Man to to go through what he did and then to carry that cross to
Calvary and, and be and be nailed on it and, and, you know,
still have the, the presence of mind, I guess you would say, to
know exactly what he was doing it for and to say it is finished
on that cross. And what a what a picture we
have of all that happening in the Bible.
But I saw a guy, Christian guy that he said for the last few
years he's been on Easter Sunday morning, he goes out and it's
part of his workout routine, I guess.
But on Easter he puts, they assume they, they estimate the
cross weighed about 300 lbs roughly.
And so he puts a, a £300 beam on his back and walks the distance
that it would have been to Calvary.
And he shows himself starting and he's, you know, kind of
going decent. He's walking and then he gets
done and he's just, he's exhausted and they, and he
always uses this video to say, and Christ did that completely
torn to shreds. You know, after all the beating
and everything that he took, then he still carried that
cross. It's no wonder that, you know,
halfway, halfway there, he, he fell under the weight of it.
But what a what an amazing thing Christ did for us and I hope we
never forget. I'm so glad that he didn't walk
away from that cross. He could have the Bible says
that he could have called 10,000 angels to destroy the world that
was there putting him on that cross, but he didn't and he took
that for us. What an amazing thing.
All right, turn in your Bibles to first Samuel chapter 10.
And while you're turning there, thank you to everybody that's
pitching in while all the normal spot fillers are gone.
I know the mute the sound is is always I've done it a couple
times and it is much more difficult than the people that
know what they're doing make it look like.
So you've heard of the the the the word picture of you know,
somebody who's making things look so smooth, but underneath
their their legs are like a duck just going crazy.
That's kind of how Sunday mornings are when pastors gone.
So maybe it looks smooth, maybe it doesn't.
I assume it it seems smooth. But anyways, first Samuel
chapter 10, brother, brother Greg mentioned this this morning
in Sunday school that you know, once, once you're asked to
preach, it's not something we do all the time.
So it's, it's definitely out of our comfort zone.
But immediately you start asking God, what do you want me to
preach on? It's a, it's a serious thing.
I believe it's not just something you go in and oh, I've
preached this before. Grab it out and I'll preach
that. I mean, it's, it's what you want
God to have you preach for his people and for yourself to study
out. And so I did the same thing.
By the way, I got to mention this Sunday morning does not
necessarily mean it's the most qualified that's preaching
Sunday morning. Pastor gives me a four, four or
five different message or spots that need filled and I pick 1
and I got Sunday morning so that no, I'm just kidding.
That's not how that happened. But anyways, First Samuel, I'm
reading through the Bible this year on a, what's it called?
Chronological chronological order.
So it's not necessarily in order that the Bible is, is compiled,
but it's in order that it was written as best they can figure
out. And just a week or so, week and
a half ago, we, we came through first Samuel chapter 10.
And I read something that I don't think I've ever noticed
before, or, or at least it's never been pointed out.
It's never really stuck out to me.
And we're going to look at that this morning.
But before I do that, I don't have any jokes, but I've got
some facts. And I think by our facts, you're
going to be able to tell what we'll be talking about this
morning. But the the the lifespan of a
heart. The average human heart beats
100,000 times per day, and the average human lifespan of a
heart will beat 2.6 billion beats in a lifetime roughly.
Got some more facts though? Blood pumping.
Each minute the heart pumps nearly a 1 1/2 gallons of blood.
They have this all in liters and I can't.
It doesn't make it doesn't compute to me.
So I switched it all to to what we can understand, but each
minute the heart pumps nearly a gallon and a half of blood Judge
adds up to about 2000 gallons of blood a day that the heart
pumps. They say the adult heart is
roughly the size of two hands clasped together.
So that's about the size of your heart and it weighs between 12
and 16 ounces. So I would place our hand over
our our heart like this. The The heart sits just left of
the center of your chest, protected by ribs, and the left
lung is slightly smaller to accommodate it.
This is interesting, though. The heart's rhythm is controlled
by what's called the cardiac conduction system, which allows
it to be even when it's disconnected from our body.
And that's pretty amazing. The electrical pulse is in it
allows it to be completely disconnected.
But here's some some neat facts about hearts.
A blue whale's heart can weigh up to or can weigh over 1000
lbs. That's what they say it's, and
it's roughly the size of a Volkswagen Beetle, like a
Volkswagen bug. That's how big a blue whale's
heart is. But the hummingbird's heart
weighs grams and can beat over 1000 * a minute.
And they also say the American pygmy shrews, a little tiny mole
of sorts, has the fastest mammalian heartbeat at 1200
beats per minute. All right, let's see.
I've got one for the kids here. Oh, this is something we need to
pay attention to. There are patterns, they say,
for heart attacks. Based on the data, the most
heart attacks of court occur on Christmas Day.
I don't know if it's the husband realizing how much money was
spent, Down he goes with the wife maxing out credit cards.
I'm not sure. But the most heart attacks occur
on Christmas Day, followed by the day after Christmas, maybe
when it's finally setting in, and then also on New Year's Day,
with Monday's being the riskiest day of the week for heart
attacks. So interesting facts there about
our hearts. And this one's for the kids to
help you understand how much 2000 gallons of blood is a day.
They say the blood can pump the equivalent of about 40 bathtubs
full of blood every day. That's how much your heart
pumps. So anyways, it is Sunday
morning, so we got to get a little bit more spiritual about
what we're going to talk about. But the Bible references and we
are going to talk about the heart this morning of sorts.
But the heart is going to be our topic and we'll see that in
first Samuel chapter 10. But it's the Bible says the
Bible references the heart 1100 times and almost without,
without exception, it is not referencing the physical,
biological organ that we were just talking about, but the
center, the heart as the center of our thoughts, our emotions,
our intellect and our spiritual life, guiding our actions and
reflecting one's relationship with God.
And if you think about that, I'm going to read a couple verses,
but everywhere we see the heart in the Bible, that's what it's
talking about. For example, Proverbs chapter 4,
verse 23. Keep thy heart with all
diligence, for out of it are the issues of life.
It's obviously not talking about your physical heart, right?
Keep your heart, keep your what we already said, your thoughts,
your emotions, your intellect, your spiritual life, your
relationship with God. Keep that with all diligence,
for out of it are the issues of life.
That makes sense, right? You step away from your
relationship with God. You stop spending time in God's
word, you stop being in church and you can actually see
yourself starting to drift. Your spirituality, your
spiritual life starts to drift. Jeremiah 17/9.
The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked.
Who can know it? Obviously, again, not talking
about our physical heart. It's, it's our, our, our
emotions, our intellect is, is wicked.
It's deceitful. Bible even says, who can
actually know that? Who can know the heart?
First Samuel 16, seven. But the Lord said unto Samuel,
look not on his countenance or on the height of his stature,
for man looketh on the outward appearance, but the Lord looketh
on the heart. And again, this is when David is
being chosen as king and, and God tells Samuel, I'm not
looking at the outward appearance, I'm looking at man's
heart. What is he?
What is his relationship with me like?
Matthew 58. Blessed are the pure in heart,
for they shall see God. Proverbs 3, five and six.
Brother Greg read this this morning.
Trust in the Lord with all thine heart, and lean not unto thy own
understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge Him,
and He shall direct thy path. So we see the heart mentioned,
like I said, 1100 * / 1100 times in the Word of God, almost
always referring to this, this emotion, this intellect, this
spiritual life that we have. Now, as a side note, we often, I
think, use them as the same when we talk about the heart and the
mind, right? We'll often say in, especially
when we're teaching or when we're talking to someone else
spiritually or, or with a biblical context, the heart and
the mind, we kind of use them interchangeably, but the mind
is, is, I think there are, it is different, but I think it's, it
is kind of subtle. The heart is often focused on
feelings and the will, while the mind is often associated with
reasoning. And so, for example, I want, I
want us to understand this because sometimes we reason what
is right to do based on maybe what we know about the word of
God. We reason that that is our mind.
But then with our heart, we do something different.
That's our, our will, our, our desires.
And so, for example, somebody might say, I have a mind to
whatever, you know, often it's in in reference to discipline.
I have a mind to, to whoop you, you know, but then someone else
might say my heart just isn't in it.
So, so for example, it may be something that you know, is
right to do or, you know, it's a good thing to do something that
you've reasoned in your mind. This needs to be done, but my
heart's just not in it. That's the, and that's our will.
And so we're going to talk about that this morning.
Our, our hearts in that context. All right, so go to first Samuel
chapter 10 if you're not already there.
And we're going to start in verse one, just to get a little
bit of context. We're going to read down through
verse 12 and then we will, we'll pray and get into this message.
But first Samuel chapter 10 and verse one and this to give you a
tiny bit of background, is Saul when he's about to be anointed
as king and these preceding chapters, he is, he is with a
servant and he's hiking through these regions looking for
donkeys that have been lost. He's looking for the donkeys of
his father. He's the he is the donkey keeper
for his father and they get lost and he's he's searching for them
and pretty diligent about it, to be honest, to the to the point
where they've been gone so long. He says, hey, let's go back
before dad starts asking, man, I wonder what happened to them and
forget about the donkeys. What happened to Saul in my
servant? So that's the background here
and he comes to Samuel verse chapter 10, verse one.
Then Samuel took a vial of oil and poured it upon his head.
And what actually happened here is he was looking to go to the
man of God to help him give direction.
Tell me where these donkeys are AT.
And that's when he comes to Saul and I mean Samuel and Samuel
took a vial of oil and poured it upon his head and kissed him and
said, is it not because the Lord hath anointed thee to be captain
over his hair, His inheritance, which is news to Saul?
He has no idea this is coming. He's just going to look for
guidance where to look for these donkeys and all of a sudden he
is being anointed by Samuel as captain over Israel.
And I'm I'm sure he was confused himself not understanding what
was going on. You also have to remember
Samuel's sons were the last judges of of Israel.
Bible says that in the preceding past chapters, but Samuel's sons
did not walk with God like he did.
And so because of their actions is when the people actually say,
you know what, just give us a king.
We we're done with the judges. They were corrupt is what the
problem was. They were corrupt and they and,
and they were not godly. And so God's people or the
children of Israel finally said, give us a king.
And God tells Samuel, you know what, yes, give them what
they're asking for. Go, go find a king.
And here we have Saul. When thou art departed first two
from me today, then thou shalt find two men by Rachel Sepulchre
in the border of Benjamin at Zelza.
And they will say unto thee, The asses which thou wentest to seek
are found, and lo, thy father hath left the care of the asses
and sorroweth for you. Saying, What shall I do?
For my son is exactly what Saul was worried about.
They found the donkeys, and now they're worried about Saul.
His father's weeping for him. Then shalt thou go on forward
from thence, and thou shalt come to the plain of Tabor, and there
shall meet the three men going up to God to Bethel, one
carrying three kids, and another carrying three loaves of bread,
and another carrying a bottle of wine.
And they will salute thee, and give thee 2 loaves of bread,
which thou shalt receive of their hands.
Verse 5. After that thou shalt come to
the hill of God, where is the Garrison of the Philistines,
which Saul would deal with for his entire reign, the
Philistines. But he's coming over to this
Garrison of the Philistines. And it should come to pass, when
thou art come thither to the city, that thou shalt meet a
company of profits coming down from the high place, with a psal
tree, and a tablet, and a pipe, and a harp before them.
And they shall prophecy, and the Spirit of the Lord will come
upon thee, and thou shalt prophecy with them.
And thou shalt be turned into another man.
Interesting phrase there Thou shalt be turned into another
man. And let it be, when these signs
are come unto thee, that thou do as occasion serve thee, for God
is with thee. And thou shalt go down before me
to Gilgal, and behold, I will come down unto thee to offer
burnt offerings, and to sacrifice sacrifices of peace
offering. Seven days shalt thou tarry till
I come to thee and show thee what thou shalt do.
And it's also interesting. Remember when Saul was commanded
to to completely wipe out certain cities, and he didn't do
it. And, and what is Samuel's
response to him? When you were small in your own
eyes, then God, God bless you, he had favor on you, but now
you're big in your own eyes and, and you have problems.
Well, still here in chapter 10, it's all small in his own eyes.
He's, he's doing exactly what Samuel commands him to do.
All these verses are Samuel commanding him to do things.
And verse 9 we see. And it was so that when he had
turned his back to go from Samuel, God gave him another
heart. And all those signs came to pass
that day. Everything Samuel said was going
to happen happen because Saul did what he was exactly what he
was told to do in verse 10. And when they came thither to
the hill, behold, a company of prophets met him, and the Spirit
of God came upon him. Saul and he prophesied among
them. And it came to pass, when all
that knew him before time saw that, behold, he prophesied
among the prophets. Then the people said one to
another, What is this that has come under?
The son of Kish is saw also among the prophets.
And one of the same place answered and said, But who is
their father? Therefore it became a proverb is
Saul also among the prophets and this happens actually a couple
times in the life of Saul where he prophesized what's going to
happen. And in this proverb actually is
is fact. It becomes a proverb in Israel
is all also among the prophets. But what I want to focus on this
morning just for a few minutes is in verse 9.
And it was so that when he had turned his back to go from
Samuel not in a bad way. He's leaving, God gave him
another heart and all those signs came to pass that day.
God gave him another heart. That's what I want to I want to
look at this morning for for us is that maybe that should be our
prayer. God give me another heart.
I think it's important when we get going in our, in our
Christian life, we get going in our walk with God and it starts
to get cold or it starts to not be what it used to be.
I don't know that there's anything particularly that we
can do to fix that other than to ask God to, to help us fix that.
We see that in Psalm 51. We see that quite a bit actually
in David's prayer there of of confession and of of humbling
himself before God. He says restore to me the joy of
my salvation. He's not saying I'm going to
restore my joy. He's asking God to do that.
I believe that's exactly what this that was in Psalm 51, David
saying God give me, give me that heart that I used to have, give
that back to me. So we're going to look at six
things. They're going to be short and
six, six different types of heart that we can ask God for
this morning that he'll give us a new heart in these six
different areas. Before we do that, let's go
ahead and pray and then we'll look at those things.
Father, I thank you for this day you've given us and I thank you
for the opportunity we have to meet around your word.
And God, I pray that as you worked in in my heart about this
topic, I pray that you'd help me to be able to convey these same
thoughts to your people. And I pray that you'd help us,
maybe if there's one of them that we're struggling and God,
that we would be able to take take a look at what's inside of
our heart. And, and maybe we need to ask
you for a new one and maybe to change what we've got going on
in our life, not not because we're we've made a mess
necessarily, but because we need a different mindset.
We need a different heart attitude toward what we've been
doing. And so I pray that you just use
these words that you've given me in the hearts of your people in
Jesus name, I pray. Amen.
Turn to Ezekiel chapter 36. If you will, keep your finger
there in first Samuel or a bookmark and go to Ezekiel
chapter 36. If you have a second bookmark,
leave it in Ezekiel because at the end of the message we'll be
back in the same passage. But verse 30, chapter 36 and
verse 26 is what I want to look at for our first first point and
the first point being God give me a new heart towards sin and
my rejection of Christ. This is this is where all of us
were at some point in our life. Most, I would maybe be fair to
say everyone in America has heard of Jesus Christ right now.
Maybe in, in remote regions, they've not heard of Jesus
Christ and they're worshipping idols because they, they don't
know anything about him. But in America and and we know
who Jesus is. But our heart before we were
saved, our heart attitude towards sin and our rejection or
our rebellion against Christ is, is one that we don't care.
We don't care that we're rejecting him.
And so Ezekiel chapter 36 verse 26 says this.
Let's see verse 26 and this, this you can read this whole
passage, but this is Jesus talking or this is God talking
to Israel. But I think it very much applies
to the the unsaved heart. He says, then will I sprinkle
verse 25 clean water upon you and you shall be clean from all
your filthiness and from all your idols.
Will I cleanse you? Well, we've all, we all before,
especially before our salvation were filthy and had idols in our
lives. That's us from all your
filthiness and all your idols. Will I cleanse you a new heart
also will I give you? And a new spirit will I put it
within you? And I will.
And what does that do? When I give you a new heart?
I will take away the Stony heart out of your flesh and I will
give you a heart of flesh. And what he's saying is, you
know, the parable of the, the sower, when he's sowing seed,
that's the picture of, of seed, the gospel falling on different
hearts, right? And the Stony heart just does
not receive it. It can't receive it.
And God says here in Ezekiel, I'm going to give you a heart of
flesh that you'll be able to accept the gospel.
That is, that's, that's from God.
And, and my point here is we need God to give us a new heart.
That'll be the maybe the subtopic underneath every one of
these. God has to do it.
That's the important thing to remember.
This is not a motivational speech of brother Ninton sent a
video maybe a couple of you saw it, but he sent a video of this.
This woman was preaching and that's a problem.
First of all, but she was preaching away and I you could
tell she was reading it. So I don't know if it was
actually her message or what, but she's just I mean she sound
like a lion up there roar. It was it was in a church.
This is your time you take the reins is going on and on.
That's not that's not biblical. God has to do that in our hearts
to make us able to accept the seed of the gospel.
And I mentioned that the heart and the mind are different, but
this is where the heart and the mind being different is so
important in our minds meet. We might sit in a message where
the gospel is preached and realize I need God, I need to be
saved, I need to do that. But then in our hearts we don't
have any desire to truly be reconciled back to God.
That's, that's the difference. We can come.
I mean, think about it. Even the devils believe and
tremble and refuse to humble themselves before God.
They know in their minds what's right.
They know who he is. But they refuse in their heart
to accept that. They refuse to to let God give
them a new heart. This is this is another thing.
Maybe you are sitting here and and I I'm looking out over the
crowd. I don't know.
I have no way of knowing. I can't look on the heart.
Remember God, we read that verse God, man looks on the outside,
but God looks on the heart. I have no way of looking at the
heart and knowing who is and who is not saved, who has accepted
Christ. But maybe you're sitting here
and you realize your sin is a huge problem.
We were knocking doors a couple weeks ago and and talk to a man
about this exact thing. We have a huge issue our sin.
That is the issue. The issue is not particularly or
maybe the first issue is not am I going to heaven or not I need
to go to heaven. That's not the main issue.
The main issue is you are separated from God because of
your sin. A great byproduct of accepting
Christ as your Savior is heaven, but that's not the main goal of
salvation is heaven or to escape hell.
The main the main goal is to be reconciled back to God because
of our sin. And so maybe we're sitting here
realizing I have a a huge problem and that is sin because
I've never asked God to forgive me and redeem me back to the
Father with and through his blood.
But I, and we've all heard people say this, I don't deserve
forgiveness. I don't deserve to be forgiven.
None of us. But none of us do, right?
Every one of us that has accepted Christ, we know we did
not deserve to be forgiven. And so God doesn't base our
forgiveness on deserving or not. Of course we're not deserving.
We're in a rebellion against God, refusing to turn from our
sin. Of course we don't.
If if any sin didn't deserve to be forgiven, it'd be that one.
But God does anyways because he gives us, as we see in verse 26
of Ezekiel chapter 36, a new heart.
And I will take away the Stony heart out of your flesh and will
give you a heart of flesh. And verse 27 He continues on And
I'll put my spirit within you and cause you to walk in my
statues, and you shall keep my judgments and do them.
Think about this. I think sometimes we get so
proud sitting in church, maybe growing up in church that I, I
follow the Bible, I do what I'm supposed to do.
But verse 27 says I put that in you.
I put that desire to walk in my statutes in you.
I did that. God did so we have nothing to be
proud of. We have everything to be
thankful for that he gave us a new heart toward our sin and our
rejection of Christ, a heart for our salvation.
Now I wanted to touch real quickly on this and then we'll
move on. But you know, it's a it's a big
debate. Now is repentance needed for
salvation because repentance is a work and and it is it's a big
debate. I don't know if you've heard of
it or not, but it's out there. And without getting too deep
into that, I think this is exactly this makes the point
that's that repentance is not a work.
Psalm chapter 34, verse 18. The Lord is nigh unto them that
are of a broken heart and saveth such as be of a contrite spirit.
Jeremiah 24/7 I will give them an heart to know me.
When God changes or gives us a new heart in this in this
respect for salvation, we repent of our sin because of the new
heart he gave us. Therefore repentance is not a
work of ours. It's what God gave us that gives
us. What do you think it means when
it's when the Bible says and gives us the power to become the
sons of God. He empowers us to realize what
our sin has done to us. Go to Ephesians chapter 2,
please. Ephesians chapter 2, a very,
very familiar verse, but I want to read it maybe in a little
different way than we're used to hearing it.
This is a verse that we learn as little kids in in Sunday school
and in Awamas when I was growing up Lighthouse Kids Club.
Now this set of verses for by grace are ye saved through faith
and that not of yourselves. It is the gift of God, not of
works, lest any man should boast.
And that is a great verse and it is a verse for our for
salvation. But if we slow it down just a
little bit for by grace are ye saved through faith?
And then there's a break, right? For by grace are ye saved
through faith? And that what is that that
referring back to? I think the faith because
because it says and that not isn't and that not of
yourselves. Well, we know grace.
The grace isn't of ourselves. We know the salvation isn't of
ourselves. So then what about the faith?
Well, that we tell people all the time.
You have to have faith to believe what Jesus did for you
on the cross so that the faith is not of yourself, which goes
back to these verses that we just read.
God gives us a heart of flesh to accept the gospel and have put
our faith in the Son of God. But even the faith that we have
is not of ourselves. It's given to us by God.
What a gift and so yes, Jesus death on the cross is a gift.
It is but the Bible tells us that the carnal man cannot can't
realize that that gift that that was given to us on the cross.
We they don't even they don't respect it.
They don't acknowledge it. They don't aren't thankful for
it until we are given that faith, that heart of faith from
God himself and then and then that would say Oh well then and
Calvinism that must be accurate that it is of God.
No, God gives us a new heart to accept him but that that spirit
or that we saw that in Ezekiel and gives you a new spirit to
walk in his statutes and all the rest of that that comes from us
giving that message out that people need.
They have a problem that they are not reconciled back to God
because of their sin. And then God says, see, now you
know now I will give you the faith that you need to accept
me. It's still not works.
And so they're the debate for is repentance works or not?
It's not. The Bible's very clear on that
all over the place, but that's not the point of tonight, this
morning's message, but very clear.
Repentance is, is needed. It is needed.
If you don't have a change of mind and a change of heart about
your sin, what do you need saved from?
Why would you feel the need to come to Christ and say, please
save me, I can't do it on my own.
Do what? So repentance is needed for
salvation, but God gives us that heart of repentance.
What a what a gift, a second gift in our, in our salvation
experience. Let's move along forsake of
time. And secondly, we're going to
we're going to look at God. These are all requests.
These are not commands, by the way, God, give me a new heart.
It's a request. God give me a new heart.
We know we have problems. We know most of the time what
our problems are and we just can't in and of ourselves.
We can't come to the point where we say I'm I'm going to get this
right. You know, determination is a
great thing, but it only goes so far.
We need a new heart. You know, the little engine that
could, the little train. I think I can.
I think we have an engine that
is failing and we need a new one.
We need a new heart for those things.
I think I can does not get us spiritually where we need to be.
We need God to to give us a new heart.
So secondly, God give me a new heart towards sin that breaks
the heart of Christ and breaks my relationship with Christ.
So now this is not a new heart in our in salvation, but a new
heart toward my sin. Really the the repentance even
after we're saved, we we need to repent.
We need to ask forgiveness often the hymn writer and you may know
the story behind this, but he he wrote prone to wander, Lord, I
feel it prone to leave the God I love and then the next phrase
says here's my heart O take and seal it seal it for that courts
above but prone to wander Lord, I feel it.
And if you know the story behind that, the guy that wrote that
later was in a in a carriage and young lady was was humming that
that hymn and he got in the carriage and he said, what is
what is that you're you're singing?
And she told him, she said, have you ever heard it?
And at this point this was I don't know that I don't think he
was a pastor at it. I'm not sure.
I didn't go read the story, but he was a Christian man for sure
and wrote this him and she asked him if he had ever heard it.
But by this time, for several years, he had been completely
away from his walk with God, doing his own thing in the
world. And he told this this young
lady, ma'am, I am the poor Wretch that wrote that song.
And then thankfully the story goes, he came back to Christ.
God smote his heart here as to what he had been doing, but
prone to wander. Lord, I feel it.
Do you feel that I do we in we naturally do not love to do to
go after the things of God. We're prone to wander, and not
only are we prone to wander, we're also very prone to the
attacks of Satan who help us wander and help us get
sidetracked by things that just are not important.
But here's my heart, O take and seal it.
Seal it for the courts above, which is why God tells us in
Proverbs chapter 4, we already read this verse, but he says
keep thy heart with all diligence, for out of it are the
issues of life because we're prone to wander.
Keep your heart but when we fail to keep it, we read in Psalm 51
verse 10, David wandered, slipped, fell and then he says
created me a clean heart Oh God, and renew a right spirit within
me. That's what we're talking about
this morning. Give me a new heart to see sin
the way you see it. We know how God sees it, but do
we see it the way he sees it? We excuse ourselves, you know,
for and I mentioned this often, but we, we excuse ourselves for
our pet sins or our maybe things that it's, it's not that bad.
But the Holy Spirit has told you, yes, I want you to stop
that. If it's not that bad and nobody
else thinks it's bad, I mean, it's but but if God works in
your heart to change that, it needs to be changed.
Lust, change my heart toward that.
God, please not a command again, but please change my heart
toward that. How about this for the kids?
A bad attitude toward my parents, bitterness toward my
parents, anger when I'm told what to do.
How, how about that? Why are we always fighting that?
Because A we're flesh, but B, we don't see our sin as that bad
before the eyes of a holy and righteous God.
We don't think think about what Satan did when he got kicked out
of heaven. What was his, what was his sin?
Pride. And so when God says honor your
father and your mother, that's a command.
And you say, me, I feel like having a bad attitude.
You've just put yourself above God in pride.
That's a big problem and we don't look at it that way.
Or when God says, you know in Matthew, the Sermon on the
Mount, that if you look with look on a woman with lust,
you've committed adultery in your heart already and you say
it's just a look that we've put ourselves above God's word,
which we heard this morning from brother Greg just did a little
bit there. He's but the Bible says that he
honors his word above Christ himself that think about how
much how important God's word is and we say me, I feel like doing
that so I'm just going to do that.
We need to ask God for a new heart in regards to how we see
our sin. Psalm 51, verse 12, just a
couple verses after the one we just read.
Restore unto me the joy of thy salvation and uphold me with thy
free spirit. How do we restore the joy of our
salvation, the new heart toward our sin, a new attitude toward
our sin given again by God. Thirdly, and we'll move through
these next ones pretty quickly, but thirdly, I want to mention
them though, a new heart toward prayer.
God give me a new heart toward prayer.
My desire to pray instead spend time with God is just not there.
Or it's or it's dry. I do it because I know I'm
supposed to, but it's just not warm.
It's not think it think about any relationship that you look
back or think back fondly on and say, man, I remember when we
used to whatever it is right, your, your, your mom or your dad
or a sibling or a spouse and then that that closeness drifts
away. I'll give you an example.
I just talked to him last week, actually April 6th, whenever
that was two weeks ago. One of my best friends growing
up for forever. His birthday is on April 6th.
My one of my brothers is also on April 6th.
So it's really easy to remember. But I called him.
I have not talked to him I think since I moved to Virginia.
So it's been 10 or 11 years and we were best friends and there
was no reason for it. We just he lives all the way out
and I think Idaho or Wyoming now I think he's in Wyoming and
we're completely the other direction.
We just don't talk. And I, I, when I was going to
call him, I thought back, man, what, what has happened?
There's no animosity, there's no anger.
We just drift apart. And so when we got to talking,
you know, we reminisced a little bit on some things from growing
up. The song me and Sarah sang last
once on a hillside, we sang that for a competition in high school
one time, me and him. And so we were talking about
that. He said, I saw that, I saw that,
you guys sang that. But we do that with God.
And so we go through the motions of praying, but that closeness
is just not there. We've drifted so far apart and
our prayer should be God give me a new heart toward prayer.
I can't I think this is a good place to put it, not because it
has anything to do with prayer, but just has to do with having a
heart for certain things. And I think that's that's the
issue A lot of times with prayer, our heart for it is just
gone. We we don't really care.
We don't realize the importance of it.
But when Mike Tyson after his, I'm not a Mike Tyson fan, by the
way. I like, I think he was a great
boxer, but I'm not a fan of Mike Tyson.
But after his fight with Jake Paul just recently, if you want
to call it a fight, he was doing an interview, naturally, and
they asked, they asked him if he would fight again.
Hey, you didn't do too bad. You know, you looked fairly
capable out there. Where will you fight again?
And this is what Tyson said. I've lost my heart for the ring
and I don't want to disgrace the sport of boxing by getting in
there without my heart to fight. I think that's what we do often.
We've lost our heart for the things of God and yet we show up
and we disgrace the Church of the living God.
That's what I do. I come to church on Sundays, but
we've lost our heart for it and how do we get that back?
Again, this is not a motivational message to say go
get it back. Go get it back.
This is a this is a message to say you've got to go to God and
say, please give me that heart that I used to have when I first
stepped through the doors of that church that I know you put
me in. And it was so warm and and I
just got something every message.
And now I can barely keep my eyes open while while the
preacher's preaching and he gets excited about things and I
actually get upset at him because who's heated?
Yell at me about whatever we've lost our heart for, for the
things of God. And that's how we get it back.
Ask God to give you a new heart, a heart for not a sport of
boxing, but a heart for the things of God.
Fourthly, kind of goes right into this point.
God, give me a new heart toward preaching.
If you've ever gotten up here and preached, you know how much
time it takes to get ready for a message.
You know how? How not hard, but how mentally
hard it is. Now add that to all your pastors
responsibilities of leading the church, making decisions for the
church, counseling anybody that needs help, all of that and
still making messages and still having a walk with God himself.
So he knows what God's people need and he does all that gets
gets a message. And I'm not just talking about
our pastor. I'm talking about pastors across
across the the world that do this every single week, week in
and week out gets a message for God's people and we hear it.
And then we sit there and say, who does he think he is to tell
me that or why is he pinpointing my issue?
Pick on something else or we've heard that topic so many times.
Well, there's a reason maybe because we're not changing.
So he has to keep preaching the same message, right?
But God gives him that message and I would say, who are we to
question the man of God? And I don't mean that in a he's,
he's a king sense, but God gave him that message for his church,
for his people, not his the pastor's God's people.
And then we, we raise our hair up against that.
We put up a wall. I'm not changing.
I'm not doing that. We need a new heart toward
preaching. We also need a new heart toward
wanting to be taught and wanting to hear that preaching.
I hope that you come in every service ready to hear what's
it's great to have the fellowship and to have the the
music and all of that. But where we really gain ground
against Satan is when the word of God is preached.
And I hope that you come in looking for that message each
service. And this is this is the thing.
I'm not here to to give you anything new.
I'm not here to correct problems in the church this morning.
I'm here as another layperson saying, if we want God to to use
us, if we want to have that warm relationship with God, if we
want God to use this church, we need a new heart in some of
these areas. And so God can bless his church.
But we've got two more fifth one, a new heart.
God, give me a new heart for the spiritual battle.
You know, I'll be honest, there were times growing up when maybe
maybe we were going to have, I don't know, dodgeball or
whatever, something simple and I go, yeah, I'm going to back up
because there's a lot of big guys up there.
Or in wrestling. I remember doing wrestle offs to
see who's going to get that weight class.
And I'm over here hoping that those two will wrestle first.
A So I kind of see what they got going on.
And also so they'll be tired when it's my turn.
And but I think in in our in the spiritual battle, in spiritual
warfare, we lose heart. Yeah, I'm going to let him fight
this one, not because we don't have the strength, but we we
just lose heart for the battle. I mean, men, think about it.
You're a husband or a father. We're fighting a spiritual
battle, not just for ourselves, we're fighting a spiritual
battle for our wives and for our children and, and literally for
our children's spiritual existence.
That's what we're fighting for. And if you and I'm not I, I'm
guilty of this at times. So I'm not preaching at you.
I'm, I'm, I'm telling us this is where why we need a new heart.
But sometimes you come home from work and you go, man, I just
don't feel like dealing with that problem.
You've lost heart for the spiritual battle.
That's what the spiritual battle is.
Bible tells us that we aren't wrestling against flesh and
blood, but against principalities.
Every spiritual battle you fight that's against the
principalities and spiritual wickedness in high places, it's
against Satan himself. And if he doesn't always come
with glowing red eyes and you know, straight at us, sometimes
he comes in little subtle things that we make enough.
We, we don't fight it enough times that all of a sudden it's
a huge problem in our lives because we lose our heart for
the spiritual battle. Ladies, you're a wife or a
mother. We need a heart to go to
spiritual battle for our kids and our husbands.
I think I, I changed this. It actually said with go to
battle with our kids and husbands.
That's not that's not what we're trying to do right, But to go to
spiritual battle for them. Your husbands are going out into
the workforce every day where there is a lot of wickedness.
We won't even I won't even start to describe it because there's
so much of it. But they need some armor and
they need a wife that's at home praying for them as they go out
to be able to come back to to to that rest of us of a Christian
home. There's nothing better than that
for a man to go out and be able to come home to that, that,
that. And by quietness, I don't mean
nobody's talking, but that, no chaos, no fighting.
No, that's, that's a Christian home that a wife is fighting, a
spiritual battle to keep. And we need that.
We need a heart for our spirit, for the spiritual battle.
Think about it. When these soldiers are
training, Brother Johnny's not here.
But when they go train, they're not training so that they look
good. They're not training so they
know how to shoot just so they know how they're training so
that when they are called upon to go to battle, they're ready.
Well, it's the same way with us. We study God's word.
We read it like Greg was talking about that this morning.
We don't read God's word so that we can get up and say I read
God's word. I this how many chapters a day I
read. That's not why we do it.
We do it so that we know what God's word says so that when as
Satan did came to Christ and he fought him with the word of God.
When we have temptation in our lives, we can fight it with the
word of God. We know what our how to use our
weapons anyways, we'll move on here, but but that's my point
here. The fifth one is ask God to give
us a new heart to get into the battle.
Like I said, sometimes we're ready to.
I'm very uncomfortable knocking on doors.
I'm going to let I will let somebody else do that.
That's the spiritual. That's, that's the spiritual
battle as well. And anybody that does do that, a
you get a little more comfortable as you go out and do
it. I would very much encourage you
to do that, even if you're shy. I'm very shy.
And the last thing we used to, we used to joke about it when we
were on the bus route and we'd go up to the door and we do
that, but please don't answer the door knock.
You know, I'm doing my duty, but I don't want to talk to anybody.
That's not we, we need to go up there a with confidence, but but
we need to have a heart for that spiritual battle, not because we
know it all, not because we have all the answers.
There have been times where somebody has asked a question at
the door and I said, never even thought about that before.
But if you don't mind us coming back, we'll I'll get an answer
for you and come back. That's rare but it's fine but we
need to have a heart to be out there on the front lines.
That's what the front lines of this of the spiritual battle are
in addition to fighting for our families and then lastly and
we'll be done but kind of goes along with this.
But God give me a new heart toward leading others to Christ.
Bible tells us that he that winneth souls is wise.
But when we we talk about spiritual spiritual warfare, the
spiritual battle we but we are not fighting against politics
against bad gun laws, against taxes.
That's not what we're fighting. We're fighting a a fight against
Satan for the souls of men that I mean that's what it comes down
to. And so when we get sidetracked
and, and again, I'm not your pastor, I'm not here to tell you
what you should or shouldn't be involved in.
That's not my job. But when we get too distracted
by by politics, by sports, by whatever, when we get too
distracted by things that aren't bad, Satan still ends up winning
because he has sidetracked the soldiers.
You know, think about soldiers going into battle and this is
their mission. And they come across the little
old lady that's got broke down in her car.
The whole, oh, we got to go help her and they do that.
That's good. But they got sidetracked,
completely failed on their mission because they didn't do
what they were called to do. And I think sometimes we do that
as Christians. We're doing good things.
That's not bad to fight politically.
It's not bad to to, to fight certain things to keep our
freedoms. It's not bad, but we get
sidetracked to not do what we are called to do.
And that's what the Great Commission is.
It's not a phrase the Great Commission.
It is a Great Commission of soldiers in God's army that we
are called. That's what our Commission is.
And so we, we, let's not get sidetracked.
And I think sometimes we need to ask God to give us a new heart
toward leading others to Christ. Now go back to first Samuel
chapter 10. I told you we'd be coming back
there. This is where we're coming back.
We're going to wrap it up here and, and be finished.
But first Samuel chapter 10 and verse 9, and I already mentioned
this, but I think it is it is worth repeating.
And it's maybe maybe more important to getting a new heart
toward these things. And it came and it was so that
when he had turned his back to go from Samuel, this is the
phrase that I want to God gave him another heart.
I want to I want to point out one more time that this is not
our work or our doing. You know, sometimes you'll hear
a message preached challenge us to go do something.
And that's good that this is a little more of challenging you
to go ask for something from God, a new heart toward one of
these areas or, or all these areas that that you need God to
do that in your life. That's that's very, very
important here because you could say, I'm going to go knock on
doors and I'm going to get in the spiritual battle.
And you and you, if you don't have a heart for that, you will
stop. You will get tired of it.
You will start complaining about it.
It's so hot, it's 92° and I'm out here on the sun side because
the other group took the shade side knocking doors, right?
We'll start complaining about all these things because God
hasn't actually given us a heart.
It's very important that God gives us this heart toward these
things. Now Saul, we see that in verse
11. But Saul was unrecognizable to
the people that knew him after he got this new heart to be a
king and to be a warrior. Saul was shy.
Remember when they went to crown him king, they couldn't find
him. He was hiding among the stuff
the Bible says. Because that was not Saul.
He was not a warrior. He was not a king.
But go to Second Samuel should just be a few pages for you.
Second Samuel chapter 1. So you have Saul, who was the
shy, no name. I mean the Bible says he was
very handsome, tall, good choice for a king from man's
perspective, but he was not striving to be a king of Israel.
He was, he was happy to be a shepherd of donkeys, but God
gave him a new heart. And look what we see here in a
few chapters. Second Samuel chapter one verse
23 Saul and Jonathan were lovely and pleasant in their lives and
in their death. They were not divided but this
is what Bible says about Saul. They were swifter than eagles.
They were stronger than lions. Talking about in in battle took
a shy guy that just I'm fine having no conflict.
I'll travel through these regions looking for some donkeys
for my dad. Just a just a nobody.
God gave him a new heart and then his legacy is swifter than
an eagle, stronger than a lion out doing God's work.
But he had to have a new heart. And so we'll close with this.
The message today is not, as my coach used to say, rah rah shish
boom Bah. Have anybody ever heard that rah
rah shish boom Bah? They used to say that all the
time. This isn't rah rah shish boom
Bah. I'm telling you to do this in
wrestling. That's, that's, that's not what
this is this. I'll leave that for the
evangelist. They're really good at it,
right? This is also not a message of
correction. I'll leave that to to our
pastor. This is a message.
I already mentioned this, but from one layperson to another
layperson that we as part of the Church of the Living God need
Him to give us new hearts toward these things so that we can be
effective in His service. I told you we were going to go
back to Ezekiel. I don't know if you guys closed
your Bibles already, but go back there.
One last passage. I want to read Ezekiel 36 and
we'll close with this. Now we read verse 26.
A new heart also will I give you and a new spirit will I put
within you. But the reason, the reason I
keep emphasizing that we need to ask God for this.
Look in verse 37, Ezekiel chapter 36 says Thus saith the
Lord, so all these things, a new heart, all of that, Thus saith
the Lord God. I will yet for this be inquired
of, and he says by the House of Israel to do it for them, but I
will be inquired of for this. I think God wants to give us
victory in spiritual warfare. I think He wants us to give us
power in prayer. He wants to give us all these
things that we talked about, but he says I will be inquired of
for it. I want you to ask me for that.
Then I know, A, you're serious and B, you'll know it's from me,
but I will be inquired of this. I think that's a very
interesting phrase in the Bible and it's real close to a new
heart I will give you and a new spirit I'll put within you, and
I will take away the Stony heart out of your flesh and I'll give
you a heart of flesh. I'll put my spirit within you,
cause you to walk in my statutes.
You should keep my judgments and do them.
But then the Lord says I will yet for this be inquired of.
And so that's my encouragement to you.
If there's any one of these six things that you say, you know
what, I really have lost it on that.
I need, I need that back. My encouragement is then go ask
God for a new heart in that area.
All right. And that's a it's a simple
message, but I think most preaching is simple.
It's what we do with it afterwards that makes all the
difference. If you say, man, you know what,
that's really good. I need to ask God for that.
And you don't and you go away and never do it.
And we'll be back in the same same boat, right?
But if we go away and say, you know what, God, I know I can't
do that on my own, but if you'll give me a new heart, I will go
out and I will win souls for you or attempt to God, I know that
I'm I'm not naturally built for spiritual battle, but if you
give me a new heart in that area, I will go to war for those
that I love. I will go to war for my church.
I will I will do that if you give me a new heart for it and
ask him for it. Saul wasn't asking for it.
Even Bible just says he gave him a new heart.
And next thing you know, he's swifter than an eagle, bolder
than a lion, ready to go to battle for God.
We can do that. And that's not a motivational
you, you, you have it in you. We don't have it in us.
We need a new heart from God to make U.S. soldiers for him.
All right, let's bow our heads, close our eyes.
Go ahead and stand with me. We'll close in prayer.
And then right after that, she'll play a few verses on the
on the piano. And if God has worked in your
heart, you come forward and deal with him.
But let's pray. Father, I thank you for this day
you've given us. God, I thank you for this
message that you worked in my heart from your word with God.
I just pray that I would have made it make sense to your
people and they would see the necessity of a new heart from
you for all these different things.
But God, it comes from you and God, I pray that you would give
us a a new heart towards sin. Yes, sin in the world, but our
own as well. God, the things that we've been
letting go or letting slip for so long because it's not that
big a deal. Pray that you give us a new
heart toward those things and we clean those up in our lives and
and got our relationship with you would be restored to what
you want it to be, not just what we're OK with it being.
And I just thank you for your word, thank you for your church
and thank you for all the people that make it up.
God, I just pray that you'd help us to continue to grow.
Always be looking to to draw closer to you, to walk with you
and God just let you use our lives however you see fit.
In Jesus name I pray. Amen.