How is your heart?

Q: What does the Bible say about the condition of the heart?

The Bible describes the heart as deceitful and wicked, needing transformation through Christ. In scripture, particularly in Jeremiah 17:9, it is stated that the heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked. This inherent condition is part of the fallen nature due to sin. However, through the new birth, God replaces the heart of stone with a heart of flesh, enabling true belief and affection for Him. A transformed heart recognizes its own depravity and looks to Christ as the sole source of righteousness and salvation.

Q: How do we know Christ is the only cure for sin?

The Bible consistently identifies Christ as the sole remedy for sin's penalty and power. The diagnosis of humanity's problem, which is sin, is beautifully countered by the provision of Christ as its cure. Romans 5:8 reveals that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us, demonstrating God's love and the necessity of faith in Him for salvation. Only through His completed work, which satisfies divine justice, can any remedy for sin be found. The Lord's declaration in John 14:6 reinforces that Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life, underscoring that no one comes to the Father except through Him.

Q: Why is it important for Christians to guard their hearts?

Guarding the heart is essential to prevent unbelief and maintain a faithful relationship with God. The exhortation in Hebrews 3:12 emphasizes the necessity for believers to take heed lest they develop an evil heart of unbelief. A hardened heart can lead to spiritual apathy and estrangement from God. As Christians, we are reminded to actively nurture our faith and encourage one another, thus ensuring that we remain sensitive to the leading of the Holy Spirit. The continual presence of sin necessitates vigilance and reliance on Christ for grace to overcome our sinful tendencies.

Q: What does the Bible say about continuous sin in a believer’s life?

Believers experience continuous sin, but they are called to rely on Christ for ongoing redemption. In Isaiah 64:6, it is indicated that even our righteousness is as filthy rags, highlighting the reality that sin continues to be a struggle for believers. However, through the new life in Christ, as outlined in Romans 8:1, there is no condemnation for those who are in Him. Believers are called to acknowledge their sin and continuously seek Christ as their remedy, recognizing that He alone can sustain and cleanse them from their ongoing struggles. This reliance on Christ fosters a contrite heart that is teachable and receptive to God's Word.

Q: How does spiritual growth relate to the heart according to the Bible?

Spiritual growth involves a transformation of the heart, leading to a deeper relationship with God. Spiritual growth is intricately linked to the condition of the heart. 1 Samuel 16:7 reminds us that God looks at the heart, not outward appearances. As believers, we undergo transformational heart surgery through Christ, which directs our affections and desires toward Him. This transformation is ongoing as we are encouraged in Philippians 2:12 to work out our salvation with fear and trembling. Engaging with Scripture and the body of Christ helps to cultivate a heart that reflects God’s righteousness and bears spiritual fruit, thus nurturing spiritual growth.

Ego, thank you for reading Proverbs 31. And I want to say Happy Mother's Day to our moms. And I want to say how humbled I am to have, as you were reading those verses being read, I was thinking about the mothers in our church. I can say, honestly, I'm humbled to be your pastor and thankful for you. And truly, there's not a group of people, humanly speaking, humanly speaking, there's not a group of people that influence this world more than mothers. And they are shaping the lives of their children more than anybody.

And I'm very, very thankful. That having been said, I was also thinking as you're reading Proverbs 31 that that's in its perfection a description of the bride of Christ, the church. You read that again sometime and in every verse you see what the Lord is doing through his bride to bring honor to himself through the preaching of the gospel. It's a beautiful, beautiful picture. Let's open our Bibles to Hebrews chapter three, Hebrews chapter three.

Without an accurate diagnosis, it would be impossible to prescribe a cure for that disease. How many times we find, and we're thankful, for our physicians and we're thankful for the advancements that have been made in modern medicine. But how many times in practicing medicine they misdiagnose a disease and provide the wrong cure?

I read a quote by a man by the name of William Osler. He was one of the men who founded Johns Hopkins and they were asking him whether or not medicine was a science or whether it was an art. And I guess among those in the medical community, this is a very famous statement that he made. He said this, he said, medicine as a science or is a science of uncertainty. and it is an art of probability. It is a science of uncertainty and an art of probability.

That's why we say doctors are practicing medicine, trying to figure out what the problem is and trying to provide a proper cure to that disease or to that problem. The Lord is called the great physician. He is called the balm of Gilead. And he never practices medicine as an uncertain thing or as a matter of probability. Over and over again, he has been absolutely clear as to what the disease is. There can be no question about it. And he has been equally clear as to who the cure is.

Whatever our physical condition, we have a spiritual condition That's called sin. That's the disease. And the wages of sin is death. It's a terminal disease. And if a prescription, if a proper diagnosis is not made and a Proper prescription given, we will die in our sins and suffer eternal separation from God for all eternity. That's death.

The Lord has given a cure for his people. He has made himself the medicine. that takes away our sin. And this, this cure is not a, it's not a medicine that you take one time and all of a sudden all is well. It's one of those medicines that you have to take multiple times a day for the rest of your life. Isaiah said this in Isaiah 64, he said, we have sinned and in those is continuance. This sin problem that we have is a continual problem. Yes, there is such a thing as the new birth. Yes, there is such a thing as being translated from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of light.

Yes, there is a moment in time of conversion when we are saved from our sins. By God's grace, he opens the eyes of our understanding. By God's grace, he opens our ears and enables us to hear his voice. And by God's grace, he gives us faith to believe on Christ. And there is a forgiveness of sin and a deliverance from the penalty of sin.

The presence of sin is still very real in our flesh. Consequently, we are always in need of having to come back. In these is continuance, and we shall be saved. There's no question as to what the problem is, and there's no doubt as to who the cure is. You have your Bibles open to Hebrews chapter three. Let's begin reading at verse eight. The Lord is saying to his people, you still have this problem with sin in this world.

And he's encouraging us to not allow our hearts to become hardened and unbelieving. Verse eight, harden not your hearts. And he uses the example of those Israelites who spent 40 years in the wilderness and died in the wilderness. He says, harden not your hearts as in the provocation. in the day of temptation in the wilderness when your fathers tempted me, proved me and saw my works 40 years."

Now, what the Lord is telling us here in verse nine is that, I proved to them by the demonstration of my works and my presence, who I was. And yet they ignored the evidence and provoked me with unbelief. Verse 10, wherefore, I was grieved with that generation. And I said, they do always air in their heart and they have not known my ways. So I swear my wrath, they shall not enter into my rest.

The Lord reminds us of that to say to us in verse 12, take heed brethren, take heed. Lest there be in any of you an evil heart, of unbelief in departing from the living God. Now let's stop there for just a moment and be reminded that God has given us his word for us. The child of God's the only one that's gonna hear what God has said. the Lord's not he's not warning the world he's warning his people he's not saying to them if you do this I'm going to I'm going to cut you off he's he's speaking as a As a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them who love them. And he remembers that they're made of dust. And so he's reminding us of what we know to be true.

Our problem is sin. And he's encouraging us and admonishing us to believe on Christ as the solution and the remedy to our sin problem. and to not look somewhere else to try to fix it. That's what unbelief is, looking somewhere else. And this matter of sin that is continuous, as Isaiah said, in our lives, it's not just the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the pride of life and all the things that the flesh is drawn to in this world. It can be good things.

Well, I mentioned in the first hour, Mary sitting at the feet of the Lord Jesus and choosing that one thing that was needful. What was Martha doing? What was Martha doing? Martha was doing a lot of good things. I mean, she had a group of people in her home. She has felt responsible to feed them and provide for them and prepare for them. And she said to the Lord, Lord, tell Mary to come in the kitchen and help me. And the Lord Jesus looked at Martha and said, oh, Martha, Martha, are you not encumbered about with many things? Mary has chosen that one thing needful, to sit at my feet and to learn of me.

There's a lot of good things that can take us away from Christ. that can become substitutes for our satisfaction and for our comfort in this world. And anytime we look anywhere other than the Lord Jesus, it's the evidence of our fallen nature. It's the evidence of that sin nature that's in us. And all the Lord's telling us here in this, remember those Israelites.

I showed them over and over and over again, my mercy, just as I have shown to you. I have cared for you and provided for you and kept you and brought you this far. Harden not your hearts as in the day of provocation. Guard your hearts. Take heed, brethren, lest there be an evil heart of unbelief.

There's the root of sin. The root of all sin is unbelief. And the believers always cry, and Lord, Lord, by your grace, I do believe that thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. And you are all my righteousness and all the hope of my salvation. But Lord, I bear in this body, a dead man that I'm caring about that causes me to look away from you and to worry and to fret and to try to find ease for my sin problems somewhere other than you. The Lord's saying to me and you, I'm the only medicine. There's only one disease. We're not We're not practicing medicine here. We're not having to go through tests to try to find out what's wrong with us. I have declared it clearly what's wrong with you.

All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. And there's a description of our continual problem. In that one verse, God's defining sin. And how does he define it? Everything in you that falls short of his glory. Now what in you falls short of the glory of God? The only one thing in me that doesn't fall short of the glory of God and that's Christ. Christ in you is your only hope of glory. Everything else falls short of his glory.

This is that continual problem that we bear in our bodies. As I said, God's word is for God's people. He's not warning the world. This is a loving father warning his children of the dangers of sin. He's not threatening to disown them. He's reminding us of what we know to be true and admonishing us, encouraging us to look to Christ and to not to try to find relief for our sin problem anywhere else, anywhere else.

They will tell you to go to the desert. Go not there. They will tell you to, you know, to make this sacrifice and that sacrifice in order to try to atone for your sins and try to fix it. Go not there. They will say to you that he's in a secret place. Believe them not. Believe them not.

That's what the children of Israel in the wilderness did. They saw all the evidences of my care and my love And they hardened their hearts. They hardened their hearts. In the book of Hebrews, there is a very much of an emphasis on the problem of apostasy. What is apostasy? It's having professed faith in Christ and having forsaken the gospel. Having forsaken, having gone back to the world. This is what the Lord's talking about here in Hebrews. You say, well, I thought the Lord did not the Lord say that he would never leave us nor forsake us and that we'll be kept and that no man can snatch me out of his hand. Yes, he did. He did.

And yet he's reminding us, we are never to become indifferent about our sin problem. And we are never to look somewhere else for the solution other than to Christ. And how frequent we do both of those things. How frequently. We become numb, we become dull, we become cold, uncaring. And how frequently we find ourselves trying to fix the problem apart from Christ. The Lord has given a clear diagnosis. The diagnosis is sin. We are fully responsible for it. And it is a terminal illness. And there's one medicine. There's one cure. There's one solution. Take heed, brethren.

And when the Lord talks about the heart, he's not talking about the physical organ in your heart. in our chest that pumps blood throughout our bodies, any more than when he talks about the mind, he's talking about that organ between our ears that processes thoughts and reasons.

No, he's talking about that seat of affection, that thing that we love. In every culture and in every language, the heart is used to describe that which moves men to do what they do. That which they have a desire for, that which they have a love for, that's the heart. And the mind, the Bible says, is the process through which we discern matters and come to conclusions about things. So it's reasoning and it's affection. And the Lord's talking about the seat of affection in His children. He's not talking about that.

The hardened heart is what we come into this world with. We have to have a new heart, and that He gives us in the new birth. But we're We're constantly reminded by the presence of sin that that old nature was a cold, hard, heart of stone, an unbelieving heart. Genesis chapter 6, verse 5, the Lord describes the natural state of all men. This is the natural state in which we come into this world. where God looks down from heaven and he saw that the wickedness of man was great and that every imagination of the thoughts of the heart were only evil and that continually.

That's a description. In Jeremiah chapter 17, verse nine, the Lord says the heart, the human heart, is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked. Who can know it? And in Romans chapter three, the Lord takes man and opens his mouth and looks down his throat and he says, all I see is an open sepulcher. He looks into the heart of man and he sees, he sees what we have produced by our sin, death.

And then the Lord says, I've got to take out that heart of stone. That cold, lifeless, unbelieving heart, I'm going to put in a heart of flesh. I'm going to cause it to beat and to be warm and to love and to believe, to believe, to believe the gospel, to believe on Christ.

The unbelieving heart can't do that. The natural heart cannot do that. The Lord tells us in 1 Corinthians 2, the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness unto him, neither can he know them, for they are spiritually discerned. The natural man cannot know the things of God.

So the Lord is saying to the unbeliever, harden not your heart in the day of provocation, in the day of temptation in the wilderness, your father's tempted me, they proved me, they saw my hand at work and they died in the wilderness. He's saying to the believer, You have enough experience with your old man, don't you?

To know that sin is not something to be trifled with. Sin is not something to be thought lightly of. Sin continues to be your problem. But I've given you a solution. I've given you a savior. And so take heed. Look with me at our text again. Take heed, brethren, lest there be any of you of an evil heart, of unbelief, and departing from the living God. This warning of departing from the gospel, apostasy, begins here in chapter three, goes all the way to the end of chapter four. And then the Lord picks it up again in chapter six, and then again in chapter 10, and then again in chapter 12. And over and over again, this theme of the Lord saying to his people, be on guard, take heed to yourself, and look to Christ The hardened heart is the heart that we come into this world in. What's the difference between a hardened heart and a believing heart? Well, a believing heart is broken and contrite.

You know, if you break something, you can't use it anymore. When God breaks the heart, he causes the believer to know that their heart can no longer be trusted. Lord, you have broken my heart. I cannot use my affections. A man that trusts his own heart, Solomon said, is a fool. When God breaks the heart, he causes you to realize that your heart can no longer be trusted. You've got to have the heart of Christ. And that is revealed in Christ in his word. And so, Lord, my heart is, you've broken my heart.

That's the difference between, and it's contrite, it's teachable. It's, Lord, whatever you say is right. And if what you say is contrary to what I think and what I feel, then I know what you say is right because you've made me contrite. You've made me teachable. You've made me to believe what you say over what I think.

You say, well, I don't, I don't always, I don't feel a certain thing about, I don't feel like I'm as sinful as what the Bible says, but I know I am because God said so. I know I am because God said so. I don't know if the Lord is gonna have mercy on me. What's God say about it? What's God say about it?

That's a broken and contrite heart. My heart, my feelings, my affections, my thoughts are no longer reliable as a source of truth. And a contrite heart is a heart that's teachable to believe what God says about it. And if what God says is different from what I say, what I think, then not my will, but thy will be done. Do you have a broken and contrite heart?

You know, in light of our text, I started to title this message, How's Your Heart? And I thought about that commercial on TV, perhaps you've seen it, you know, where the guy's set up on the street somewhere and strangers pass by and he just stops them and says, how's your heart?

Oh, it's fine. And he gives them this little device, you know, gets to check their heart out. Sometimes we think our heart's fine, but when we put it under the microscope or under the instrument, if you will, of God's word, we find out our heart's not as good as I thought it was. It's not reliable, not reliable.

A believing heart, a tender heart, One that's persuadable and one that's persuaded. One that's moved by the spirit of God and by the word of God. That's the new heart. A new heart will I give them. and they will have one heart. It's not that you have a way of believing different than I have a believing or someone else. No, they're all gonna believe the same thing. Christ is not divided. I'm gonna give them the same spirit. I'm gonna give them the same truth, the same light, the same word, the same savior. They're all gonna believe the same thing.

They're gonna see eye to eye. They're gonna see eye to eye. That's what Isaiah said. This is a new heart. And they're all gonna testify to the same thing. They're all gonna agree that they're sinners. They will, like Ephraim that we saw in the first hour, bemoan themselves. They will, like Job, confess that they are vile, that everything about them is sinful, and that this sin problem they have is continuous, and they are in continual need of a savior every day. They will say with Paul, who shall deliver me from the body of this death? I bear it in my body all day long, every day.

They're gonna say the same thing. And they're going to say the same thing about Christ. In other words, they're going to agree with the great physician as to what the disease is. And they're going to agree with the great physician as to who the only cure is. They're going to agree with God. They're not going to go anywhere else. Oh, they'll try.

They'll try every day, but when they hear the gospel, when they hear the truth and when the spirit of God reminds them, and if it was not, you know, you say, well, I thought the Lord promised to keep me. He did, but he uses means to keep us. He uses the power of his spirit and the truth of his word.

He uses the rebukes and the admonitions and the fellowship of saints and how easy it is for us to become indifferent toward worship, whether it be public worship or whether it be private worship, how easy it is for us to become lax in prayer or in studying the scriptures or in seeking God's face. These are the means to an end. This is what God has provided for us and how lax and cold we can become. And that coldness reminds us of that old heart, what it used to be. It was dead in its trespasses and sins. It could not believe. And it doesn't presume upon God's grace and it doesn't It doesn't take lightly the continual problem of sin that it has.

It receives these words and it runs to Christ. It runs to Christ again and again and again. This is the walk of faith. This is our walk in this world. What we say about Christ, who is he? He is God's anointed savior of sinners. And he satisfied everything that God required for his justice and for our salvation. He fulfilled the law. He ascended back into glory. His works went before him. And the father saw the travail of his soul. And the father said, I'm satisfied. The father said, sit down here.

Sit down. Why sit down? Because your work is finished. is finished, sit thou here at my right hand until I make all thine enemies thy footstool. All those who are by nature at enmity with thee, I'm gonna cause them to be like Mary and sit at thy feet. And those who are not given a broken and contrite heart, those who are not teachable, they will be your footstool in judgment and in wrath. Our Christ is seated at the right hand of God. The Lord said a good tree cannot bring evil fruit. And an evil tree cannot bring good fruit. You can tell a tree by its fruit.

And then he goes on to say this, a good man out of the good treasure in his heart bringeth forth good fruit. And an evil man out of the evil treasure in his heart bringeth forth evil fruit. And then this verse, out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaketh. Some of you perhaps have been in churches where they took that parable of the tree and went around inspecting each other's fruit and holding each other under the law depending on who had sweeter and who had better fruit than another. But the Lord makes it clear here that the fruit that he's talking about is the fruit of our lips. It's the fruit of our lips out of the abundance of the heart, the new heart. I will write my law upon their heart and I will impress it upon their mind. Now we have this treasure out of the treasure of the new heart comes good fruit. We have this treasure in an earthen vessel. And so we bear the gospel and we bear Christ in a fallen nature. And this sin continues to be our plague and Christ continues to be our remedy for our sin.

But in Romans chapter one, the scripture says the law of God has been written on every man's heart. Every man knows right from wrong. Every man knows it's wrong to steal, it's wrong to lie, it's wrong to cheat, it's wrong to murder. Every man knows that it's wrong to be unfaithful to their spouse. Every man knows that. That law has been written in the conscience of all men.

So when the Lord said, I will write my laws upon their heart and I will impress it upon their mind, what did he mean by that? Well, Paul put it like this. He said, I was alive once without the law, but when the commandment came, sin revived and I died. Let's look at that. Let's look at that Romans chapter seven. Paul's talking about the heart and the law being written on the heart. Verse seven, what shall we say then?

Is the law sin? God forbid. Nay, I had not known sin, but by the law, for I had not known lust, except the law had said thou shalt not covet. When the law is written on the natural man's heart, He is able, as we've known, of people who on their deathbed took comfort in the fact that they'd never murdered anyone and had remained faithful to their wife all through their marriage. That law was written on their heart and they look to their behavior, their outward law keeping, as the source of their righteousness before God. Not knowing that the Lord Jesus said, you have heard it said that thou shalt not commit murder.

But I say unto you, if you have ought in your heart toward your brother without a cause, you've already murdered him. You've heard that it was said that thou shalt not take thy brother's wife, thy neighbor's wife. But I say unto you, if you lust in your heart toward a woman, you've already committed adultery in your heart. What is the difference?

Paul said, I was under the law, And according to the law, I was blameless. I was going about my life keeping the law of God that had been written on my heart from birth. I knew right from wrong. But the law had not come to me in power. The spirit of God had not given me a new heart. And when the spirit of God gave me a new heart, I realized then that the law of God reaches much, much farther. than just my behavior. The spotlight of God's law reaches into all the recesses of my heart. And now the commandment has come. to me in power in the Holy Spirit.

And sin now for has revived. I didn't see myself as a sinner before, but now sin has revived. Now I see that everything about me apart from Christ is sinful in the sight of God. And now that sin has revived, I have died. Sin has, the law has killed me. Let's read on. But sin, verse eight, taken occasion by the commandment, wrought in me all concupiscence, for without the law, sin was dead. I wasn't a sinner until the law came in power, until the Holy Spirit gave me a new heart. My heart was cold, it was indifferent toward sin. I had a conscience, I knew right from wrong, But now I'm a sinner.

Now I've got this disease that I'm in constant need of medicine for. And Christ is the only hope that I have. Now everywhere I look, I see sin in me. And I can only find the hope of my salvation in the one who is without sin and the one who put away my sin. I've got to have Christ.

That's what Paul's saying. Verse 10, and the commandment which was ordained to life, I found to be unto me death. When God gave the commandment to the Israelites at Mount Sinai, he said, you do this and you'll live. The commandment which was ordained to give life has now brought death.

Why? Because the commandment can never give life. We can't, why? Because we can't do it. If we could be saved by the commandment, then God would have given the commandment whereby we could have been saved. There's nothing wrong with the commandment, but by the weakness of the flesh, we are unable to keep any of God's commandments.

But the unbeliever goes to their deathbed thinking, well, I've kept God's commandment, therefore I'm good with God and he's gonna accept me into heaven. That's the cold, dead, lifeless heart. When God takes out the heart of stone and puts in a heart of flesh, he writes that law on your heart in a whole different way. Now you realize that this law of God goes a lot deeper than just what other people see and just what my outward behavior might be.

And I can't produce any righteousness. I can't present to God anything that I've done for my righteousness before God. Sin has been revived and I have died. I have no life in myself. All of my life is in Christ. For sin, verse 11, for sin taking occasion by the commandment, deceive me and by it slew me, was put to death by my sin. Unless the corn of wheat dies and goes into the ground, it cannot produce life. In order for us to be born again in Christ, we've got to be put to death. Death must come before life. Now we're already spiritually dead, but we must be made to understand and to believe that we're spiritually dead outside of Christ. That's the miracle of salvation. That's the new heart. That's the broken and contrite heart. Lord, I see now that I can't trust my heart. I can't trust my thoughts. I can only trust Christ.

Verse 12, wherefore, the law of God is holy. It's perfect, but it can't make me holy. The commandment of God is holy. It's just, but it can't justify me. And it's good, but the law by itself cannot produce in my heart any goodness. I've got to have the goodness of God in Christ. Was then that which is good made death unto me? God forbid. But sin, that it might appear sin, working death in me, by that which is good, that sin by the commandment might become exceedingly sinful.

For we know that the law is spiritual. But I, Paul's identifying his flesh. He says, in me, that is in my flesh dwelleth no good thing. I, my flesh, my old man, and that word sold in that verse is a slave. It can't do, it can't produce anything but sin. What do I do? I've got to have a savior. Who shall deliver me from the body of this death? Verse 24. I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. Verse 25.

So then by the mind I serve the law of God, but with the flesh, the law of sin. There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the spirit. For the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death. For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh, that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. For they that are after the flesh, they mind the things of the flesh, but they that are after the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. For to be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is life and peace, because the carnal mind is enmity against God. For it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God.

Verse nine, but you are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit. if so be that the spirit of God dwelleth in you. Now, if any man have not the spirit of Christ, he is none of his. And if Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the spirit is life because of righteousness. And if the spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his spirit that dwelleth in you. Therefore, brethren, we are debtors not to the flesh to live after the flesh. For if we live after the flesh, we shall die. But if we through the spirit And here's what I wanted to get to, do mortify the deeds of the flesh, we shall live. Now go back with me to our text and we'll close.

Verse 12, Hebrews chapter three, take heed brethren, lest there be any of you of an evil heart, of unbelief, depart from the living God. Lord, I see that. I see that continually. I've got to have Christ. I've got to walk by the Spirit of God. I've got to take heed of this old man. And I've got to Sin can easily get the upper hand. And again, it's not just, sin is unbelief. It's not just the bad stuff that you don't want people to know about. It's just looking outside of Christ. It's trying to find satisfaction somewhere. It's what we are. It's what we are. We're sinners. Because of that, we can become slack in our spiritual life, cold towards the things of God, indifferent toward our sin. I believe what the Lord's saying to us, brethren, is right here.

Exhort one another. Verse 12, verse 13. Exhort one another. That word exhort means encourage. Encourage one another daily while it is called today, lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin. I want it so badly. for this message to be an exhortation for all of us, an encouragement for sinners to know that there is one remedy for our problem.

There is one medicine for our disease and it is Christ. And this is something that we all need to be exhorted in daily. To walk after the Spirit. What is it to walk after the Spirit? It's to look to Christ. It's to come before the throne of grace with a broken and contrite heart. It's to confess to God, Lord, you're right in the diagnosis. I am a sinner and you are right in the diagnosis. Solution to my problem, Christ is all.

And how much brethren, we're not gonna hear this out there and none of your unbelieving friends are gonna have any understanding of what we're talking about. We are the only ones that can exhort one another daily in this walk of faith that God has called us to. May the Lord give us the grace to do that. Tom. 126. Let's stand together.

How is your heart?

Key Quotes

What does the Bible say about the condition of the heart?

How do we know Christ is the only cure for sin?

Why is it important for Christians to guard their hearts?

What does the Bible say about continuous sin in a believer’s life?

How does spiritual growth relate to the heart according to the Bible?

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How is your heart?

Key Quotes

What does the Bible say about the condition of the heart?

How do we know Christ is the only cure for sin?

Why is it important for Christians to guard their hearts?

What does the Bible say about continuous sin in a believer’s life?

How does spiritual growth relate to the heart according to the Bible?

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