebrews regarded the heart as the source of wit, understanding, love, courage, grief, and pleasure…The heart is said to be dilated by joy, contracted by sadness, broken by sorrow, to grow fat, and be hardened by prosperity. The heart melts under discouragement, forsakes one under terror, is desolate in affliction, and fluctuating in doubt. To speak to any one's heart is to comfort him, to say pleasing and affecting things to him. The heart expresses also the middle part of any thing: "Tyre is in the heart of the seas," Ezekiel 27:4; in the midst of the seas. "We will not fear though the mountains be carried into the heart (middle) of the sea," Psalms 46:2 .The heart of man is naturally depraved and inclined to evil, Jeremiah 17:9 . A divine power is requisite for its renovation, John 3:1-11 . When thus renewed, the effects will be seen in the temper, conversation, and conduct at large. Hardness of heart is that state in which a sinner is inclined to, and actually goes on in, rebellion against God. I have trusted in Thy lovingkindness; My heart shall rejoice in Thy salvation. (Psalm 13:5 Ezekiel 18:31 “Cast away from you all your transgressions, whereby you have transgressed; and make you a new heart and a new spirit; for why will ye die, O House of Israel?” The word in Hebrew for cast is shalak which is found in a Hiphal (causative) imperative (command) form. Thus there is something causing us to want to cast off our transgressions and we are being commanded to do so. The word itself, shalak, suggests the idea of banishing or abandonment. It would seem that from this particular form that God is filling us with such disgust over our transgressions that we are going to want to abandon them or banish them from our lives. Yet, I have met many who are disgusted with their transgressions and are trying to throw them off or abandon them, but they just keep coming back, particularly addictions. How are we to abandon our transgressions? The word itself may provide a clue. The word shalak is spelled Shin, Lamed and Final Kap. This suggests that it is the power of God (Shin) through prayer (Lamed) that our transgressions are emptied from our hearts (Final Kap). Note how the phrase, all your transgressions is preceded with an Aleph Taw or an eth which is simply a sign of the direct object and is in a construct to kol (all) pishe’ikem (transgressions). This is telling you that you cannot cast off some of your transgressions and keep the ones you want; it is an all or nothing process. This is important as you will find out in the following paragraphs. The word transgression pishe’ekim comes from a Semitic root word pasa.’ It is a word used to express the idea of rebellion, sin or offending someone.
It has its origins in a willful, conscious act, or what we call premeditation. It involves outward manifestations of anger, lust and jealousy. These transgressions are not just those of the addict and the obvious sinners. This applies to all of us who feel a surge of jealous, lust or anger and we allow these feelings to be manifested in some action. Note the passage continues by saying, which we have transgressed in them. That sounds pretty redundant doesn’t it, to say the transgressions we transgressed in them?
That word for in them is bam and is not to be overlooked. In other words they were not a part of us to begin with, we walked right into them. These are manifestations of behavior that are not a part of our sin nature. Now as to why we must cast off all our transgression note that the verse says, make you a new heart. Now how can we make ourselves a new heart? Did not David have to ask God to create in him a new heart? Well the syntax seems to suggest that it is this casting away of all your transgressions that will make you a new heart. The word make is ’ashah. The word is spelled Ayin which is deep spiritual insight, Shin representing the power of God and Hei the presence of God. It is still God creating us a new heart, but He cannot do it until we allow our spiritual insight to recognize our transgressions, then the power of God can change our heart so that it may be emptied of all its transgressions and filled with the presence of God. This is not casting off our sin nature. We cannot control that, which is why Yeshua had to die on the stake. But these are sins that we allow or willful allow that are resulting from our sin nature. Apparently, we have some control over that. God will deal with our sin nature, but that doesn’t mean we cannot sin. There is another level of sin that we can still enter into because of our free will and we must also make a conscious decision not to commit sins that results from our sin nature or what the Apostle calls the old man that is within us. It also says we will have a new spirit. This is a play on words chadash rauch. This is very close to chadosh rauch or Holy Spirit. The word rauch means spirit but is also used to express the idea of a pleasant scent. Where our hearts were once a stench in the nostrils of God, it will become a sweet scent to the nostrils of God through the cleansing work of Yeshua Christ through whose divine power, our transgressions are emptied from our heart and then filled with the Holy Spirit – presence of God. Finally, we get a new heart. The word for heart is lev. It is spelled Lamed and Beth. I have read that our English word love derives from this word lev or heart. When God cleanses our heart, it becomes love. As a rabbi once told me, the very last letter of Torah (Old Testament) is a Lamed and the first letter is a Beit. Together they make the word levor heart, from the Torah we find the Love of God as well as the love of fellow man. But why does this combination appear only reversed? Because this love can only be fully created after we have obeyed the entire Word of God and we allow the word of God to complete love in us.
Shema Selah, let us hear, listen and consider in our hearts what the Most High is showing us in the season of our joy--Sukkot! Facebook LIVE video
