Out of the Treasure of the Heart…
Blog | Family | God's Word
“All right, who ate my candy bar?” Luke demanded as he stormed out of his bedroom with a crumpled Hershey’s wrapper and a frown.
“I didn’t,” Liz insisted and held up her hands as if to prove her ten-fingered innocence.
“Me, neither,” Hannah added with a shrug. “But I did use your bubblegum machine yesterday,” his sister compelled by honesty confessed. The admission momentarily lured Luke off the track of his pointed investigation, but his littlest sister’s dive for the empty Hershey wrapper restored the focus at hand.
“Mine!” Maggie yelled with two-year-old passion.
“No,” Luke corrected, “It’s mine. But it’s empty. Did you eat it?”
Our blue-eyed baby shook her blond head and held out her chubby hands, palms up. “I have one?” she implored as she kicked the silver wrapper across the living room floor.
“I don’t have any more chocolate,” Luke explained. “Somebody at my last piece!”
My firstborn scanned the room. His eye caught mine as I quietly folded laundry in the corner. He raised an eyebrow and gave me a penetrating look. “Mom?”
“I’m innocent, too,” I assured my son, “but if I’d known there was chocolate in your room…”
Luke stared at the females in his life and then back at the empty candy bar wrapper in his hands. Suddenly, he whipped his head toward the hallway and asked, “Where’s Joshua?”
“Last I saw him, he was in his room playing with his trucks,” I answered as I pondered the whereabouts of my littlest boy. Luke headed down the hall in search of his little brother and soon returned with his suspect in his arms. While the candy bar in question was safely concealed somewhere in the depths of Joshua’s round tummy, the drizzle of chocolate drool that slipped out of the corner of his mouth when he smiled at his big brother blew his cover! The thief had been found!
“From a biblical perspective,” Gary Thomas writes in The Beautiful Fight, “Words reveal the state of our hearts. That’s what Jesus was getting at in Matthew 12:37 and in Matthew 15:1-20; the mouth reveals what the heart conceals” (76). If we long to control what slips out of our mouths, we must first control what slips into our hearts. Are our words harsh, impatient or critical? Then our hearts may be selfish and proud. (There is one who speaks like the piercings of a sword, but the tongue of the wise promotes health -Proverbs 12:18) Do we gossip, disparage or slander? (A gossip separates the best of friends -Proverbs 16:28). Then our hearts may lack love and compassion. Does our speech fan the flame of conflict rather than promote peace? (A gentle answer deflects anger but harsh words make tempers flare –Prov 16:24). Then are hearts may be restless and discontent. If we truly want transformed speech, we must pursue a transformed heart.
According to the prophet Jeremiah, The heart is deceitful above all things…-Jeremiah 17:9. Therefore, we must invite the Holy Spirit to fill our hearts with truth and do our best to “wallpaper” our minds with God’s Word (I have hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you. –Psalm 119:11). Granted, these are “walls” that take some “holy sweat” to build. We will not build homes that speak life without a deliberate decision to maintain a truth-filled heart. In the candid words of Moore, “Because the mouth speaks from the overflow of the heart (see Luke 6:45), an untreated heart will easily give way to a lying tongue…God desires truth in our inmost parts (see Ps. 51:6). I have come to the conclusion that we will never have it accidentally. A truth-filled heart is so unnatural that we must pursue it to have it.” (Believing God 117).
A truth-filled heart and a transformed tongue begin with an earnest desire to become more like Christ. Moses, once a man of pathetically powerless speech is remembered as one of God’s great spokesmen. Why? Because this once apathetic shepherd began to spend time with the One who spoke the universe into being. And the more Moses allowed God to speak to his heart, the more his purified heart flowed from his mouth. Thomas points out, “Every time Moses entered God’s presence, he came out with a radiant face. If we are serious about spending time in God’s presence, we will be changed as well. It is impossible to spend time in the forceful, dynamic, and powerful presence of God and to emerge the same person you were before…” (The Beautiful Fight 80).
At its core, heart AND tongue control may come most simply by “association”. With whom do we spend time? Whose thoughts and words impact ours? If we truly want transformed tongues, and consequently, transformed lives, then there’s only One whose company we must be sure to keep. And as we do, we will become known for the treasure of our tongues.
The Overflow: A good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth good things…. Matthew 12:35
Oh, I’d love that glow! I just read an awesome quote by the martyred Jim Elliot- so convicting- “Wherever you are, be all there.” Maybe being “all there” with God would add to our glow!
I’ve seen you glow, however, my friend 🙂
I love the thought of Moses “glowing” after being with God. It doesn’t always feel that way for me . . . is it because I’m not fully there? I’m too distracted??? Know what I mean?
~Robin