A Heart Issue

I’m behind on joining in the reading group discussing The Excellent Wife last week, but I’ve got a really long post to make up for it, since I just do not seem to be able to write short posts. Last week we finished Chapter 7, Christ: The Wife’s Heart. This was a hard chapter, but it was one of the best yet, I think. The issue of idols in the heart and learning to worship Christ wholeheartedly is one every believer needs to be aware of, not just wives, but I know this book is specifically dealing with being a godly wife.

There was so much packed into this chapter that I really wish I could just quote the whole thing, but I’m not going to do that. I very much like the focus that we are dealing with the wife’s day to day devotion to Christ and being aware that we are to daily consecrate our hearts to Him. Mrs. Peace quotes Lou Priolo, saying, “An idol can be anything. It may even be a good thing. But if we want it so badly that we sin if we don’t get it or sin to attain it, then we are worshipping an idol rather than Christ.” This is a very good, very thought-provoking definition of what an idol is. I especially appreciate the emphasis that the desire may even be a good desire in itself, but its how we react to it and set our affections that makes it an idol or not. I remember having a conversation with someone once who is very squeamish about the idea of suffering in life. We talked about how anything that can cause us to lose faith in God if we either lose it or never get to have it is an idol, because we want it more than we love God. That’s hard, isn’t it? But we really need to think about these things.

Mrs. Peace’s example of the fisherman and his desire to go fishing was good. Substitute any desire there, especially good desires, and it is interesting and disturbing to realize how easily things and ideas can replace pure devotion to Christ.

“Believers have a God-given capacity to have a pure devotion to and worship of the Lord Jesus Christ, but they frequently struggle with other “gods”/lusts/cravings competing for these affections. These “desires” are not necessarily bad.”…….

If that person who loves fishing is denied an anticipated fishing trip, “A person whose heart is set on fishing may become angry, frustrated, feel self-pitying, anxious, manipulative, or bitter. Fishing is not sinful, but what a person thinks about it may be.”

Think about your life at the moment. Substitute whatever is going on that has you feeling angry, frustrated, self-pitying, anxious, manipulative, or bitter. There is a good chance that that ‘whatever’ may be a good desire which has taken too high a place in your affections and has become an idol. Those aren’t easy things to think about. I’ve been examining my own heart this week, I’ll tell you. I was humbled looking at her list of things that could become idols – things we set our hearts on – and how many of them are danger areas for me if I am not careful. I had to circle several. And I thought of others that weren’t on the list.

To me, a key that I am getting things out of perspective and beginning to set my affections on something other than Christ are summed up in this statement: “When they do not turn out as you may desire, frustration and perhaps anxiety begin to build even to the point of desperation.” When frustration and anxiety build, I need to use those negative emotions as a real warning to examine what it is that I’ve set my heart’s desire on and get into the Word and pray and ask God to help me realign my desires with His will, because, “(w)hen something is so important to us that we sin to get it or we sin when it doesn’t go well, it can be an idol in our heart.”

The entire section on God-honoring desires was very meaningful to me as I read last week. She is right that such a heart is a grace gift from God. Mrs. Peace quotes Psalm 37:4, “Delight yourself in the Lord, and He will give you the desires of your heart.” I have heard that scripture so misused – treating God as if He is obligated to give us just whatever we think we want (like a genie as was mentioned under the false saviors/refuges discussion). She carefully explained that this verse means that God will put the desires in our heart that He wants to be there as we seek to delight in Him. We need to ask God for that kind of passion, to honor and glorify Him, and diligently seek Him in His written Word. I very much like how she pointed out also, that we need to cultivate an attitude of gratefulness, to deliberately think grateful thoughts to God – even when we don’t feel like it. Amen! It really isn’t about me and my feelings, we need to be learning to look at things from an eternal perspective and quit the navel gazing and “woe-is-meism” that we are so prone to do. Boy did this get into my business this week.

The point being made is that what we spend the most time focusing our thoughts on and planning for and longing for is what we have our heart set on. Some of the desires may not be wrong in and of themselves, but they are not where our deepest longing should be placed. I noticed a striking difference in the list of possible wrong desires – if they become idolatrous – and that was that they were all “me” focused, how I feel, what I want, how special I want to feel, etc. I notice, too, that just having the desire isn't necessarily always wrong, but allowing a good desire to become too important to me is what is wrong. The right desires were God focused. I’d like to list those things Mrs. Peace highlighted as right things to set our heart toward because I know that if I will spend more time cultivating those kinds of thoughts and desires, the other things won’t be so difficult to deal with:

"1. That I may know God’s Word and obey it.
2. That I may delight in Him.
3. That I may seek Him with all my heart.
4. That I may be pleasing to Him regardless of my circumstances (this one really hit me hard).
5. That I may cultivate an attitude of joy and gratitude in what God is doing in my life no matter what my husband does or does not do (and I add here and no matter if things in life are not going exactly as I would want).
6. That I may have joy in God deciding how my life and circumstances can glorify Him the most, that He can use me for His glory. "

Really this boils down to our understanding of God. Is He sovereign? Is He Lord? Am I submitting to Him? Am I willing to serve and love Him even if things don’t seem to go the way I want? Am I willing to surrender my wants to Him and let Him have the rule of my life? These are difficult questions to answer, but as I thought about them this week, I kept coming back to my recent study of Matthew. Jesus took my sin and bled and died and rose again so that I could be made right with God. In light of that awesome truth, I bow my knees and cry, “Holy! Merciful Savior!” I want to learn to view my circumstances through that lens all my days and learn to desire Him more than anything else. In other words, I’m asking God to give me desires that will honor Him and to give me the strength and eyes to see the idols that I am prone to hold in my heart and to learn to recognize when something is taking His rightful place on the throne of my heart.

In closing, Mrs. Peace gave us several very useful ways to set our minds on the things above. The last one was extremely meaningful and difficult for me. “Be alert to sinful anger (you’ll feel frustrated) and/or anxiety as an indicator that your motive is likely not righteous. As soon as you are aware that you are sinning, confess it to God. Take the time and effort to think a God-honoring thought in place of the idolatrous thought.”

If you’ve read my blog for a while you’ve probably seen that I have talked about times when I struggle with my temper and frustration. I see that this is an indicator that somehow my thinking or motives are not righteous in those situations, and I want to be more aware of this and more diligent to stop and recognize this, in the heat of the moment and learn to think God-honoring thoughts. It was pointed out that it is not our circumstances that make us sin, but our idolatrous heart. May I have ears to hear and eyes to see, that I will not give in to the temptation to blame my circumstances for my sin but to recognize it as sin and repent. I do so want to be found faithful. And because Jesus is ever interceding for me as one of His, I can trust Him to continue to grow me and lead me in sanctification. For His glory.