Training the Heart

Death and life and in the power of or under the control of the tongue. What we speak affects our heart, our spirit, our hidden man of the heart, our inward man. Our words register upon our heart, the part of us that is spiritual. And what registers upon our spirit produces a harvest in our life.

The Power of Words

It says that with the increase of his lips, the harvest that his words produce, shall he be satisfied, or filled to the full. And it says that he who loves to use the tongue, who loves to talk, shall eat the fruit thereof. So then, our words do produce fruit in our lives.

This is a little understood truth, that what we speak with our mouth produces something either good or bad in our life. Why is that true? Because our spirit, our heart, hears what we say, and what we hear ourselves say becomes the truth that resides in us, the thing that we believe in our heart. And what we believe in our heart produces either good or bad in our life.

The phrase “bringeth forth” carries the same idea as the earth bringing forth when seed is sown into it. Seed in the earth produces or brings forth a crop and a harvest.

The Abundance of the Heart

A good man has sown good treasure into his heart, that’s how the good treasure got there, and that good treasure brings forth or produces good things in his life. Why is that true? Because it says “for of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaketh.”

What we speak with our mouth is what will fill our heart. And what we fill our heart with is what we are going to speak. How do we fill our human spirit with something? By speaking it with our mouth.

Write Them on the Tablet of your Heart

The Psalmist says, my tongue is the pen of a ready writer. It is with our tongue that we write upon the tablet of our heart.

Be Ye Transformed

The Bible tells us to be transformed by the renewing of our mind. And to do that requires spending time in the word of God, by receiving the sincere milk of the word, and pondering it. It is the word of God that transforms the heart and mind of a person.

When the word of God is meditated upon, it will fill the human heart with good treasure. And that good treasure will produce in our life whatever God sent that word to produce.

So Shall My Word Be

The word of God was sent from heaven to produce something in our lives. It will accomplish what the Lord sent it to do. But it will only do that when sown into the human heart, the human spirit.

The Sower Sows the Word

In Mark chapter 4, Jesus gives the parable of the sower, the story of a sower, or a farmer, who went forth sowing seeds. Much of the seed fell on bad soil, but the seed that fell on good ground produced an abundant crop.

In this parable, the seed is the word of God, and the soil is the human heart, the human spirit. How is the seed received? By hearing it. It was through hearing it that the seed was sown into the human spirit.

First the Blade then the Ear

Notice here that it says, for the earth bringeth forth of herself. In this passage, the earth is the human heart, the human spirit. The heart brings to pass the word that’s sown into it. And it says that the man doesn’t know how it happens. He just sowed the seed and it grew and the harvest came. He didn’t need to know how.

That’s what the word of God is telling us to do. It is telling us to sow the word of God into our heart like a farmer would sow seeds into his field or his garden. And if we don’t get overly distracted, if we keep the weeds out, if we keep the soil soft, then over time the seed will gradually grow, first the blade, then the ear, and then the full corn in the ear. In other words, the harvest will eventually show up in our life.

Training the Heart

The human heart is trained by what we hear with our ears and what we say with our mouth. These two things create our inner belief system, for good or for bad, for better or for worse. Therefore, it is important that we be selective about what we hear and what we say.

Take Heed What You Hear

Take heed to what you hear. Be selective about what you focus on. Because the measure of hearing that we measure with, how deeply we hear something, is the same measure of understanding that we will receive back, and the measure that it will impact our heart.

The Word of God as a Seed

Jesus is talking about hearing the word of God, based on the parables and the observations he gives in this fourth chapter of Mark. There are countless things we can listen to and hear and believe, but the only seed that produces heavenly fruit in our lives is the word of God.

Studying the Word of God

How do we hear the word of God? The number one way to hear the word of God deeply is to meditate upon it, to ponder the things we are reading in the word. This requires us to go beyond just reading, which is merely a mental activity we use for gaining knowledge.

Meditation is more than that. Obviously, reading is required. But meditating requires us to go beyond reading and to ponder or reflect upon what we are looking at. That is a dimension of hearing that goes beyond mere reading. And by doing so we get insights into the scriptures we’re reading. Meditation is a spiritual exercise, an exercise that gets the heart involved.

Receiving the Word of God

The word of God is sealed in our heart as we take time to speak with our mouth what is revealed to us from the word of God. Our tongue becomes like the pen of a ready writer, and we begin to write the word of God upon the tablet of our heart. This is training the human heart to believe in line with God’s word.

The reason this works in training our human spirit is because we believe what we ourselves say more than we believe what anyone else says. Hearing ourselves say something solidifies it in our mind and our heart. What we say with our mouth becomes part of our belief system, what we believe in our heart.

Confess the Word of God

In this verse, Paul is referring to a verse in Psalm 116:10, which says “I believed, therefore have I spoken.” And he says that we have the same spirit of faith. The spirit of faith believes, but it also compels one to speak what he believes. Believing and speaking go hand in hand in the exercising of faith.

Hold Fast the Profession of Your Faith

What does the profession of our faith mean? It is what we profess or confess with our mouth about what we believe, our faith. Confessing the word of God and what it means to us is powerful in developing unwavering faith in the human heart.

The phrase “for He is faithful that promised” makes it clear to us that he is referring to confessing what God has promised us in His word, not the confessing or professing of just any old thing, but confessing our faith in what God has promised.

Confessing the Word of God

So then, how do we do that? Let’s get down to brass tacks. How do we incorporate this concept of believing and speaking into our Christian life? Well, it is by simply reading the scripture promise, and then confessing our thoughts and beliefs in it. Here are some examples of that.

Therefore I confess: I am the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus, for God has made Him to be sin for me, who knew no sin, so that I might be made the righteousness of God in Him.

Therefore I confess: I am surrounded with the favor of God everywhere I go and in everything I do, because the Lord will bless the righteous with favor, like a shield.

Therefore I confess: Christ has redeemed me from the curse of the law. The blessing of Abraham has come upon me through Jesus Christ. I am blessed with the blessing that God blessed Abraham with, the blessing that Abraham and his seed would inherit the world.

I inherit whatever I need in this life, because of the blessing of Abraham.

Therefore I confess: I belong to Christ, therefore I am the seed of Abraham in Christ, the seed. I am an heir of the blessing, an heir of God, and a joint heir with Jesus Christ.

Therefore I confess: Grace and peace are multiplied unto me through the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord. God’s grace and His peace are upon my life.

And through the knowledge of God, His divine power has given unto me all things that pertain to life and godliness. I have all things that pertain to life and godliness.

Therefore I confess: My heavenly Father knows the things I need.

I confess that as I seek first God’s kingdom, and seek to understand His right ways, all the things the Gentiles run after shall be provided for me. The Lord meets all my needs.

Encourage Yourself in the Lord

When David and his men returned from battle to their hometown of Ziklag, the town had been plundered by an enemy, their houses were burned down, and their wives and children had been taken captive. The men who followed David as their leader talked among themselves about stoning him.

David encouraged himself in the LORD his God. David did something in his time with God that caused him to be strengthened and encouraged. And that’s what confessing the word of God is all about, encouraging ourselves in the Lord our God.

Let us begin to seize the opportunity each day to build ourselves up in our faith, to develop unwavering faith in the promises of God, by reading those promises, pondering them in our heart, and speaking them with our mouth. And by doing so we will develop a heart faith in the Lord and in His word that only few enjoy.