The heart who knows it? This majestic work of God that can feel the pains of life, that can enjoy the joys of hope, the one area of your body that has the ability to express both love or hate, this heart was developed for the soul purpose of God’s plan, beloved we cannot forget that this heart of ours is commanded by God to do probably one of the most difficult things we don’t want to do at times of disappointment at times of travail at times of lost at times of betrayal and that is love, forgive, trust. Probably the most difficult truth in life is after a violation after a betrayal after an offense, to love is the last thing on our minds. Love is not even in our vocabulary, if we are honest. And so we come to this truth and that is love can only come from a heart that has understood and has been able to grasp the avenue of forgiveness. You might need God to give you a new heart. So I want you to do something, tell your heart to beat again.
This is a true story. A pastor in Ohio asked a member of his church, who was a surgeon, if he could be in the operating room to watch an open heart surgery. The doctor permitted him to observe. The physician began the surgery, removed the woman’s heart, repaired what was wrong, and placed it back into her chest. As he massaged her heart to get it going, it wouldn’t beat. He tried to start it using other procedures, but nothing worked. In an act of desperation, the surgeon knelt down beside his patient and said “Mrs. Johnson, this is your surgeon. The operation went perfectly and your heart has been repaired, but you need to tell your heart to beat again.” When he finished saying those words, immediately her heart began beating! Even though the surgeon did everything necessary to repair her heart, the patient needed to cooperate with him. By an act of her will, she had to start her own heart beating. This story inspired singer Randy Phillips to write the song, Tell Your Heart to Beat Again.
Maybe you’ve been rejected or you’ve lost a loved one—and your heart has stopped beating. Perhaps your spouse betrayed you and your heart no longer beats. You’ve lost hope and your will to live. Remember, God is the great physician who can repair your heart—but you have to tell your heart to beat again. You must tell your heart to love again. You must command your heart to hope again. No matter what tragedy you’ve been through, you can live again and you can move forward with your life again. Just tell your heart to beat again.
Ezekiel 36:26 A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh.
1st Point “A heart of stone”
Beloved in life there are many things that are certain and that is offense will come, some offenses come in different forms from different people at different stages in life, the ones that come from the outside really don’t seem to have an impact as much as the ones from the inside and so we are left with the reality that we are not able to dodge or ignore offenses that will occur. The people of today’s world are driven by what they feel, the heart is deceitfully wicked who knows it and yet we are driven by this muscle that is deceptive and wicked. This heart will make you believe a lie if you were to submit to it. It speaks to you often and tells you many things, some good mostly bad, because for the most part a heart that is not totally surrendered to God is in danger of total depravity of the mercies of God.
Romans 1:24
Therefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonor their own bodies between themselves:
Before man there stands an open choice; and it has to be so. Without choice there can be no goodness and without choice there can be no love. A persuaded goodness is not real goodness; and a persuaded love is not love at all. If men deliberately choose to turn their backs on God after he has sent his Son Jesus Christ into the world, not even he can do anything about it. When Paul speaks of God abandoning men to uncleanness, its main note is not condemnation and judgment, but wistful, sorrowful regret. It describes exactly the feeling of the father when he saw his son turn his back on his home and go out to the far country.
Think of the pain, the sorrow, the hurt. Hearts that have for the most part been hurt multiple times have the tendency to grow numb and will develop what we know to be true, which is a stone like affect that will slowly become impenetrable, this is a defense mechanism that people develop for their safety, they are tired of getting hurt. Tear after tear and cry after cry, moaning after moaning, I’m not gonna take this any longer! And so they begin to allow their hearts to become as hard as a rock, stoned, calloused, dead. In scripture we have Nabal a man whose heart was hardened and not penetrable to God or his servants. There was no access, no soft spot, nothing that would move him to help or to have compassion for another. It was dead.
1 Samuel 25:37
But it came to pass in the morning, when the wine was gone out of Nabal, and his wife had told him these things, that his heart died within him, and he became as a stone.
And so this is the danger that lies within us all, the danger that we face, the reality that we have the ability to shift this heart of flesh into a heart of stone, because of an offense, words of hate, or disgust, words of discouragement that have directed you into this state. Your heart has become cold, it refuses to love, it doesn’t cry out for help anymore, your saying you don’t need anyone’s help not even God. But how many know He’s not done yet, God is a good father and a just and holy God, and even though our hearts were turned against Him, how many know He didn’t turn His heart from us. Instead He sent us His son.
John 3:16
For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son for whom believes in Him shall perish but have everlasting life.
2nd Point “The operation”
We have famous physicians all around the world, many doctors that have performed surgeries that were impossible, many that they were applauded for but no surgeon has ever done what Jesus has done.
If our greatest need had been information, God would have sent us an educator. If our greatest need had been technology, God would have sent us a scientist. If our greatest need had been money, God would have sent us an economist. If our greatest need had been pleasure, God would have sent us an entertainer. But our greatest need was forgiveness, so God sent us a Savior.
See beloved you and I need a Savior, the Savior Jesus Christ. We are in desperate need of His forgiveness, we are in desperate need of His forgiveness, only when we can embrace His forgiveness only then are we able to live again. But we are going to need to do some things here, we are going to need to deal with some issues here today. We are going to need to lay down our hearts at the altar of God. Let us think of the procedure of heart surgery for a moment.
Heart surgery is performed because of artery blockage, they determine this with a series of test and blood work, x-rays, EKG’s, and stress test but how many know we don’t need anymore stress. And so we look at this in the spiritual aspect and God also examines our hearts and notices that there are some procedures He needs to perform because there are things blocking the passage way to your heart, could it be un-forgiveness, rejection, bitterness, hatred, anxiety, unbelief, betrayal, anger, rage, molestation, adultery, only you and God know what it may be but he needs to operate, He wants to clear the passages.
The question is will you surrender and lay it all down and allow Him to remove those blockages that hardened your heart of stone and replace it with a new one? Will you decide to say God here is my pain, here is my sorrow, here is my unbelief, here is my anger, my resentment, here is my heart? When you decide to do that God can begin the process to a successful surgery of the heart and He can begin to redeem and restore that stony heart of yours, He will remove that heart of stone and replace with a heart of flesh, one that can feel again, one that can love again, one that relies on Him again. He does that when the individual will say God I’m a sinner in need of a Savior, God will you forgive me of my sin, I repent and I’m sorry for what I have done, here is my heart I now give it to you, and when you dethrone self and enthrone Jesus Christ miracles begin to happen, the great physician is at work.
3rd Point “Tell your heart to beat again”
In our opening illustration we have a miracle that took place as a doctor speaks to his patience after heart surgery and whispers in her ear, “tell your heart to beat again”, and as it is recorded the heart begins to beat again, how wonderful God is to whisper in our ears and assures us that we can tell our hearts to beat again. As this takes place God will continue to minister to us and through us, with this new heart He has given us. He begins to write His truth on our hearts and we become living vessels of a wonderful work of God.
2 Corinthians 3:3
3 being made manifest that ye are an epistle of Christ, ministered by us, written not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God; not in tables of stone, but in tables `that are' hearts of flesh.
This is the good news God can change you because He has changed your heart through the gospel of Jesus Christ, this is going to be the story of your lifetime. Tell your heart to beat again. The change in your character and the change in your life is the only commendation that others need to see. This is the great claim. Every one of you is a letter of Christ. Long ago Plato had said that the good teacher does not write his message in ink that will fade; he writes it upon men. That is what Jesus had done. He had written his message on the redeemed and delivered, not with fading ink but with the Spirit, not on tablets of stone as the law was first written, but on the hearts of men. There is a great truth here, which is at once an inspiration and an awful warning--every man is an open letter for Jesus Christ.
Every Christian, whether he likes it or not, is an advertisement for Christianity. The honor of Christ is in the hands of his followers. We judge a shopkeeper by the kind of goods he sells; we judge a craftsman by the kind of articles he produces; we judge a Church by the kind of men it creates; and therefore men judge Christ by his followers. See beloved this heart that has been touched by God will be a testimony of the very love of a Father to His child, now that God wants to give you a renewed, pliable, submissive heart, now that He has replaced it with a new one, you need to tell your heart to beat again.
