First From Julie's Keyboard:
The Heart of Man
When we think about the heart of man in the sense of his core being (not a blood pumping organ), we know that from this area emimates the thrust of life. It's in this remarkable place within an individual that a person will choose to "make it or break it" in this life. David and I were just talking this morning about decisions and actions taken throughout our lives in which looking back upon now, we've been able to pin point some areas of deception. Someone said, "Hind sight is always 20/20." anon Indeed, such a well taken point.
The good news concerning our "inner most being," is that Jesus left us valuable instruction to help us keep this vital area of our anatomy in check. He warns us of the dangers of deceit and how tricky the heart of a man can be. Time and again, He had strong words for the religious of His day about their inward man being so vile while they made things so pretty outwardly.
This is no new problem. Without the grace of Christ in our lives to make us pure, no one can operate with a clean heart. I've often pondered on the passage in John 1:47 where Jesus sees Nathanael coming unto Him and says, "Behold an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile!" This is just impressive to me to think that a man actually lived that had no deceit in his heart. (Of course, if this is exactly what Jesus was saying)
The only way to live above such a weakness in man is to allow His presence to fill our lives. He makes the heart new when He changes a man and makes him a "new creation." With a clean heart, purged by Christ alone, man can pursue the course given him by God.
The prophet of old, Jeremiah, said this: "The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?" Jeremiah 17:9
As he goes on to explain, the Lord does know it, and searches it out. What does He find in us? Would He meet us walking down the street and say to someone, "Look, there's ------- in whom is not guile?"
By His great provision, this can be true for our lives. May we guard the heart with all diligence as His Word instructs. True life begins in this sacred place within.
May you be truly blessed,
Julie
____________________________________________
The Heart of Man
When we think about the heart of man in the sense of his core being (not a blood pumping organ), we know that from this area emimates the thrust of life. It's in this remarkable place within an individual that a person will choose to "make it or break it" in this life. David and I were just talking this morning about decisions and actions taken throughout our lives in which looking back upon now, we've been able to pin point some areas of deception. Someone said, "Hind sight is always 20/20." anon Indeed, such a well taken point.
The good news concerning our "inner most being," is that Jesus left us valuable instruction to help us keep this vital area of our anatomy in check. He warns us of the dangers of deceit and how tricky the heart of a man can be. Time and again, He had strong words for the religious of His day about their inward man being so vile while they made things so pretty outwardly.
This is no new problem. Without the grace of Christ in our lives to make us pure, no one can operate with a clean heart. I've often pondered on the passage in John 1:47 where Jesus sees Nathanael coming unto Him and says, "Behold an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile!" This is just impressive to me to think that a man actually lived that had no deceit in his heart. (Of course, if this is exactly what Jesus was saying)
The only way to live above such a weakness in man is to allow His presence to fill our lives. He makes the heart new when He changes a man and makes him a "new creation." With a clean heart, purged by Christ alone, man can pursue the course given him by God.
The prophet of old, Jeremiah, said this: "The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?" Jeremiah 17:9
As he goes on to explain, the Lord does know it, and searches it out. What does He find in us? Would He meet us walking down the street and say to someone, "Look, there's ------- in whom is not guile?"
By His great provision, this can be true for our lives. May we guard the heart with all diligence as His Word instructs. True life begins in this sacred place within.
May you be truly blessed,
Julie
____________________________________________
In last weeks post I heard Mr. Adams say, "[W]e have no government armed with power capable of contending with
human passions unbridled by morality and religion. . . . Our constitution was
made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the
government of any other." ~ John Adams, The
Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States, Charles Francis
Adams, editor
(Boston: Little, Brown, and Co. 1854), Vol. IX, p. 229,
October 11, 1798.)
I have since been trying to gain a better understanding of his meaning. If our Government and our Constitution have no power to govern a people without morality and religion, what would happen if that were to occure?
human passions unbridled by morality and religion. . . . Our constitution was
made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the
government of any other." ~ John Adams, The
Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States, Charles Francis
Adams, editor
(Boston: Little, Brown, and Co. 1854), Vol. IX, p. 229,
October 11, 1798.)
I have since been trying to gain a better understanding of his meaning. If our Government and our Constitution have no power to govern a people without morality and religion, what would happen if that were to occure?
Mr.
Mercer Sir, you were a delegate to the Constitutional Convention, could
you futher explain the thought behind Mr. Adams view?
"It is a great mistake to suppose that the paper we are to propose will govern the United States. It is the men whom it will bring into the government and interest in maintaining it that are to govern them.
The paper will only mark out the mode and the form. Men are the substance and must do the business." ~ John Francis Mercer. {James Madison, The Papers of James Madison, ed. Henry D. Gilpin (Washington: Langtree & O'Sullivan, 1840), Vol. III, p. 1324, John Francis Mercer, August 14, 1787.}
I think I am beginning to understand, you are saying, if we as Christian's, as a people, cherish life and abhor abortion, then the ability of the Constitution to protect that life lies not so much in the Document as it does in the men we as a people elect to govern through that Document.
If we as a people cherish traditionl marriage, then it is our responsibility to elect people to office that will govern to maintain and protect that trusted value. So in essence, if our current president favors killing a child if it survives an attempted abortion, or favors homosexal marriage and uses his office and authority to influence such, We cannot fault him as much ourselves. For ultimantly, we are responsible, or more so, if we with full knowledge of his intentions aided to his support and placement in government!
"It is a great mistake to suppose that the paper we are to propose will govern the United States. It is the men whom it will bring into the government and interest in maintaining it that are to govern them.
The paper will only mark out the mode and the form. Men are the substance and must do the business." ~ John Francis Mercer. {James Madison, The Papers of James Madison, ed. Henry D. Gilpin (Washington: Langtree & O'Sullivan, 1840), Vol. III, p. 1324, John Francis Mercer, August 14, 1787.}
I think I am beginning to understand, you are saying, if we as Christian's, as a people, cherish life and abhor abortion, then the ability of the Constitution to protect that life lies not so much in the Document as it does in the men we as a people elect to govern through that Document.
If we as a people cherish traditionl marriage, then it is our responsibility to elect people to office that will govern to maintain and protect that trusted value. So in essence, if our current president favors killing a child if it survives an attempted abortion, or favors homosexal marriage and uses his office and authority to influence such, We cannot fault him as much ourselves. For ultimantly, we are responsible, or more so, if we with full knowledge of his intentions aided to his support and placement in government!
Mr. Penn Sir, you carried thoughts on government long before Mr. Mercer, would you concure with his assessment?
"Governments, like clocks, go from the motion men give them; and as governments are made and moved by men, so by them they are ruined too. Wherefore governments rather depend upon men than men upon governments. Let men be good and government cannot be bad. . . . But if men be bad, let the government be never so good, they will endeavor to warp and spoil it to their turn." ~ William Penn. {Memiors of the Private and Public Life of William Penn (London: Richard Taylor and co.< 1813), Vol, I, P. 303, from Penn's frame of government in 1682.
So, even if our Constitution is a wonder in itself, it's life and purpose will be maintained or ruined based upon our choices of principled men and women we elect to those offices!
"Governments, like clocks, go from the motion men give them; and as governments are made and moved by men, so by them they are ruined too. Wherefore governments rather depend upon men than men upon governments. Let men be good and government cannot be bad. . . . But if men be bad, let the government be never so good, they will endeavor to warp and spoil it to their turn." ~ William Penn. {Memiors of the Private and Public Life of William Penn (London: Richard Taylor and co.< 1813), Vol, I, P. 303, from Penn's frame of government in 1682.
So, even if our Constitution is a wonder in itself, it's life and purpose will be maintained or ruined based upon our choices of principled men and women we elect to those offices!
Mr.
Garfield Sir, Mr. Penn's views agree with Mr. Mercer, but you were the
20th President of the United States, did you still hold with those views
as late in our American history as you were?
"Now, more than ever before, the people are responsible for the charactor of their Congress. If that body be ignorant, reckless, and corrupt, it is because the people tolerate ignorance, recklessness, and corruption.
If it be intelligent, brave, and pure, it is because the people demand these high qualities to represent them in the national legislature. . . . If the next centennial does not find us a great nation with a great and worthy Congress, it will be because those who represent the enterprise, the culture, and the morality of the nation do not aid in controlling the political forces." ~ President James Garfield. {The Works of James Abram Garfield, ed. Burke A. Hinsdale (Boston: James R. Osgood and company, 1883), Vol. II, pp. 486, 489, "A Century of congress," Published in the Atlantic Monthly, July 1877.}
Mr. Garfield Sir, I see what you are saying, but how can the good side of this be made possible? Yes, Mr. Morris, as a Signer and penman of the Constitution you may most certainly answer that question.
"Now, more than ever before, the people are responsible for the charactor of their Congress. If that body be ignorant, reckless, and corrupt, it is because the people tolerate ignorance, recklessness, and corruption.
If it be intelligent, brave, and pure, it is because the people demand these high qualities to represent them in the national legislature. . . . If the next centennial does not find us a great nation with a great and worthy Congress, it will be because those who represent the enterprise, the culture, and the morality of the nation do not aid in controlling the political forces." ~ President James Garfield. {The Works of James Abram Garfield, ed. Burke A. Hinsdale (Boston: James R. Osgood and company, 1883), Vol. II, pp. 486, 489, "A Century of congress," Published in the Atlantic Monthly, July 1877.}
Mr. Garfield Sir, I see what you are saying, but how can the good side of this be made possible? Yes, Mr. Morris, as a Signer and penman of the Constitution you may most certainly answer that question.
"There
must be religion. When that ligament is torn, society is disjointed and
its members perish. The nation is exposed to foreign violence and
domestic convulsion. Vicious rulers, chosen by vicious people, turn
back the current of corruption to its source.
Place in a situation where they can exercise authority for their own emolument, they betray their trust.
They take bribes. They sell satutes and decrees. They sell honor and office. They sell their conscience. They sell their country. . . . But the most important of all lessons is the denunciation of ruin to every State that rejects the precepts of religion." ~ Gouverneur Morris. {Discourse Delivered Before the New York Historical Society by the honorable Gouverneur Morris (President), 4th September, 1816.}
This all makes it sound like the problems we are facing in our country and in Washington fall not on those in Washington, but on us who placed them there!
Place in a situation where they can exercise authority for their own emolument, they betray their trust.
They take bribes. They sell satutes and decrees. They sell honor and office. They sell their conscience. They sell their country. . . . But the most important of all lessons is the denunciation of ruin to every State that rejects the precepts of religion." ~ Gouverneur Morris. {Discourse Delivered Before the New York Historical Society by the honorable Gouverneur Morris (President), 4th September, 1816.}
This all makes it sound like the problems we are facing in our country and in Washington fall not on those in Washington, but on us who placed them there!
Mr. Witherspoon, as a Signer of the Declaration of Independence, did you want to add something?"Those who wish well to the State ought to choose to places of trust men of inward principle, justified by exemplary conversation. Is it reasonable to expect wisdom from the ignorant? Assiduity and application to public business from men of a dissipated life?
Is it reasonable to commit the management of public revenue to one who hath wasted his own patrimony?
Those, therefore, who pay no regard to religion and sobriety in the persons whom they send to the legislature of any state are guilty of the greatest absurdity and will soon pay dear for their folly." ~ John Witherspoon. {The Works of the Rev. John Witherspoon (Philadelphia: William W. Woodward, 1802), Vol, III, p. 82, "A sermon Delievered at a Public Thanksgiving After Peace."
May God bless each of you,
David
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