2. The Heart Diagnosed
We recognize our desire by our affections. Jesus said it this way, “Where your treasure is there your heart will be also.” What you treasure, that is what you have affection for is where your heart or your desire will be. Any desire or affection that comes between you and Jesus, any desire or affection that keeps you from being like Jesus, any desire or affection that isn’t eternal, any desire or affection that will not withstand the fire of God’s holiness is trash. By the way, there’s a name for any desire or affection that comes between you and God, and it’s called idolatry.
Everything the world has to offer is trash. The Apostle Paul learned to recognize the difference. “But everything that was a gain to me, I have considered to be a loss because of Christ. More than that, I also consider everything to be a loss in view of the surpsassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. Because of Him I have suffered the loss of all things and consider them filth, so that I may gain Christ and be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own from the law, but one that is through faith in Christ—the righteousness from God based on faith.” His criterion was simple: “Everything that was gain to me, I have considered to be a loss because of Christ.” Did you really catch that? He said “Everything that was gain to me, I have considered to be a loss.” In other words, if it brought personal gain to Paul, even just in the way of personal satisfaction, Paul considered that in reality to be a loss because it meant he was looking out for himself and not Christ. The reason God answered Solomon’s prayer for wisdom and gave him the riches he didn’t ask for was because, “He asked nothing for himself.” [I Kings 3:11] Well, how do we get to that place?
Worldliness can be so cleverly disguised that the only way to tell the difference is by the illumination of God’s Word through the Holy Spirit. When God’s Word is applied to our heart, that is when we begin practicing the Word of God, it becomes the tool by which we can make the separation between the thoughts and intents of the heart. Hebrews 4:12-13 “For the Word of God is living and effective and sharper than any two-edged sword, penetrating as far as to divide soul, spirit, joints, and marrow; it is a judge of the ideas and thoughts of the heart. No creature is hidden from Him, but all things are naked and exposed to the eyes of Him to whom we must give an account.” So God’s Word is the standard by which both treasure and trash are exposed in the heart. Jesus confirmed this in John 15:3 when He said, “You are already clean because of the Word I have spoken to you.”
Our response to God’s Word is a great indicator of the condition of our heart. Consider the parable of the sower found in Mark 4. Seed is sown on several kinds of ground:
• Along the path
• On rocky ground
• Among thorns
• On good ground
The first place seed is sown is along the path where it is trampled and unable to even sprout. This is a picture of the word being sown in a person’s heart, but Satan immediately takes it away. Obviously, this is a person over whose heart Satan has free reign. The next kind of soil, the rock ground is where a person receives the word (in the mind) with joy (in the emotion), but the Word doesn’t take root (in the desire). When persecution or affliction arises because of the Word, they quickly stumble. Why? Because their will was never surrendered. Then there’s the seed sown among thorns. Notice that the Word says, “These are the ones who hear the word, but the worries of this age, the seductions of wealth, and the desires for other things enter in and choke the word, and it becomes unfruitful.” Notice it becomes unfruitful. When there is no root (in the desires) there is no fruit (change of behavior). Unlike the previous two soils, the promise for fruit was there, but worries and seductions and desires for other things made the Word unfruitful. But, in contrast to all others, the seed “sown on good ground are those who hear the word, welcome it, and produce a crop: 30, 60, and 100 times what was sown.” So I ask you, what’s the difference between the other soils and the “good” soil? One thing: good soil produces a crop. What’s the basis for how much fruit is produced—30, 60 or 100 times what was sown? It’s how receptive the heart—by heart I mean the desire—is to the Word of God.
Continuing in the Mark passage, at first glance Jesus seems to abruptly change the discussion. “‘Is a lamp brought in to be put under a basket or under a bed? Isn’t it to be put on a lampstand? For nothing is concealed except to be revealed, and nothing hidden except to come to light. If anyone has ears to hear, he should listen!’ Then He said to them, ‘Pay attention to what you hear. By the measure you use, it will be measured and added to you. For to the one who has, it will be given, and from the one who does not have, even what he has will be taken away.’” This seems somewhat confusing until you interpret it in light of the previous verses. What Jesus was saying was that the seed of God’s Word planted in the heart is like a lamp that is to be put on a lampstand, not hidden in a basket or under a bed. In other words, God’s Word was never intended to sit in the soil of your heart without accomplishing the purpose for which it was planted. James 1:21 admonishes us to “…humbly receive the implanted word, which is able to save you.” The Word will not be concealed in the heart without being revealed by the bearing of fruit. The Word will not be hidden in the heart without being revealed in a person’s character. Ultimately what is or isn’t implanted into our hearts will be revealed. So Jesus gives this warning: “Pay attention to what you hear.” NAS translates it this way: “Be careful how you listen.” In other words, be careful not to listen from a heart tainted by its own desire. Remember, it was desires for other things that choked the Word and made it unfruitful. Listening is how God’s Word is received into our hearts. He goes on to say that whatever measure we use to listen, however receptive we are to truth, that’s the measure by which we will reap a harvest of Truth. Our receptiveness to truth is measured by our desire. Desire then is a place where Truth is either accepted or rejected.
But it’s also a place where God’s grace is at work. In fact, the basis by which we either are receptive to the Truth or reject the Truth is God’s grace. When God’s Word enters our minds by reading or hearing it, our desire will choke the Word unless God’s grace is at work. Grace is God giving us the desire and the power to do His will. Philippians 2:13 says, “For it is God who is working in you, enabling you both to will and to act for His good purpose.” That’s God’s grace at work. That’s how we were saved in the first place. God giving us the desire and power to do His will.
When God offers His grace and we resist and thereby fall short of His grace (by the way, that doesn’t mean that God’s grace is short, but that we keep ourselves from being touched by the effects of God’s grace), Hebrews warns us that a root of bitterness can spring up causing trouble and defiling many people. So, if you resist the grace of God, that is if God is offering you the desire and the power to do His will and you resist, it’s not you alone that will bear the consequences but other people may be defiled by you. That’s a serious and sobering thought! It is God’s grace poured over our hearts that gives us not only the desire to change, but the power to change, the power to change our desire, the power for our hearts to be one with His. And it’s the application of God’s Word to our hearts by His grace that will enable us to recognize the difference between treasure and trash.