Heart Instruction

For Monday, July 23, 2007
Proverbs 23:12

Apply your heart to instruction
and your ear to words of knowledge.

This is a good proverb to heed in a culture that teaches the one thing we can trust is our heart.

"Go with your heart."
"What does your heart tell you?"
"Follow your heart."

Movies and TVs (the real instruction institutions of our society) invariably teach that the heart is to be trusted over anyone and anything, especially in times of crisis. By listening to the heart, we will know when to go against conventional wisdom and when to defy the instructions even of the people we respect and love the most. The heart is supposedly the place of instinct, of innate knowledge.

For the Bible, the heart needs instruction just like the mind, indeed, more so. As Jesus said, "out of the heart of man, come evil thoughts," etc. Due to the fall, the heart loves sin. The heart "feels good" about the things God hates. Consider the bigoted mind that hates others of different races. Such a person acts on what his heart feels right. Even the wicked oppress the weak out of what feels right. They despise the weak and don't understand why others do not as well.

Thus the heart needs instruction as to what is right and wrong. And more. For instruction, as essential as it is, cannot change the heart. The proverb says to apply your heart to instruction. There's the rub. You must first desire instruction, and that takes a heart change. Where then is your hope? It is in God's Spirit who can change your heart. Pray for such a work, and don't fool yourself into thinking that because you have been regenerated by the Spirit, all the work needed as been done. The toughest case is the Christian who thinks by virtue of being Christian his heart is all right. Sanctification - the process of cleansing the heart from all sin - is a lifetime work. Start each morning praying for that work to continue in your heart, applying it to instruction.