Friday, January 6, 2017

Worth Repeating - January 6, 2017


Psalm 51: 10 Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me. (NIV)

Every heart is contaminated and capable of horrendous wickedness.*

Is it possible to have a steadfast spirit without having a pure heart? David seems to imply that it is. Perhaps we take David’s words too literally instead of allowing him his poetic license, but whether one condition exists without the other or not, David knows he is lacking and that it is not within his power to fix what is broken. He asks God to create a pure heart in him, not to make the old one clean.* He acknowledges that if God can create the universe, he certainly has the power to create a new heart.

A pure heart is an undivided will; a steadfast spirit that is loyal, constant and consistent. Surely, a new heart – a pure heart – would revive the constant and consistent spirit that had been languishing around the old heart.

According to II Corinthians 5: 17, “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!” We don’t have to make do with the scraps of an old, mended heart – he makes a new one from scratch!

Jesus changes our hearts in an instant. But becoming like Christ is a process of putting off things that are old, and putting on things that are new.*

No comments:

Post a Comment