“Cross Currents: In Your Heart You Know What’s Right”
Col. 3:1-17
The post on Facebook by one of my high school classmates read, “We don't need religion to be moral – in our hearts we know what's right”' It’s a popular sentiment. “Just follow your heart.” It sounds so good, so logical, so easy. But is it wise?
What if your heart and my heart disagree? And what if our disagreement means we’re at polar opposites on an issue that demands conflicting actions? Let’s assume we both, at the same time, come upon a man ready to jump off a bridge and commit suicide. I want to let him jump I believe he has a right to do it, and should be allowed to do it – after all, it’s what his heart is telling him to do. So I will do whatever is necessary to be sure he jumps. But you want to stop him. You believe it’s wrong and will do whatever is necessary to stop him. How do we resolve our differences? After all, we can’t both do what our heart tells us to do without major conflict. Whose heart is right?
The first two chapters of Colossians have dealt heavily and extensively with the fact and reality of Christ’s death on the cross. They are filled with heavy theology. But in this third chapter, as he always does in his letters, Paul launches into how all of this heavy theology – how Christ’s death on the cross – impacts our daily living. And he begins by dealing with the heart (1): “…set your hearts…” To fully grasp why Paul would start with the heart, recall the Biblical perspective on the heart – that we must ACKNOWLEDGE THE PROBLEM WITH OUR HEARTS. The clear message of the Bible is that because of the fall of humankind, OUR HEARTS ARE EVIL. The prophets proclaimed it. (Is. 59:12-13) “For our offenses are many in your sight, and our sins testify against us. Our offenses are ever with us, and we acknowledge our iniquities: rebellion and treachery against the LORD, turning our backs on our God, inciting revolt and oppression, uttering lies our hearts have conceived.” (Jer. 17:9-10 MSG) “The heart is hopelessly dark and deceitful, a puzzle that no one can figure out. 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. I treat them as they really are, not as they pretend to be.” Jesus preached the same thing. (Mt. 15:17-20) “Don’t you see that whatever enters the mouth goes into the stomach and then out of the body? But the things that come out of a person’s mouth come from the heart, and these defile them. For out of the heart come evil thoughts—murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander. These are what defile a person; but eating with unwashed hands does not defile them.”
Therefore OUR HEARTS MUST BE GUARDED AND EXAMINED. (Prov. 4:23 NLT) “Guard your heart above all else, for it determines the course of your life.” Is it any wonder the Psalmist prayed (26:2 & 51:10) “Test me, LORD, and try me, examine my heart and my mind…Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me.” There’s a powerful scene in the Bunyan’s classic “Pilgrim’s Progress.” Christian asks Ignorance, “What leads you to believe that you have given up all for God and Heaven?” Ignorance responds “My heart tells me that I have.” The conversation continues. “But is your heart reliable? The Bible says, ‘He that trusts in his own heart is a fool.’” (Prov. 28:26) ”That is spoken of a fool. I’m no fool. My heart is wise and good.” “But how do you know that? What means have you of testing your heart?” “My heart comforts me in the hope of Heaven.” “That may be through its deceitfulness. Jeremiah the prophet said, ‘The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?’ (Jer. 17:9) A man’s heart may give him hope when there are no grounds for his hope.” “But my heart and my life agree, so my hope is well grounded.” “What proof have you that your heart and life agree?” “My heart tells me so.” “Your heart tells you so! Except the Word of God bears witness, other testimony is of no value.” (i)
We may not agree on what the standard should be, but the fact is WE NEED AN UNCHANGING STANDARD - a holy, righteous guide. The Bible qualifies. “For the Word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart. Nothing in all creation is hidden from God’s sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account.” (Heb. 4:12) The ‘one to whom we must give account’ is Jesus, the holy righteous one who knows our hearts. “… God knows your hearts. What is highly valued among men is detestable in God’s sight. I am He who searches hearts… (Lk. 16:15 & Rev. 2:23)
Our ongoing task then is to ESTABLISH THE PRIORITIES OF OUR HEARTS. According to Paul it’s a two-step process. First, we must KNOW WHO WE ARE. Verses 1-2: “Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things.” WE ARE RAISED. The cross drove Jesus to the tomb but also launched Him to heaven – so we have a resurrection perspective. The resurrection is the cornerstone of Paul’s theology and life. Six times in 1 Cor. 15 – his resurrection passage – Paul mentions “Jesus was seen…” after his resurrection. Knowing Jesus Christ was alive radically altered the disciples and followers of Jesus. Those who ran in fear were now willing to be mocked, mauled, and martyred, because they knew their Lord, their commander in chief, was alive. He is seated at the right hand of God, in the seat of power and authority.
But this is more thanjust head knowledge – it is an inner conviction because WE ARE RAPTURED with Jesus. (3) “For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God.” Here’s the picture. When a person died, the ancient Greeks referred to that person as being ‘hidden in the earth.’ Paul says believers are hidden – living in – Jesus Christ. We can be strong in our Lord, and in the strength of His might (Eph. 6:10).
Knowing who we are – raised and raptured – Paul instructs us to BE WHO WE ARE. He lists three elements that enable us to do so. First, REMOVE THE OLD desires and behaviors. (5 & 8) “Put to death…rid yourself…” Destroy and dump the sinful way of life. The imagery is that of baptism. In ancient days – and in the early church – following baptism a person would remove their old wet clothes and put on new clothes – not just because they were dry but to symbolize new life. And notice the old clothing, the sinful behaviors Paul lists – sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil, desires and greed, anger, rage, malice, slander, filthy language, and lying. He’s referring here to the sins that seeps into our lives every day.
The late Ray Ortlund drew a great visual. He said, “You and I are not integrated, unified, whole persons. Our hearts are multi-divided. It's like we have a board room in every heart. Imagine: a big table, leather chairs, coffee, bottled water, and a whiteboard. A committee sits around the table in your heart. There is the social self, the private self, the work self, the sexual self, the recreational self, the religious self, and others. The committee is arguing and debating and voting, constantly agitated and upset. Rarely can they come to a unanimous, wholehearted decision. We tell ourselves we're this way because we're so busy with so many responsibilities. But the truth is that we're just divided, unfocused, hesitant, and unfree. That kind of person can "accept Jesus" in two ways. One way is to invite him onto the committee. Give him a vote too. But then he becomes just one more complication. The other way to "accept Jesus" is to say to him, "My life isn't working. Please come in and fire my committee, every last one of them. I hand myself over to you. I am your responsibility now. Please run my whole life for me." "Accepting Jesus" is not just adding Jesus. It is also subtracting the idols.” (ii)
Once we remove the old clothes – fire the committee that’s running and ruining our heart – we can RE-CLOTHE WITH THE NEW. (12-15) We replace the old sinful way of living with Christ-like living. “Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity. Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body you were called to peace. And be thankful.”
It sounds simple enough, but we know it’s not. How do we re-clothe ourselves? London businessman Lindsey Clegg told the story of a warehouse property he was selling. The building has been empty for months and needed repairs. Vandals had caused much destruction and left things a mess. As Lindsey showed a prospective buyer the property, he took pains to say that he would repair all the damage and clean things up. The buyer said, “Forget about the repairs. When I buy this place, I’m going to build something completely different. I don’t want the building; I want the site.” That’s God’s message to us. When we become His all He wants is the site and permission to build. All we have to do is give him the property and He will do the building.
So Paul says to REORIENT OUR LIVES. In verses 1 & 2 he instructs us TO SET our hearts and minds on things above. To set is to put in a particular place, position, or posture; to put into a certain condition. So we set a floral arrangement where it can best be seen and add the most beauty; we set a telescope on the moon so we can see it and not the starts; we set our watch so we can be confident of the correct time; we set a table so people can better enjoy and facilitate their meal. Paul is teaching that we give God our property when we similarly set OUR HEARTS AND MINDS. Verse 1-2 again: “Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things.” We reorient our lives when we set – focus, tune – our hearts and minds. The heart is important, as we’ve seen, because – as it is used in the Bible – it is the seat of our desires and will and emotions, so from it flows our behavior. And the mind is critical because in it we form our thoughts. Paul says this reorientation needs to impact our desiring, willing, doing, and thinking. So FOCUS ON OUR RAISED AND RAPTURED JESUS.
John Bunyan has captured these thoughts exquisitely. Perhaps you remember from last year’s Lenten series the scene in Pilgrim’s Progress where a man has a muckrake in his hand. He’s old, bent, careworn, with his eyes fastened to the earth below him. All the while a shining angel stands over his head, offering him a crown. But he cannot see it, because he never looks up. All he sees is the muck in his life. As John Phillips pointed out, “Psychologists tell us ‘Look within.’ Opportunists advise, ‘Look around.’ Optimists say, ‘look ahead.’ Pessimists say ‘Look out.’ But the Holy Spirit encourages us to ‘look up.’’ ‘Could’st thou in vision see Thyself, the man God meant; Thou never more could’st be The man thou art, content.’”
One day a lady was giving her little nephew a lesson. He was generally a good, attentive child, but on this occasion he could not fix his mind on his work. Suddenly he said, “Auntie, may I kneel down and ask God to help me to find my marble?” His aunt having given her consent, the little boy knelt by his chair, closed his eyes, and prayed silently. Then he rose and went on with his lesson contentedly. Next day, almost afraid of asking the question, lest the child had not found his toy, and so might lose his simple faith, she said, “Well, dear, have you found your marble?” “No, Auntie,” was the reply, “but God had made me not want to.”(iii) As I love to say, “UNLESS THERE IS WITHIN US THAT WHICH IS ABOVE US, WE SHALL SOON YIELD TO THAT WHICH IS BENEATH US.”
Paul has been steering us to the key theme of his application. We reorient our lives – we set our minds and hearts on Jesus – when we SATURATE OURSELVES WITH THE WORD OF GOD. (16) “Let the message (the word) of Christ dwell among (in) you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom through psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit, singing to God with gratitude in your hearts.” LET THE WORD DWELL IN US. To dwell means to stay or live as a permanent resident; to live or continue in a given condition or state; to linger over, emphasize, or ponder in thought, speech, or writing. Like the Ark of the Covenant remained in the temple, so the word of Christ is to remain in us. As Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote, “Because I am a Christian, therefore, every day in which I do not penetrate more deeply into the knowledge of God's Word in Holy Scripture is a lost day for me. I can only move forward with certainty upon the firm ground of the Word of God. And, as a Christian, I learn to know the Holy Scriptures in no other way than by hearing the Word preached and by prayerful meditation.” (iv)
This implies that full orientation happens only when we do more than casually and occasionally read the Word of God. Donald Whitney provides the analogy of a cup of tea: In this analogy your mind is the cup of hot water and the tea bag represents your intake of Scripture. Hearing God's Word is like one dip of the tea bag into the cup. Some of the tea's flavor is absorbed by the water, but not as much as would occur with a more thorough soaking of the bag. Reading, studying, and memorizing God's Word are like additional plunges of the tea bag into the cup. The more frequently the tea enters the water, the more permeating its effect. Meditation, however, is like immersing the bag completely and letting it steep until all the rich tea flavor has been extracted and the hot water is thoroughly tinctured reddish brown. Meditation on Scripture is letting the Bible brew in the brain. Thus we might say that as the tea colors the water, meditation likewise "colors" our thinking. When we meditate on Scripture it colors our thinking about God, about God's ways and his world, and about ourselves. (v) Immersing, keeping the tea bag – the Word of God – means that when we read or hear Scripture, we THINK ABOUT IT, PRAY OVER IT, AND ACT ON IT. That’s the only way Christ can be a living part of us; it allows Him to be at home in us and to have the run of our house, to be the chairman of the board.
When we set and saturate, we STYLE OUR LIVES (17). “And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.” Do you give thanks to God in all you do? Is Christ really the main ingredient in your life? Erin Bunting suggests you think of the foods you buy; the container or package always lists the ingredients so you can have the assurance of the ingredients. What if you had an ingredients list printed on you? Would Jesus be the main ingredient? If not, how far down the list would He be? Would your "label" accurately represent your contents? Or would you falsely project a misleading outward appearance that cleverly masked diluted ingredients? Your packaging may be convincing. You may look and sound like the real thing. But what if someone came to you looking for Jesus beneath your "Christian" label and found something else? Something Jesus-flavored, but not Jesus-filled? (vi) It all depends on your saturation level.
Only if we are fully saturated, can we trust our hearts and know what’s right. Katherine Bevis tells how among the students at a well-known college there was a young man who had to get about on crutches. He had an unusual talent for friendliness and optimism and so won the deep respect of his classmates. One day a student asked him what had caused his deformity. “Infantile paralysis,” he replied briefly, not wishing to elaborate on his difficulties. “With a misfortune like that, how can you face the world so?” inquired his classmate. “Oh”, replied the young Christian, smiling, “the disease never touched my heart.” (vii) The Word of God – Jesus Christ – dwelt richly in His heart. Will you let Him dwell in yours?
(i) John Bunyan, Pilgrim’s Progress in Today’s English, Moody Publishers, Chicago, © 1992 The Moody Bible Institute of Chicago, p. 139
(ii) Ray Ortund, "#9: What Does It Mean to Accept Jesus?" Ray Ortlund: Christ Is Deeper Still (blog), (6-4-10); from www.preachingtoday.com
(iii) Tan, P. L. (1996). Encyclopedia of 7700 Illustrations: Signs of the Times (p. 1052). Garland, TX: Bible Communications, Inc.
(iv) Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Meditating on the Word, translated and edited by David Mel Gracie (Cowley Publications, 1986); from www.preachingtoday.com
(v) Donald S. Whitney; "Spiritual Disciplines for the Christian Life(Navpress, 2014), page 47; from www.preachingtoday.com
(vi) Erin Bunting, "Jesus Flavored, or Jesus Filled?" Kyria.com (10-7-09); from www.preachingtoday.com - Condensed from the on-line sister publication Kyria, © 2009 Christianity Today International.
(vii) Tan, P. L. (1996). Encyclopedia of 7700 Illustrations: Signs of the Times (p. 953). Garland, TX: Bible Communications, Inc.
