How is Your Heart?, Part 5

Fire, for five weeks now we've been looking at the topic, how is your heart? It began with the passage that we're studying in the book of Hebrews as we're going through verse by verse, the book of Hebrews, coming to understand the sufficiency and supremacy of Christ In our lives And the Rite of Hebrews, on three separate occasions, says today: if you hear his voice, do not harden your heart And so, in that passage, we begin to realize that there is a warning that's been given that we are not to harden our hearts against the things of the gospel, the things of truth

And so in our study of Hebrews, we have looked at what's imperative for us to study, the condition of our heart Because we don't want to be like those Jewish people who believed in God because they were Jewish people and they were sons of Abraham and they were raised in the synagogue and they knew about the Lord God of Israel They did not commit themselves to following Christ as Lord and Savior And the write of Hebrews warns them for the second time in three chapters: if you hear his voice Today is the day Don't harden your heart

And so, in that passage, we realize that there is a plea, a plea of urgency Don't wait till tomorrow because tomorrow will be too late So, if you hear his voice today, you're not guaranteed of tomorrow So, today, if you hear his voice, don't harden your hearts As your fathers did when they provoked me in the wilderness, because he says they always go astray in their hearts, they're always wandering away from me in their hearts Don't be like them They've been taken away, fallen away by the deceitfulness of sin And so the plea comes today If you hear his voice, do not h your hearts

And so we looked at that plea and we looked at a passage and we went to another portion of Scripture, and that was the petition in the book of Proverbs where the Lord says, Son, give me your heart And that's the question: have you given your heart to the Lord? Because that's the great petition, because out of your heart flow all the issues of life As a man thinks in his heart, so is he So, have you given your heart to the Lord God of Israel? There's this great petition, son, give me your heart And with that petition comes the pre That 's in Proverbs 4: guard your heart Protect it

Keep it with all keeping For out of your heart flow all the issues of life Everything about your intellect, everything about your emotions, everything about your mental faculties, everything that you do stems from your heart So protect it, guard it That's the pre Make sure you watch over it Make sure you keep it with all keeping because it is the most valued treasure that you have If you don't do that, you're in danger of coming to a place where you harden your heart

So we hit try to help you understand the difference between how the how the belie hardens his heart versus the unbeliever and how he hardens His heart, because there is a difference And we saw the last couple of weeks that there's that great Great warning given all throughout scripture that you need to be careful how you hear the word of God Because if you hear it and you don't respond to the truth, you're in danger of hardening your heart

And the question comes over and over again in Scripture: have you listened to what the Lord God of Israel has said? And how do you know you've listened? You actually apply that truth to your life You actually follow through on what God has said in His Word The Bible says in the book of Proverbs, the 28th chapter, these words: How blessed is the man who fears always, but he who hardens his heart will fall into calamity

How many people you know have fallen into great calamity because they have hardened their hearts? Solomon would go on to say these words: A man who hardens his neck after much reproof will suddenly be broken beyond rem That's the danger Those who harden their hearts and fall into calamity are in danger of once hearing about The way out and the way of reproof, not responding, and falling into such a calamity that there's absolutely no longer a remedy for their soul That God would then harden their hearts

We can harden our hearts to the things of God to the point where God ultimately then hardens His heart against the things that we are doing because God says, Enough is enough You've said no to me No to you Man's willful rejection leads to God's judicial rejection You reject God long enough, God comes back and says, You know what? That's it, lights out No opportunity to repent That's illustrated for us in the book of Matthew If you got your Bible, do you remember me? The book of Matthew, the 13th chapter

In Matthew chapter 13, our Lord begins to change his strategy in terms of how it is he preaches the truth of the gospel And disciples ask him why he changes What's the difference? He begins by talking to them in parables in Matthew chapter 13 He gives them that very first parable, the parable of the sower and the soil, which speaks about how people respond to what they hear In the kingdom age How do they hear the truth of the word of the Lord? It says in verse number 3 in Matthew 13, these words: He spoke many things to them in parable, saying, Behold, the sower went out to sow

And as he sowed, some seeds fell beside the road, and birds came and ate them up Others fell on the rocky places where they did not Have much soil, and immediately they sprang up because they had no depth of soil But when the sun had risen, they were scorched, and because they had no root, they withered away And others fell among the thorns, and the thorns came up and choked them out And others fell on the ground on the good soil Yielded a crop, some a hundredfold, some sixty, and some thirty He who has ears, let him hear Jesus begins to give a story

Parables are earthly stories with a heavenly meaning That's all they are Earthly stories, common everyday stories that everybody in the land of Israel would know So every parable that Jesus gives, everybody in the land of Israel understands from a natural perspective But to understand it from a spiritual perspective, you need the Spirit of God to open your eyes and to illuminate you, or it's just another story that Jesus tells And the disciples know that

So it says in verse number 10: the disciples came and said to him, Why do you speak to them in parables? What are you doing? Why now change the way you've preached? Why now change the style in which you deliver the goods? Why is it now you're going to give them parables that they probably will not grasp or understand? He just gave them the parable of the sore sower in the soil, which everybody who in that day In that kind of culture, they would know exactly what he was talking about They say, Why would you do that? And so, Jesus tells them: Listen to what he says He answered them, verse 11

To you it has been granted to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven But to them it has not been granted We'll stop right there To you, my disciples, my followers, it has been granted to you to know the mysteries Things concealed in the Old Testament, now revealed in the New Testament, you will now have them revealed to you But to them, them are the unbelievers, them who follow the Pharisees, because in Matthew chapter 12, it was the religious establishment that had attributed the works of Christ to Satan

They had said that his miracles are from hell, they're from Satan, and his message, therefore, must be demonic, not truth They committed what the Bible calls the unpardonable sin in the face of overwhelming evidence Of the miracles and message of Christ, they took what he said and attributed it all to Satan And therefore, they had come to a place of will reject And because of their will rejection, there came a Confirmation by the Christ, a judicial rejection by him because they would not embrace him as their Messiah So for the Pharisees, the light had gone out

There no longer was an opportunity for them to repent And so Jesus says this: For whoever has, to him, more shall be given That is, you, the disciples, you have seen, you have heard, therefore, you will receive more And he will have an abundance But whoever does not have, even what he has, shall be taken away from him In other words, they have seen the light, they have heard the message, but no more we're going to take it away that they can no longer see or hear or respond Verse 13, therefore I speak to them in parables, because while seen, they do not see me

And while hearing, they do not hear, nor do they understand In other words, in the midst of overwhelming evidence, they refuse to hear, they refuse to listen, they refuse to respond, they refuse to respond To obey, so I'm going to confirm them in their obstinence, I'm going to confirm them in their stubbornness No longer will they have the opportunity to repent, no longer will they have the opportunity to respond The light is out This is this In their case, whose case? The Pharisees, those who lived in unbelief, in their case, the prophecy of Isaiah is being fulfilled

What prophecy? The prophecy that Isaiah gave that says, You will keep on hearing, but will not understand, you will keep on seeing, but will not perceive For the heart of this people has become dull With their ears they scarcely hear, and they have closed their eyes, otherwise they They would see with their eyes, hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and return, and I would heal them In other words, the opportunity for them to hear and respond is over Because while they had the opportunity, they did not respond

Isaiah gave the prophecy about Israel that would lead them into Babylonian captivity, a first fulfillment of the prophecy, but a prophecy given five times Five times in the New Testament to talk about Israel's rejection of their Messiah Because Isaiah was prophesying that this is the way it was going to happen, not just today, but in Israel's future In fact, in Psalm 78, As the prophet said this It's quoted in verse number 35 of Matthew 13 This was to fulfill what was spoken through the prophet. I will open my mouth in parables. I will utter hidden things since the foundation of the world

As the prophet Prophesied Israel's rejection And therefore, speaking of the Messiah in the future, he says that he will utter parables So that those who listen will no longer respond because they would have rejected their Messiah So Jesus quotes Isaiah, and then he says this, but blessed are your eyes because they see, your ears because they hear You see, the constant repetition of he who has ears to hear, let him hear what the Spirit says Your ears have heard Theirs have Tune me out Theirs have turned me off Theirs are no longer willing to listen

He says, For truly I say to you, verse 17, that many prophets and righteous men desire to see what you see and did not see it, and to hear what you hear and did not hear it There are many who want to hear what you hear, see what you see No opportunity But for you, oh, there's all the more been granted to you Why? Because there was something different about the heart of the disciples Versus the heart of those unbelievers, those Phar, those religious leaders who all said they believed in God Who all said that they lived a righteous life

And those around them would confirm the fact that these were our religious leaders and they believed in God And we follow those who believe in God, but it was the Lord Christ who Said no While having the opportunity to hear, they would not listen They turned away from the truth In fact, they attributed my works to Satan and would not respond To the truth of the gospel And so, what Jesus does is he interprets one parable, one kingdom parable for them To re-emphasize once again how it is people will hear in the kingdom age

That is the age that began with the arrival of the Messiah and ends with his return That's the kingdom age We live in that kingdom age And this is how people respond to the gospel And you know them well because you preach the gospel to people Maybe they're in your family Maybe they're one of your relatives Maybe they're your friend Maybe they're your best friend And they have either received or rejected the gospel They've heard the truth And embrace the truth, or they've turned away from the truth, or there are those who have embraced the truth for a short time

And they look like they are truly saved, but after a while, the cares of this world, the deceitfulness of riches, cause them to fall away, to turn away from the truth And the Lord gives this parable to show you that there were people who look like they hear the gospel and receive it But in reality, most people in the kingdom age who hear the gospel and jump on the Jesus bandwagon never truly are born again You need to understand that, folks Most people in the kingdom age who hear the gospel and look like they embrace the gospel

But because of the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches, they fall away That's what Jesus says Verse 18 Hear then the parable of the sower Again, he goes to how you listen How you hear When anyone hears the word of the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what has been sown in his heart This is the one on whom the seed was sown beside the road This is the hard soil Oh, the seed falls in the hard soil, the stony heart, and Satan comes and snatches it away, and they remain in unbelief

And the one on whom, verse 20, the seed was sown on the rocky places This is the man who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy Yet, he has no firm root in him, but is only temporary And when afflictions or persecution arises because of the word, he immediately falls away He turns away Oh, he embraces Jesus for a short time He wants to have freedom from difficulty He wants to have a better marriage He wants to have financial success He wants life to be To be better for him than it is So he embraces Jesus because Jesus had been presented to him that way

And yet, when affliction comes and persecution comes because of the word, Now he wants nothing to do with Jesus anymore He falls away But what's a true believer do? He digs his roots down deep, see, and perseveres and stands strong And then Jesus says this And the one on whom the seed was sown among the thorns, this is the man who hears, okay, here, there's the word again, hears the word And the worry of the world and the deceitfulness of wealth choke the word, and it becomes Unfruitful This one hears the word He too receives it with joy

But boy, they just can't seem to break away from the things of the world Because they're so ensnared with the things of the world They just love it so And they fall away And the one on whom the seed was sown on the good soil, this is the man who hears the word and understands it Who indeed bears fruit, the only one who bears fruit The other three do not bear any fruit This one bears fruit Because in This Is My Father glorified, John 15:8, that you bear much fruit Who indeed bears the fruit and brings forth some a hundredfold, some sixty, and some thirty

So Jesus goes back and says, Look, guys, let me interpret the parable for you so you understand it Because you're going to go out and you going to present the gospel And a lot of people are going to reject it We understand that But others will look like they embrace it because they've heard it They receive it with joy But because it's on the rocky soil or the thorny soil, what's going to happen is that when persecution arises or they can't break away from the cares of the world When push comes and shove, they choose the world, not Christ And they fall away

But some of the seed will fall in good soil And when it does, that soil not only embraces what they've heard, but they bring forth fruit to demonstrate true repentance Some 100, some 6-fold, some 30-f And then he goes right into the parable about the tares and the wheat because he wants them to understand that those in the rocky soil and those on the thorny soil are among the tares Hairs sown among the wheat because they look so much like the wheat, but they're not And the only way you can ever tell them apart is at the end of the harvest But at that time, It's too late for the tear

It's too late So, in the in between time, how do you know? That you've hardened your heart to the point that you are not rep That is, you're irreparable You cannot repent You cannot turn because you have neglected the truth of God's word You have turned your back away from God The stubbornness of your heart, the boastfulness of your heart, the wickedness of your heart Has turned you further and further away, where God will ultimately confirm you in your hardness, and therefore there is no opportunity to repent See, that's a very dangerous place to be

The problem is, no one really knows where that place is until it's too late So the question is, how is your heart? Is your heart hard or is your heart tender to the things of God? Do you have a soft heart to the things of God? This is why we spent so much time here Because I don't want you to have a hardened heart of unbelief. A heart that's been led away because of the deceitfulness of sin. I want you to know for certain that your heart is tender and soft to the things of God In fact, turn with me in your Bible to the book of Second Kings Second Kings chapter twenty-two

Remember King Josiah? Jehovah has healed That's what his name means And the great God of Israel was going to bring healing to Israel through King Josiah Now King Josiah should be, for all of us who were raised in an ungodly home, he should be the hope That all of us hold on to Because his father was a wicked man His grandfather Was a wicked man And yet, God would use Josiah He is one of eight kings, eight of the 22 kings that ruled in Judah during the divided kingdom of Israel He is one of eight good kings, and Josiah would be able to reverse

The wickedness and the iniquity of his father and grandfather, because his heart would be tender to the things of God He began to rule at age eight Remember that? Eight years old, he became king Over Judah. I don't know what you were doing when you were eight, but I know that when I was eight, the only thing I did was play baseball That's it Nothing else really matters to me at age eight But for Josiah, he became king over Judah at age eight

And in the 16 year of his reign, or in the 18th year of his reign, When he was 26 years of age, during the repairs on the temple, they f the book of the law They found the Torah Can you imagine not having the book of the law present among you while you were being raised? Having God's word among you while you were being raised? And then, all of a sudden, at 26 years of age, that word is found It would be like you left your Bible at church this week And then you lo it And you never read it for years Who does that, right? We don 't do that At least we don't think we do

But the case of the matter is that the law had been hidden under the rubble of the temple in their repairs of that temple They found a book of the law And so they brought it to the king, and they read it in the presence of the king And the holder, the prophetess, would give a prophecy Listen to what it says Second Kings chapter twenty-two It says in verse number 11, When the king heard the words of the book of the law, He tore his clothes He realized the error of the nation's way

The king commanded, verse 13, go inquire of the Lord for me and the people in all Judah concerning the words of this book that has been found, for great is the wrath of the Lord that burns against us, because our fathers have not listened to the words of this book To do according to all that is written concerning us In other words, as they read the book of the law, they realized that Israel was going to experience the wrath of God because they disobeyed the truth And so it says these words, when Hold the prophetess said in verse 15

Thus says the Lord God of Israel, Tell the man who sent you to me, Thus says the Lord, Behold, I bring evil on this place and on its inhabitants, even all the words, the book which the king of Judah has read Because they have forsaken me, and have burned incense to other gods, that they might provoke me to anger with all the work of their hands Therefore my wrath burns against this place. and it shall not be quenched

But to the king of Judah, who sent you to inquire of the Lord Thus shall you say to him, Thus says the Lord God of Israel, regarding the words which you have heard, because your heart was tender And you humbled yourself before the Lord when you heard what I spoke against this place and against its inhabitants That they should become a desolation and a curse, and you have torn your clothes and wept before me. I truly have heard you, declares the Lord Therefore, behold, I will gather you to your fathers, and you will be gathered to your grave in peace

And your eyes will not see all the evil which I will bring on this place So they brought back word to the king Josiah heard the words of the law Unlike his father Ammon, like his grandfather Manasseh, when he heard it, he tore his clothes And he repented because he realized the error of the way of Israel The prophet has said, listen, all this wrath that God said he's going to bring, it's going to happen Because God's faithfully shooted his word But for the king of Judah, young Josiah, none of this will happen during his reign Because he had a tender heart He had a humble heart

He had a receptive heart He had a soft heart to the things of God And because he did, and because he embraced me and realized through repentance The severity of my word, he will not experience my wrath Isn't that great? Jehovah has healed Healing came through a king who repented and turned from the evil of the nation's ways He'd bring the nation together He'd begin to tear down all the altars that had been raised to Asht and to Baal, and began to wipe clean Israel from all of its iniquity Because he had a tender heart towards God And I wonder if that is you and me today

Is that the kind of heart that you have? I want to be able to share with you today and the next time that we are together the characteristics of a tender, soft, receptive he Because I want you to be able to compare what we've talked about concerning the hard heart to see what the soft heart looks like So, you can examine your life and see where you're at So, you, as a father, can look at your family and say, This is where my family is So you can say, listen to your family who has turned their back on the truth That you can warn them that God is in danger of turning the light out in their lives

Unless they soon repent Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your heart any longer Because if you do, it will be impossible to renew you to repentance What does that tender, soft heart look like? How do you know this is you? What does the Bible say? So let me begin this morning by helping you understand what the tender heart looks like The heart that Josiah has, what kind of heart was that? What are the characteristics of the soft heart? What are the characteristics of the tender heart? The supple heart, the heart that truly embraces the Christ

Well, first of all, that heart is a see heart, a seeking heart It seeks after God You say, well, wait a minute The Bible says that no one seeks after God That's correct That's absolutely correct No man seeks after God because there's none good, no, not one But the Lord also says in Jeremiah 29 that if you seek me, you will find me if you seek for me with all of your heart. A seeking heart If God calls you, there is this search for him, a desire to embrace him Don 't you understand that everybody in the room Has a seeking heart

The question is, what do you seek after? Do you seek after, we talked about this on Wednesday night, do you seek after the praise of man? Or do you seek after the Lord God of Israel? What do you truly seek for? What are you searching for? Because, see, the tender heart searches for the Lord God of Israel The seeking heart wants to embrace God and all that he is and all that he stands for There is this desire in the heart of the believer that wants to know more of God, that wants to embrace all of God, that can't get enough of God

See, if you can get enough of God, you don't have a seeking heart He's infinite There is this desire to embrace him What are you here today to seek after? You know, some people go to church to seek for a wife Did you know that? Or seek a husband That's why they go to church They go to church, listen to this, to seek friends Is it wrong to have friends? No No. I think it's great to friends. I don't have any friends, but it's good to have friends, right? But you don't go to church to seek friends You don't go to ch To seek for a husband or to seek for a wife

You don't go to church to seek fellowship Although, when you come, there is the fellowship of believers You come to seek more of God You come to seek more of all that he has You come to worship the king And so you got to ask yourself the question: what am I seeking after? What dri me? Where are my passions and my desires? Listen to what the Bible says in Psalm 119 Verse number 10 With all my heart, the psalmist says, I have sought you Isn't that good? There's an intensity about our search There's intentionality surrounding our search With all my heart I have sought you

How many of us can honestly say that? Can honestly stand before the Lord God and say, You know what? This is my heart's desire to seek my God With all my heart I've sought you Do not let me wander from your commandments Isn't that great? You see, the heart that seeks God doesn't want to wander away from all that God says If you don't care about whether or not you wander away or not, if you don't care about whether or not you commit sin or not, you don have a heart that really truly seeks after God

The heart that seeks God says, Lord, I want to know you, and Lord, don't let me move away from all the commandments that you have All that you have. I want to embrace you, Lord. I want you That's a seeking heart That's a tender heart That's the saved he It seeks after God Listen to what the Bible says in Psalm 119, verse number 2 How blessed are those who observe his testimonies, who seek him with all their heart Again, the seeking Is all-encompassing All their heart You don't come to worship Christ and seek Him half-heartedly You come and seek him with all of your heart

That's the tender heart Listen to what it says in Psalm 27 Psalm twenty-seven. I love this Psalm twenty-seven, it says Verse number seven: Hear, O Lord, when I cry with my voice, and be gracious to me and answer me And when you said, see my face My heart said to you, Your face, O Lord, I shall seek Isn't that good? When you said, Seek my face, my heart said, Oh, I'm going to seek your face. I will obey you. I will search after you. I will long for you How about you? That's why the Psalm already said: There's one thing I have asked from the Lord that I shall seek

What did he want to do? To dwell in the house of the Lord, to behold the beauty of the Lord Why? Because at the core of his being, he wanted to seek the face of God He wanted to see God in His glory and His splendor and His beauty He wanted to see God for all that He is When you said, seek my face, my heart said, O Lord, I will seek your face Do you have a seeking heart? Did you come today to seek all? Of Christ with all of your heart Is that why you're here? That's the tender heart The soft heart is a seeking he The soft heart, number two Is a shattered heart It's a shattered heart

Why? Because when the Lord says, seek my face, and my heart says, Your face, O Lord, I will seek When I see Christ in all of his splendor, in all of his beauty, all of a sudden I see more of my sin And my heart is broken and shattered because of who he is and who I am That's why the Bible says in Isaiah 66, verse number 2: To this man will I look, to him who is broken and of a contrite heart, and who trembles at my word That's the man that God looks to We look to him, we seek him But he is looking for the one who, when he seeks him, is completely shattered by him

That's why in Jeremiah 2, 13 it says, Is not my word like a hammer? We talked about this before a couple weeks ago It just shatters the hard heart It breaks it in two, it crumbles it, it shatters it The shattered soul That's the soft heart The Bible says in Psalm Psalm 3 These words Verse number seventeen The righteous cry, and the Lord hears And delivers them out of all their troubles The Lord is near to the broken and saves those who are crus in spirit See that? The Lord saves the brokenhearted The Lord saves those who are shattered in their spirit That's the tender heart

And the reason it's so tender is because when it seeks after God and sees Him for who He is, He is overwhelmed by His sin That's why Paul recognized himself as what? The chief of sinners He wrote thirteen epistles in the New Testament Fourteen, if you consider Hebrews, right? And yet he saw himself as the chief of all sinners. I'm the worst of all sinners Why? Because the more he sought God The more his passion was that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, the fellowship of his sufferings

The more I want to know him, the more I know me, and the more I know me, the more I despise me. I rep in dust and ashes because I am a sinner and I fall so short of the beauty and glory of the living God See, that's the tender heart That's why Josiah, when the law was read, and whether they read all five books of the Torah, I don't know, but when he heard what God said, His only response is, I'm a sinner. I've broken God's law He is pure and holy, and I am not He tears his robes He repents in dust and ashes because he realizes, having seen God, he saw his sin

How many times do we tell you, when you go to church, whatever church it is, if you leave, Not having seen God, you haven't seen, or not having seen your sin, you haven't seen God If you leave church feeling good about yourself, you probably didn't see the Lord God of Israel Because if you see the Lord God of Israel, You don't leave feeling good about yourself You leave feel grateful for the forgiveness and mercy of God Amen You leave thankful for the love of God and the mercy of God, but you leave

Having seen your sin and are overwhelmingly broken and crushed over your sin because God is so holy, holy, holy That's the tender heart That's the heart that Josiah had That's the heart that we need to have as we ask the Lord, Lord You said, seek your face Lord, we want to seek your face with all of our hearts That's my prayer for you and me And next time we're together, we'll tell you more about the soft heart, the tender heart, and what the Bible says concerning that so you can understand more about it Let me pray with you Father, thank you for today

Truly, Lord, you are great and worthy to be praised Go before us, Lord May you, may you lead and guide us in the way that we should go May our hearts be broken over our sin But overwhelmingly blessed because of the forgiveness that only you offer We pray in Jesus' name Amen.