Heart Work. 4

3. To "keep" the heart means to preserve it tender unto sin. The unregenerate man makes little or no distinction between sin and crime: so long as he keeps within the law of the land, and maintains a reputation for respectability among his fellows, he is, generally speaking, quite satisfied with himself. But it is far otherwise with one who has been born again: he has been awakened to the fact that he has to do with God, and must yet render a full account unto Him. He makes conscience of a hundred things which the unconverted never trouble themselves about. When the Holy Spirit first convicted him, he was made to feel that his whole life had been one of rebellion against God, of pleasing himself. The consciousness of this pierced him to the very quick: his inward anguish far exceeded any pains of body or sorrow occasioned by temporal losses. He saw himself to be a spiritual leper, and hated himself for it, and mourned bitterly before God. He cried, "Hide Your face from my sins, and blot out all my iniquities. Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me" (Psalm 51:9, 10).

Now it is the duty of the Christian, and part of the task which God has set him, to see to it that this sense of the exceeding sinfulness of sin be not lost. He is to labor daily that his heart be duly affected by the heinousness of self-will and self-love. He is to steadfastly resist every effort of Satan to pity himself, to think lightly of wrong doing, or to excuse himself in the same. He is to live in the constant realization that the eye of God is ever upon him, so that when tempted he will say with Joseph, "How then can I do this great wickedness, and sin against God?" (Gen. 39:9). He is to view sin in the light of the Cross, daily reminding himself that it was his iniquities which caused the Lord of Glory to be made a curse for him; employing the dying love of Christ as a motive why he must not allow himself in anything that is contrary to the holiness and obedience which the Savior asks from all His redeemed.

Ah, my Christian reader, it is no child's play to "keep the heart with all diligence." The easy-going religion of our day will never take its devotees (or rather, its victims!) to Heaven.

The question has been asked, "Who shall ascend into the hill of the Lord, or who shall stand in His holy place?" (Psalm 24:3), and plainly has the question been answered by God Himself: "He who has clean hands, and a pure heart" etc. (Psalm 24:4). Equally plain is the teaching of the New Testament, "Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God" (Matt. 5:8). A "pure heart" is one that hates sin, which makes conscience of sin, which grieves over it, which strives against it. A "pure heart" is one that seeks to keep undefiled the temple of the Holy Spirit, the dwelling place of Christ (Eph. 3:17).

4. To "keep" the heart means to look diligently after its cleansing. Perhaps some of our readers often find themselves sorrowfully crying, "O the vileness of my heart!" Thank God, if He has discovered this to you; if such be so, and you really feel it, it is clear proof that He has made you to differ from the multitudes of blindly-indifferent professing Christians all around you. But, dear friend, there is no sufficient reason why your "heart" should continue to be vile. You might lament that your garden was overgrown with weeds and filled with rubbish; but need it remain so? We speak now not of your sinful nature, the incurable and unchangeable "flesh" which still indwells you; but of your heart, which God bids you "keep." You are responsible to purge your mind of vain imaginations, your soul of unlawful affections, your conscience of guilt.

But, alas, you say, "I have no control over such things: they come unbidden and I am powerless to prevent them." So the Devil would have you believe! Revert again to the analogy of your garden: do not the weeds spring up unbidden; do not the slugs and other pests seek to prey upon the plants? What, then? Do you merely bewail your helplessness? No, you resist them and take means to keep them under. Thieves enter houses uninvited, but whose fault is it if the doors and windows be left unlocked? O heed not the seductive lullabies of Satan. God says, "purify your hearts, you double minded" (James 4:8); that is, one mind for Him, and another for self; one for holiness, and another for the pleasures of sin. But how am I to "purify" my heart? By vomiting up the foul things taken into it— guiltily owning them before God, repudiating them, turning from them with loathing; and it is written "If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness" (1 John 1:9). By daily renewing our exercise of repentance, and such repentance as is spoken of in 2 Corinthians 7:11: "Just see what this godly sorrow produced in you! Such earnestness, such concern to clear yourselves, such indignation, such alarm." By the daily exercise of faith (Acts 15:9), appropriating afresh the cleansing blood of Christ, bathing every night in that "fountain" which has been opened "for sin and for uncleanness" (Zech. 13:1). By treading the path of God's commandments: "Seeing you have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit" (1 Peter 1:22).

We close this first article by pointing out, what is obvious to every Christian reader, namely, that such a task calls for Divine aid. Help and grace need to be earnestly and definitely sought of the Holy Spirit each day. We should bow before God, and in all simplicity say, "Lord, You require me to keep my heart with all diligence, and I feel utterly incompetent for such a task: such a work lies altogether beyond my poor feeble powers; therefore, I humbly ask You in the name of Christ to graciously grant unto me supernatural strength to do as You have bidden me. Lord, work in me both to will and to do of Your good pleasure."

Next Part Heart Work. 5

Back to Arthur Pink