From the abundance of the heart

MATTHEW 12 VERSE 34-35 34 You brood of vipers, how can you who are evil say anything good? For out of the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks. The good man brings good things out of the good stored up in him, and the evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in him.

Do not ignore signs of disloyalty and unfaithfulness in a person because it stems from the heart. Rebuke them immediately because these signs are not a mistake or of once of thing. They really indicate what is in the hearts of people. Even those people that appear loyal, these signs are never misleading of what they have within their hearts. If you ignore it, it will grow like cancer and will erupt on a day you least expect. It may show itself as a big matter that may destroy you, your ministry or your family sometimes.

We must understand that nothing anyone does brings good or bad out of them, it is all self-contained. Situations in our lives just manifest it. This means no one can claim to have done or said anything out of anger or joy. Their actions would have already pre-existed within them and were made manifest by the person or situation that made them either angry or happy. I have experienced this many times in my life. I have heard people confess that they may say hurtful things in anger, or “I am a wrong button to press”. Others say “don’t get on my bad side”. Unknowingly they are actually telling you the contents of their hearts. They mean that they are unforgiving, very angry, waiting to lash at someone or they do not accept correction. Because it is not realistic to say “don’t get on my bad side”, everyone will make a mistake at some point but forgiveness of those mistakes will come from the abundance of the heart.

One story that my mother has always told me was of my late grandfather. She says he used to say, “I am the wrong button to press”. Indeed he was a wrong button to press, he was known for his violent nature at the soccer arena where he watched his favourite soccer team play. He instilled authority through a harsh character and violence so much that he had his own particular seat during soccer games. In his words to those who did not know him, he expressed exactly what his heart contained. Because no one is completely bad, he was also a man that taught discipline and hard work in children. My point is, the words we speak everyday are an exact reflection of what is in our hearts. These things manifest beyond words into action due to circumstances in our lives. This man became the wrong button to press when you had a misunderstanding with him. We have been told stories of him having hand injuries from punching an unaware someone that pushed his wrong button. I would begin to imagine the person whose face had come in contact with the hand that was injured as a result of the punch. It is all in the seeds that are within our hearts.

It is just like the way most Christians appear humble while they sit in church. You know that pretend character that we have. Seemingly holy and couldn’t harm a fly. Most people are very humble because they lack. They my lack money or influence and as such are humble. The moment a hundred dollar note hits their pocket, they begin to change. They are never available for church duties and are not chatty as they used to. We then see this behaviour and we say, money is bad it makes people change, we even quote the verse that says, money is the root of all evil. This is not true, at least not entirely. This person has always been this way, they have always been snobs that hate chatting to people after church and hugging orphans. The signs were always there in the words they spoke. We just did not see them or listen attentively enough. The introduction of money just magnified the very small symptoms that we could not previously see. These are symptoms of things that existed in their hearts. They only endured all these things they hate because they lack and were really fishing for the opportunity to be freed from poverty. And when you don’t know who God will use, it is in your best interest to hug all of them. I have been told stories of people that get married and a few months into the marriage, the person starts to change. The person is not changing, they are now becoming honest about who they are. Using this rule to explain human behaviour you cannot be sure of anyone’s humility until they have passed the test of time money and power. If we cannot safely conduct the test of money and power, just listen to the contents of their hearts through the words they speak. That way you will know if they are truly humble or they are just have a doctorate in acting.

We all have issues with our hearts that we may not even know exist. This is because a human being’s heart contains the power to drive and direct their entire life. That is why the word says guard your heart for from it flows all the issues of life. Thus the heart is a very deep well of spiritual seeds growing slowly. These seeds mature bit by bit, becoming a new stage in life. For example, we all have children at different stages in life because the maturity of the seed in the heart to be a parent is different to all of us, some at age twenty, others at thirty, others much later or earlier. There is however, an age where generally everyone’s parenting seed is fully matured enough to be a parent. So imagine a pit with all sorts of seeds growing in silence. One for marriage, one for parenting, one to be able to handle a million dollars, one to be able to have a thousand churches. It really is a pit that brings out all issues of life. With that mindset, be aware that the devil has an understanding that to establish a negative thing in your life, he does not have to grab you into his shrine to worship him. All he has to do is plant a seed. That seed will grow almost undetected to human nature for years, as it grows it begins to manifest itself bit by bit. First with small things like lying to your parents about where you have been. Next it jumps to getting fake doctors’ letters to the principal at school, when fully matured, the seed is one of a con man, a person that can cheat their way through seven years of medical school, graduate with no clue what paracetamol is for. The seeds in our hearts are sometimes deadly ones, that can mature into murder, suicide, theft, extortion. No one gives birth to a child and raises them to be any of these things. Everyone wants the best for their children, that is why most parents don’t believe it when you say to them you son has taken a gun a shot dead five people because they spoke a different language from him, or they had a different skin colour. It’s the seeds finally maturing.

To navigate and change all the evil seeds that may be planted deep within takes only the power of Christ through his word to do completely. You have to be engrossed in exploring scripture and the power of God because this is the only way to gradually cure yourself from the bad seed that may have been planted in your heart by your past life. This is what David meant when he said search my heart Lord. The heart has many seeds growing in it. Others planted by the Holy Spirit, other planted by the enemy. If you understand that the devil does not like you at all, he wants to destroy you completely. If he could do it he would have done it way back. In the same manner, if he gets a chance to plant anything in your heart, he will plant the worst things he can find in his arsenal of evil in order to get the worst results as soon as possible. He likes it even better if the process of planting these seeds is very painful to you. Very painful. Some of these seeds are not our fault, horrible life experiences and betrayal by people in the past may cause people to harbour unforgiveness, hate, bitterness that will mature and explode into something really bad after it has grown roots within us. The deeper the roots we allow it to grow, the stronger the hate is and the more difficult it is to uproot and discard. Although it may have not been our fault that these seeds were planted in our hearts, it is very important that we know we are responsible for what happens to us after these seeds were planted.

It is our responsibility to invite Christ to search our hearts, clean them and plant new seeds of God things. For He says He has plans to bless us, not to harm us, plans to prosper us. So first He uproots everything that is not His. Then over time plants seeds of prosperity, joy, peace, love, fogginess through impartation and reading of his word. That is why it is important to go to a living church of Christ. It is the only way to have good seed planted in your heart and soon make you a hundred percent Christ-centred person.