Join us for Day 11 of Living the Surrendered Life and then join us for discussion and community in the comments below!
Text: Proverbs 4:23
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11 thoughts on "day 11"
day 11
Text: Proverbs 4:23
Leave a Reply
11 thoughts on "day 11"
It's very interesting how society tells us "follow your heart" but the bible says pretty much the exact opposite, "guard your heart."
It's such a challenge to know whether we are really following our emotions (our "heart") or the Holy Spirit. I think sometimes we have to check in with logic AND the bible to see whether this feeling we have is from God or from our own selfish ambitions.
I think all we can do is pray to be able to discipher between the two. Because really, I don't want to follow my self, I want to follow God.
wow this hit home for me today, especially when it mentioned a old boyfriends. my daughters father came back into my heart a month ago with all the promises that "this time would be better" I let him in my heart and followed it.. only to be hurt and to realize that nothing has changed.. all because i followed my heart. The Lord is so good and had been with me thru all of my mistakes!! Love this!!
Sara you sound just like me. I don’t know how many times I also let that happen. When you finally turn it all over to God he can provide and open so many more doors! Hang in and stay strong.
Ashley, wise words again! Thank you!
I’m from Charleston, SC & my friends and I are loving #shereadstruth :)
Follow your heart…how many times do we hear that in this secular world?? Seems to run with follow your dreams! Yes, it IS ok to follow your dreams/goals IF they are in alignment with God's will for you. I have a HARD time distinguishing MY will from God's. I have to continually pray that God would align my heart with His so that my will is then aligned with His will. I am reminded of James 4:15: Instead, you ought to say, “If it is the Lord’s will, we will live and do this or that.” GREAT reading for today, totally convicted me!
I agree with this! We are basically told to follow what WE think is right, not what was originally set out for us by God. Great reading!
Today's reading called to mind the passage in Jeremiah 17: "The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?"
or as the Message puts it: "The heart is hopelessly dark and deceitful, a puzzle that no one can figure out."
it goes on to say… "But I, God, search the heart and examine the mind. I get to the heart of the human. I get to the root of things."
Ashley, I love your search for action steps – for *how* we can guard our hearts. We should not be trusting our own hearts – we should be seeking the Lord and calling on Him for wisdom.
"If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given to him." James 1:5
Ashley, thank you for sharing your thoughts. I too just went through soul detox but hadn’t remembered the how to of guarding our hearts & had already begun to pressure myself in working from my own strength to guard my heart. Thank you for reminding me of the truth! What a blessing it is to do this study with people all over!
Kristen, YES! That's exactly how I know when I'm using my own strength–when it starts to feel overwhelming and impossible; that's when I think, "wow, this IS impossible!" Because exactly like Rae says below, our hearts are so dark. But He has promised that his yolk is easy and his burden is light, and when that burden feels so heavy it is often the weight of my own sin I have put on myself. And He has already taken the weight of it!! That is such cause for celebration. Surrender is such a hard thing–to let go of the US and embrace the HIM. But oh, the sweet joy that comes when we realize that we are surrendering to such a gracious God! And I too am loving the community I'm finding here! Where are you from??
LOVE looking at today’s verse in the context of the Soul Detox many of us just went through and in the context of the entire Proverb. HOW do we guard our hearts? Vs 24–by guarding our words. Vs 25–by guarding our eyes. Vs 26–by guarding where I go. Guarding our hearts is such an all-encompassing, heavy-feeling task to me sometimes. So many “can’ts” and “shouldn’ts.” I feel so much more free when I break it down into little thoughts, and realize that He hasn’t given me this task to do alone–it is HIM IN ME.
Thanks for sharing this! I really should read the entire context of these short verses we are getting! :-)