WHAT’S IN YOUR HEART?

There are an abundance of answers that come from the question, “What is your first thought when you think of David’s life?”  

The Hebrew word for heart is leb or lebab.  The Greek word is kardia.  In both Hebrew and Greek, heart is used in the literal and the figurative sense.  The predominant usage is in the figurative sense.  The word is used for the center of a person’s being from which all motivation comes.  In this sense, heart sometimes refers to the seat of feelings and vital strength.  We love God with all our hearts (Deut. 6:5).  We must not hate our brother in our hearts (Lev. 19:17).  A heart can be grieved or pained (Gen. 6:6).  Heart sometimes refers to character and moral conduct.  A person can have a pure heart (Ps. 51:10), a faithful heart (Neh.9:8), or a heart of integrity and uprightness “as David” (1 Kings 9:4).  A person’s heart can be perverse (Ps 101:4), of stone (Ezek. 11:19), or proud (Prov. 21:4).   Finally, heart can refer to the seat of will, desire, and determination. It was in David’s heart to build the temple (1 Kings 8:18).  Also, David was a man after God’s own heart (1 Sam. 13:14).

I am about the same age as David when he died and looking back across that span of my life, like I expect David may have, there are events by which I would not like for people to remember me and some by which that I very much would like to be remembered.  As humans, we are naturally depraved in our ways but then as we become Christ-followers, we have a new life, a new focus on what matters, a Holy Spirit living within us and therefore new hearts which desire to be like Him in every way.  If our hearts are after God’s own heart, we will train daily to become more sanctified.  No matter if you are seven or seventy, or anywhere in between, being remembered as a person after God’s own heart would be a great answer when someone is asked one day how they remember you.