By Elizabeth Garrett
• You deserve to be happy!
• You do you!
• You do what is best for you!
• You have the right to live your life!
Lately, I have noticed these comments pop up repeatedly as I have scrolled through my Facebook newsfeed. These comments have always been heard in the world…it is a humanistic, man-centered viewpoint. But these comments are not being written by the world: they are being written by Christians!
To quote James 3:10, “My brethren, these things ought not so to be.”
It is so easy for the world and the world’s philosophy to infiltrate our thinking. We must constantly guard against it. Nowhere in Scripture are we told that we deserve happiness or that we are to do what is right for us. It is quite the contrary! Scripture teaches us that all we are and all we have is by the grace and mercy of God! And our duty to our God is to obey Him in all things, not do what is “right” for us. Our life and our decisions are to bring glory to God. "What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own? For ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God's" (I Corinthians 6:19-20).
Those who are not saved follow the leading of their heart, their flesh. Yet, we as born-again children of God are warned about our hearts. Jeremiah 17:9 says, “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?” The days of the Judges in the Bible were perilous times! As we read Judges, we do not have to wonder for long what the problem was. Judges 17:6 says, “In those days there was no king in Israel, but every man did that which was right in his own eyes.” When a man chooses to follow the leading of his own heart instead of what God says, the results are disastrous!
As a child of God, I should not base my decisions on what makes me happy or what I consider to be “right” for me.
So, how can we combat this way of thinking?
• Prepare our hearts
Ezra 7:10, “For Ezra had prepared his heart to seek the law of the Lord and to do it, and to teach in Israel statutes and judgments.” The word prepared in that verse in the original language means “to establish, to set up, to be firm, to be securely determined.” It gives the idea to establish or determine in our hearts. Here Ezra determined in his heart that he would seek God’s Word, obey it, and teach it! We must determine in our hearts that we will follow God, no matter what happens or what others do. We should establish the fact that we will not be led by our heart, our emotions, or what “sounds right.”
• Keep our hearts
Proverbs 4:23, “Keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life.” The command to keep means “to guard (in a good sense), to protect, to watch over.” Solomon tells us to guard or protect our hearts with diligence. It is essential that we guard what enters our hearts and what proceeds from our hearts. It requires effort on my part! I cannot simply float through my Christian life with no regard for my heart (my thoughts, emotions, etc). It is a proactive command; I must take the initiative to protect my heart both against what is in my heart and against what would enter my heart from the world.
• Guide our hearts
Proverbs 23:19, “Hear thou, my son, and be wise, and guide thine heart in the way.” Guide means “to go straight on, to lead on, to set right.” As the world shouts its mantra, “Follow your heart!,” God commands His child to guide her heart, to lead it, to set it right. Here is where our standard is presented. Paul tells us in Ephesians 4:13, “Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ.” Throughout Scripture, we are given instructions on how God wants us to live and how we can be more like Christ. We are to take these commands and guide our hearts in the correct path. We cannot follow the path that our heart chooses; our heart will not choose what pleases God. It will always choose what pleases the flesh.
May the Lord help us measure our thoughts and words by the standard of His Word and not just repeat phrases that “sound good” to justify wrong decisions or behaviors.
We do not desire to pattern our thoughts after the philosophy of the lost world around us.