Well, we’re coming near to the end of our series in the Book of Proverbs. We’ve been studying the Proverbs since probably the middle of the spring, and we’re in this section in the middle of Proverbs. We just have two weeks left where we’re looking at various topics. How does the Book of Proverbs address various things? We looked at money. One of the things we looked at, we looked at a wide variety of topics Proverbs addresses. This week we’re going to be pressing into what does Proverbs say about our motivations, our desires, our longings. We all have them. And sometimes we wonder, where did that come from? What do I do with it? Is that from God or the devil? How do I respond to this deep desire I feel inside of me? I remember when a friend of mine, when the iPad first came out and he could think of nothing else when that first came out, other than an iPad, should I have it or not? Watching all the video reviews of it, reading all the specs online, getting all the information he could, it absorbed his thoughts all the time. Finally he said to me, John, you know what I had to do? I just had to buy it so I’d stop thinking about it. And I thought, I need to remember that line. Honey, I had to buy that gun, I couldn’t, you, it was for you so that you would have my full attention. I had to stop thinking about it. You. I did it for the family, right? That’s one way to think about it. But the point being, for him, his heart. And that’s the biblical word we’re going to look at in the book of Proverbs. His heart was completely absorbed and consumed by the desire to learn about the iPad, whether he should have it or not. And that maybe is a superficial, silly example. But for all of us there is some longing of the heart that attaches itself to us. What do we do with that? Well, we’re going to look at what the book of Proverbs says about the heart today. We’re going to be following the notes that were handed out. If you didn’t get a copy, raise your hand. We’ll try to get one to you. But what does the Book of Proverbs say about the heart? We’re going to look at three aspects of that. What is the heart to begin with? Second, what does it do? How does the heart function according to Proverbs? According to the biblical perspective? And then lastly, how does it change? How do we direct it? How do we give it direction? First then, what is the heart? Now of course, when we use the word heart that has a wide range of meaning. Probably the most basic meaning is the pumping organ within your body. The organ that pumps and circulates blood around your body to bring fresh oxygen to your body, recirculate the old blood, bring oxygen to it, and of course, when you think of the heart, we also think about it being maybe the fundamental element of your life, because you might even hear of someone being brain dead. Their brain has lost much of its function. But as long as the heart is pumping, their body is alive. But when the heart stops, it’s all over. The heart is the most, maybe basic element of our life. Now. Scripture uses it, though. It’s interesting, even though that’s probably the first place we think of when we think of if someone mentions a heart. The Bible barely uses it that way to speak specifically only of the pumping organ. Maybe just a handful of times in the Old Testament does it refer to this heart only as an organ and the bulk of the time, and in your notes outline that letter C is going to get filled in here. It’s oftentimes referring to the center of someone or something. The control center, the core of their being, their essence. We use it this way when we talk about maybe the heart of the C. You mean the depths of the C deep in the middle of it. We might use it this way when we speak of finally getting to the heart of the matter, we’ve gotten to the essence of it. The core. In fact, if you look in your notes here in Genesis chapter six, it’s used this way of the Lord. And the Lord regretted that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him to his heart, in his very essence, in the very core of who he was. This wasn’t just a peripheral grieving. It was at the center of his being. So the heart reflects maybe the motivational core of who we are. This is why it’s important to look at Proverbs 4:23 and turning into the book of Proverbs in any time in your notes, when you just see the numbers and no reference. That’s referring to Proverbs. Here, one of the ways the Proverbs speak of the heart is it’s referred to as a spring. Look at 4:23 here. Keep your heart with all vigilance, for from it flow the springs of life. Whatever is in your heart, that is what will come out. Now. A lot of times we can maybe suppress what’s in there and fake it. But when you’re stressed, when you’re put in a situation. Where maybe you lack self-control, what is in there will come out when you’re squeezed. What is in the heart will come out. You will be exposed for what’s there. We have to understand that what has gone into the heart is what will come out. What has shaped you. Your heart will express itself. The core of who you are will be reflected in how you interact with others. Now, part of what’s important in Matthew 12:34 points this out. Out of the overflow of the heart, the mouth speaks. What comes out of our mouths is what is already inside of us. Now here’s the tricky part, though, about the heart. The heart can be hard to understand. Look here. This, this blank. The heart is a deep water in Proverbs 20, verse five, the purpose in a man’s heart is like deep water. But a man of understanding will draw it out a deep water. If you think of a well that needs to be drilled, it can be difficult to even first of all know where to drill. And if it’s a deep well in a dry land, it can cost a lot of money and take a lot of time to find the water. It’s not obvious, it’s not easy and it’s true of our hearts as well. Just just think of the times you’ve asked. One of your children. Why did you hit your brother or sister? And what do they always say? I don’t know, I don’t know. Now, you were hoping for more than that. You were hoping there would be deep philosophical reflection on the depravity of their heart and how they had been harboring bitterness for months, and it finally came out. They thought physical violence would be something that would work to bring change into the life of their sibling. You’re hoping for that kind of interaction, and all you get is, I don’t know, why do they say that? Because they really don’t know. I have no idea. I wanted to, I did it, I’m sorry. I got nothing else for you. You know, what’s crazy about that is how many times is that what we say of ourselves as well? Why did I do that? I still am not sure why I did that. Why did I say that to them? I don’t really know. I need to press into that and try to figure that out. The heart can be hard to understand. It can take layers upon layers of introspection and reflection to try to figure out what is really going on in my heart. Why did I think that? Why did I do that? Why did I say that that should be who I am. I don’t think that’s who I am. And then it came out. What does that mean? What we need. And if you look back at 20, verse five, a man of understanding will draw it out. Meaning I, if I have understanding, will work at drawing it out, but also I need others to help me draw it out. I can’t do it in isolation. I need others to speak into my life. This next verse help points that out –27:19, as in water, face reflects face. So the heart of a man reflects the man. You can write the word mirror down there. The heart is a mirror, which means at one level the heart reflects who you are to others, but also others. The heart of others acts as a mirror in your life. I need other people in my life to help give me perspective. I can think I’m 1,000% right about something and someone else comes along and goes, actually, have you considered this other perspective? That’s one of the beautiful things about marriage done rightly. Let me congratulate Arwen and Brie Peak, our most recently married couple in the church. Go ahead and stand. Let us go ahead. Stand up. Let everybody stare at you. Newly married couple. They’re going to learn a few things in the coming years, right? One of the things you’re going to learn is that your way isn’t the only way to do things you thought in your home growing up. This was the biblical way to make mac and cheese. And then you see that they do it different. They don’t use the powder stuff. They use real cheese. What are you doing? You’re trying to mess it up. This is the only way you do it. But over time and whatever it might be, of course there’s things a lot more serious than that. But those little things are what often cause you to blow up. Over time, you start to see. I thought my way was the only way. I thought it was the only right way. Now I’m seeing maybe there’s another way. Maybe there’s a chance. There’s another way. And the beautiful thing is, over time, hopefully it goes from. That’s your way. That’s my way to now. This is our way. This is how we’re shaping a life together. I’ve seen what you bring to the table. You see what I bring to the table. We grow together. But that only happens when you have the mirror of reflection, another perspective. And if you’re open to it, if you’re open to hearing another perspective, the heart will change over time as others can speak into it, even though it is hard to understand. That’s how we work together and that happens in the church as well. You’ve all had it happen where you’ve been in a life group, you’ve been in some discipleship interaction, you’ve gotten to know someone else, and they’ve helped you see an area of your life that needed to grow, and maybe you didn’t want to hear it at the time, but it helped you. It was done in love. It helped us grow the hearts of deep water. Now that’s a little bit of what the heart is. What does it do? How does the heart act? How does it function in our lives? Look here at this very first line. The most core understanding, I think, to begin with is every heart is designed and it will worship. The heart is designed to follow something to long for something, to worship something it will worship something. Look here at verse 13:12, hope deferred makes the heart sick. But a desire fulfilled is a tree of life. We all have in us a deep desire. We have various desires, various longings, and when those aren’t fulfilled, it can even lead to what some have called heart sickness. You may have heard someone you may have said even they died of a broken heart. And I remember reading Viktor Frankl. He was a concentration camp survivor in World War II, and he wrote a number of books about that experience. And one of the things he saw in people, they would be physically okay. Of course, no one was okay, but they would be surviving physically. And then all of a sudden one day he would see something change in their eyes, something change in their countenance. And the next day, even though physically able to survive, the next day they would pass away. And he said what had happened is they finally just gave up. They lost the will to live. They lost hope. For whatever reason, something happened and something broke inside of them and they said, I’m done. Hope deferred makes the heart sick. There is a desire deep within us that we long to see fulfilled, and we’re wired that way. We’re wired to worship. Some have said the heart is an idol factory. It’s going to worship something. That’s why we saw in the history of Israel this to be true. Moses had gone up on the mountain to get the law from God. He’s gone 40 days and the people are like, hold on, we’ve been abandoned. Aaron, go make us a golden calf to worship. We got to have something to worship. We couldn’t even go 40 days without something to worship. If you’re. If God’s not going to show up, we’ll make up a God to worship. We gotta have something to worship. It seems that we’re hard wired. In fact, you may remember some of us of the more experienced crowd may remember the old Bob Dylan line along this lines. Bob Dylan, folk singer, 60s and 70s. He said, everybody’s got to serve somebody. It might be the devil, it might be the Lord, but you’re gonna serve somebody. We’re hardwired to worship. There’s a desire deep within each of us. Now, part of the problem with this desire can’t always be trusted. Sometimes the desires are clearly good. Sometimes they’re very strong, and you feel like you have to follow them. Look here at verse 14:30, a tranquil heart gives life to the flesh, but envy makes the bones rot. Envy comes up. Envy is a very strong desire for something someone else has. Here’s the crazy part about envy. There’s another layer to it. Not only do I want what they have, partly because I can’t have it, I want what they have, but also I need to hate them for having it. And I want them to not have it. And I want them to suffer harm because they have the thing that I want as well. Man, that is the messed up part of envy that shows that we can desire the wrong thing for the wrong reasons. There’s something about our heart that that that happens at times, the heart can be unpredictable. Look here. 23:17 let not your heart envy sinners, but continue in the fear of the Lord. Isn’t it crazy that sometimes we can find ourselves envying sinners, envying those who openly profess to be completely against God? Maybe it’s something about their life you admire. Maybe it’s the way they look, dress, talk, communicate. Maybe they’re very famous. But don’t be deceived. Make sure you’re careful about who you admire and follow. But sometimes Christians will get a, What’s the right word? They might get accused of living in a Christian bubble. You’re just in your little Christian bubble. Living in your own little space, unaware of everything that’s going on around you. Well, well, let me tell you, many of the people we admire, maybe in Hollywood, are in their own little bubble, too. I mean, some of these folks live very depraved lives, and in their little world, everybody’s okay with it. And they think the rest of the world is crazy. For example, holding the biblical sexual values. Do not envy sinners. Be very careful who you admire, who you follow, and who you envy, because the heart can be easily deceived. The heart is not always trustworthy. Our desires are not always good. In fact, the word I have to fill in the blank here. Remember, the heart is fickle. Undependable. Fickle. Some not always trustworthy. And you know how this is. At one minute you could be on cloud nine. You could be having the best day. And something can happen. Something small, even. And you can be miserable in a second. It just is mind blowing how that happens. Everything can be perfect. And the smallest little thing. A buddy of mine was sharing this with me. Nobody here recently. He was out in the driveway. He was in a hurry. He was trying to wash his car and he’s tugging on the water hose and it’s all wadded up. You know how that happens. It gets all tangled up and he keeps tugging on it. And he said, I had this thought. God, why do you hate me? Why have you allowed this to happen to me? That my water hose is all tangled up when I’m trying to wash my car and I’m in a hurry? And he thought, what in the world am I doing? Where did that come from? The smallest little thing was going to ruin his day. And of course, there are big things that set us off course. But how often is our heart just easily led astray? Look at here at a couple of these verses that point this out. Jeremiah 17 nine the heart is deceitful above all things, desperately sick. Who can understand it? The heart easily deceives us and lead us astray. Many times when we have a strong desire and a strong longing, the assumption is, is that we should go with that longing. Follow that. If you feel it strongly, you need to follow your heart. That’s the mantra. You hear all the time in the culture. Every Disney movie has that somewhere in there, follow your heart. That’s where you’ll find fulfillment. But our hearts aren’t always right. In fact, a couple of these verses here, 19:2, desire without knowledge is not good. It’s great to have a strong desire. Make sure it lines up with biblical truth. Desire without knowledge is not good, and whoever makes haste with his feet misses his way. We don’t just run after whatever desire shows up, we make sure it aligns with ancient wisdom for a modern age. Romans ten two even emphasizes this. They have zeal for God, but not according to knowledge. We want to make sure that what we feel deep in our heart aligns with God’s Word, because there’s a couple other ways that our heart tricks us. Sometimes it traps us. That’s the next blank. Proverbs 11:6– The righteousness of the upright delivers them, but the treacherous are taken captive by their lust. They’re trapped by their intense desire, by their intense feeling. You can be trapped by a strong desire if it’s not the right desire, if it doesn’t line up with God’s Word and what is good and what is right. Also, our strong desires blind us. Proverbs 16:2 — all the ways of man are pure in his own eyes, but the Lord weighs the spirit. It can be easy to think I can be blinded to truth. And I can think that because I thought of it, because I felt that it is inherently pure, it is inherently good. All the ways of man are pure in his own eyes. And look, this is tricky because we all have blind spots, but because they’re blind spots, we don’t even know it. We got to have other people in our life to point those out. And if you think you don’t have a blind spot, guess what that is? That’s a blind spot. That’s a big one. We all have even the best cars, the most perfectly designed cars. In fact, probably the fancier it is, the more blind spots it has. Unless you’re in the Popemobile and it’s just a big glass dome. But even then, you can only see forward. You can’t see behind yourself. You got to turn around for that. We all have blind spots. We all have to have other people in our lives that help us see that and are willing to do it in love. They’re willing to come to you and say, look, I think this is an area that you need to give attention to. Do it in love. Do it in kindness. That’s part of what community is. That’s why we’re here. That’s what we hope for, is that others would help us grow and see the full picture. So our hearts can be fickle. They can trap us. They can blind us. Now, how do we move towards the right desire? Because a lot of this is the way the heart works negatively. I’ve been very heavy on that. How do we move towards the right desire to make sure our hearts are fully captivated by the right thing? Let’s look at how the heart changes. How does the heart change? We’re going to look at four ways here. First, remember and be aware that the heart is moldable. Remember it is moldable. Your heart is changeable. Don’t get stuck thinking I can’t change. But here’s the key for a heart to change, it has to be soft. It has to be pliable. Scripture talks about that. Ephesians 4:32 — be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another. Just as God in Christ has forgiven you, we have to have a pliable like a lump of clay. It’s only going to be pliable, moldable, changeable if it’s soft. But if it’s hardened, like in Exodus seven, here in your notes, it’s mentioned where Pharaoh’s heart is described multiple times as hard. He’s not changing. He’s not open to change. He’s not open to hearing another direction. But a soft heart is pliable, is moldable, is changeable. This is important because we need to understand how this happens. And I think the key word for us here is we must, in order to see change come through, we must direct our hearts, give direction to our hearts. 23:19 says hear, my son, and be wise and direct your heart in the way. It’s not follow my heart. Okay? Listen, but direct your heart. Don’t just follow it, lead it. Give it direction. Our hearts are designed to worship, but your heart needs something greater than you to follow. Don’t just look deep inside and follow what you see there. You need something stronger than you outside of yourself to follow. I need something I can lean on. I can’t just lean on me. I’ve let myself down so many times. I’ve failed myself. So many times I need something greater than me, stronger than me, bigger than me to lean on. And so for us, we’ve got to look to God’s Word. We’ve got to follow God’s Word here. Here’s a powerful example of this look in chapter four, and I put the page number of the church Bible. If you have a church Bible here in your notes, it’s on page 496. Yeah. If you don’t have a Bible, we have free copies out in the lobby. Grab those anytime. But I want you to turn over to Proverbs chapter four, because we’re going to read more than just one verse. There’s a few verses here that point this out. We have to be active to direct our hearts. This contradicts or complements what I said at the beginning. What is in your heart will come out. What is already there will come out. But also the way we act affects what goes in our heart. It works both ways. Our heart directs our steps, but our steps influence our heart. It goes both ways. Look here at Proverbs chapter four verse 23. We’ve already read keep your heart with all vigilance, for from it flow the springs of life. Now look at the different parts of the body that are described here, put away from you. Crooked speech. Put devious talk far from you. Be careful with your mouth. In fact, keep your heart, guard your heart is another way to translate that guard your lips. The things you say will affect the condition of your heart. He goes on with the eyes. Let your eyes look directly forward and your gaze be straight before you. What you look at with your eyes affects, influences, your desires, your longing, your heart. And then he says, ponder the path of your feet. Then all your ways will be sure. Do not swerve to the right or to the left. Turn your foot away from evil where you walk, where you take yourself. The company you keep will affect your heart, will influence your heart, will influence your desires, your longings. What you believe, what you want. We’ve got to be active to direct our hearts. And this blank here. The next to the last one on the page is we direct our hearts by following God’s Word. Following God’s word. This right here is what’s going to direct your heart more than anything else in the right way. And I want to I want to issue a challenge today to us. Because everything you consume affects your heart. Everything. There’s no neutral ground. It’s either drawing you closer to God or pulling you away from him. Everything we absorb affects your heart. And here’s my one simple challenge today. We’re not a church that you know. We don’t have a list of books you can’t read, or things you TV shows or movies you can’t watch. We don’t we don’t do all that. But don’t be deceived. Everything you consume affects your heart in some way. Don’t walk in naivete. And so my simple challenge to you this week is to make sure you consume more of God’s Word than social media or news. I’m not saying never look at social media, never look at news, but make sure you’re consuming more of God’s Word than you’re consuming of those. Because, listen, those folks, they spend millions and millions and millions and millions of dollars every year doing all they can to manipulate you to believe what they want you to believe. And don’t just don’t be naive about that. It’s true. They know what they want. They know how to make you swipe up again and keep going endlessly for hours. They they’re smarter than us in that regard. They know our hearts better than we do. Here’s what John will love. I’ll keep feeding him photos of Greek Bibles. He’ll never be able to stop swiping up on those all day long. They know your heart. They know how to do it. The news outlets know how to make you believe what they want you to believe. If you keep absorbing it, the government knows how to get you distracted. Don’t look at this. Look over at this. We want you to look here because we don’t want you to see what’s going on over here. They they know and it’s okay to read the news. It’s okay to be on social media. Just don’t be naive to reality and make sure that this is influencing you more than all that. This is eternal truth. In fact, here’s the simple challenge– spend more time in God’s Word than on all those things combined. If you only got to read your Bible for ten minutes today, then don’t spend any more than ten minutes on social media, media and news. Even write it down and track it this week. Just track it. Just see for one week, write down the numbers. You can look at your screen and see your screen time. It’ll show you how much time you spent on an app. I’ve got a buddy. What he did was he took all of his apps off his phone. I think maybe some of them are there, but on the home screen, the only app he has is the Bible app, and he doesn’t open anything else until he’s opened that and he spent some time. The Bible app has a verse of the day. There’s devotions, there’s prayers, there’s all kinds of stuff to guide you. What we’ve done as a church is we have a Bible reading plan as a church. We want to do all we can to get you in God’s Word. We want to make it normal here that everyone who is here is in God’s Word. This year we’re reading through the whole Bible together and some of us are going, oh yeah, I forgot we were doing that. That’s right. You’re just now reminding me that’s okay, it’s okay. I’m not coming to your house and checking to see if you checked off all the boxes or not. Digging through your Bible to see if the Bible reading plan’s in there. I’m not. This is for you. And if you haven’t, if you’ve fallen off on that, just. Just start again today, right where we are. If you can get back to the rest, great. If not, no worries. Be in God’s word. Don’t let past failures keep you from getting in His Word. This year we’re reading through the whole Bible. Next year we’ll do New Testament Psalms and Proverbs. The year after that, we condense it down a little further just Gospels, acts, Psalms, and Proverbs. But the key thing is be in God’s Word. This is what will allow you to direct your heart. This will give you something true to follow in the midst of just madness. Follow God’s word. Now lastly, this point I think. Helps explain everything else we’ve talked about because I know some of us are sitting here going, okay, John, I have these strong desires and you’re saying I need to change them, but I’ve tried and I can’t. I want to long for something different than these things that I know aren’t good for me. This last point is critical. Ultimately, our hearts must be transformed. Until your heart is changed and transformed. It’s actually impossible to long for Christ and His Word. There might be some interest there, but for it to be your core desire until he opens up your eyes to His Word. In fact, the phrase in the New Testament, John 3:3– unless one is, and this is on the back side of your notes, unless one is born again, born a new reborn spiritual birth, he cannot see the kingdom of God. The wind blows where it wishes. You hear it sound. You do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the spirit, Jesus Christ, working through you, His Holy Spirit in your life. That’s what gives you new life, new spiritual eyes, new spiritual desires. Prior to that, Ephesians says you were dead. Ephesians two verse one, you were dead in your trespasses and sins in which you once walked. And when you’re dead, what can a dead person do to make themselves alive? Not a trick question. Someone surely knows. Nothing. There’s nothing a dead person can do to make themselves come alive. The only hope they have is there’s some other force that can bring them alive. And of course, we know spiritually this is referring to the fact that in my own effort, I can’t make myself alive to Christ. Only he can change my heart. And it says God made us alive in him, raised us with him, seated us with him in the heavenly places. This was a promise that was given in Ezekiel in the Old Testament. I’ll give you a new heart, a new spirit. I’ll put it within you. I’ll remove the heart of stone, the hard heart that doesn’t want change. I’ll remove that. I’ll give you flesh, a heart of flesh. I’ll put my spirit within you. I remember when we were Julie and I worked as campus missionaries for years. And we had to do our own fundraising. And I remember when we went to meet with this, couple who were in Louisiana, we were down that way. We got connected with them. And I’ve shared some of this before, but she shared more about her conversion, about her coming to know Christ. She grew up in a church. I think she said she was Catholic. Many are in that part of the country very heavily Catholic. But for her, she really she thought she was a Christian. She thought she knew who Jesus was. She thought she was doing all the rituals right. But she started into a Bible study at her work. Some people at work had started her in that Bible study. And over the course of that Bible study, she had never really read the Bible much before. She started to see who Jesus is, what he has done on her behalf, how he died on her behalf for her sins, she saw that she needed to repent of her sins and follow him. And there came a point where the leader of that group said, listen, I think, I think it’s time for you to surrender your life to Christ, to give up on trying to control your own life. And follow him. And she said, John, I did that. And I got to tell you that day, it was like scales. She used that phrase. It was like scales fell from my spiritual eyes. I saw stuff I had never seen before. Spiritually, God awakened my heart to him in a way it had never been before, she said. I went to church that Sunday and the priest was talking, and I’m sitting there going, why haven’t you said all this before? I came up to him afterwards and I said, where did you get all this new stuff? What are you talking about? How come you’ve never talked about this before? And he’s like, what are you talking about? I’m not saying anything different than I’ve said before. And he said to her, your eyes are open is the difference. The desires of our heart have to be awakened by Jesus. And if you’ve never surrendered your life to him, I’d love to talk with you about what that means. Just come down front and find me afterwards. I’d love to talk with you. There’s others I know who are available to talk with you. My wife and many of the elders. Listen. So many are longing for purpose and meaning in life. You don’t have to wait another day to find that. You can have that in him today. There’s no reason to wait another day. There’s no reason to keep playing a spiritual game, especially not in this world. Thank you for coming here today. Let’s pray. Jesus, we thank you for your word that guides us, that helps expose the fallen condition of our heart. Our hearts can be fickle. Our hearts can be depraved. Our hearts can be misled. Our hearts can be blind. Thank you that through you, our hearts can be awakened to truth. That in you we can see new life. We can be born again. Jesus. If there’s anyone here that doesn’t know you today, I pray that today would be the day they put a stake in the ground. And they turn from worshiping self to worshiping you. You have created us to desire. Thank you for that. Help us to desire the right things. Would you work in our heart this week? Give us a measure of self-control to feed our hearts with your word more than anything else. Jesus, we love you. Amen.