Set Your Course Series

On November 28, 1979 Flight 901 left Auckland Airport in New Zealand. The flight was a sightseeing tour bound for Antarctica with 257 people on board.

http://christchurchcitylibraries.com/kids/nzdisasters/erebus.asp

These sight seeing tours had been operating since 1977. They had experienced pilots, but these two men had never flown this

particular flight before. They knew there destination and set their course.

Our verse in the NLT says, “Guard your heart above all else for it determines the course of your life.”

What course are you heading for? A dream maybe in your heart that almost sounds like a destination you cannot achieve? Is this the life you planned to live or have you found yourself following someone else’s plan?

The word heart refers to the whole personality. Why do we act that way think that way or say the things we do? Is it really you?

T.S. Eliot wrote, “Whatever you think, be sure it is what you think; whatever you want, be sure that is what you want; whatever you feel, be sure it is what you feel.” http://www.quotationspage.com/quote/38971.html

When David became King over all of Israel, God sent Nathan the prophet to him and gave David these word, “Go do all that is in your heart for the LORD is with you.” 2 Samuel 7:3

In other words David your course is set, your heart is right and now go fulfill your life’s mission. God is with you and nothing can stop you from being all that God wants you to be.

Notice again Proverbs 4:23

Two wonderful truths that enable us to set our course and reach our destination safely.

I. Your Heart’s Guard “Keep your heart with all diligence “

The word keep refers to a guard, the word diligence actually refers to a prison guard watching out for the bad things that happen.

A guard on and around your heart. Don’t let the wrong things come through your mind and in your heart. Stand watch. How?

Think about a prison guard for a moment. He is there to keep the bad guys from harming themselves, other inmates and to keep them from getting out to harm innocent people. The guard also doesn’t let other people in that shouldn’t be there.

A guard on our heart is just the same. We are to Protect our heart in such a way we don’t harm ourselves, others or that what we say could damage our testimony. How again do we accomplish this?

Great question. Here’s the answer. I can’t let things into my heart that would damage me from being useful to God and other

people.

Take soda for example. Now if your from the South you say soda, doesn’t matter what the flavor is I like Diet Pepsi but I especially like Mountain Dew, White Out Voltage, or Live Wire.

If you’re from the North it’s not soda it’s pop. I’ll have a pop. In the South you better duck if you say that.

The dental community says, “People who drink 3 or more

sugary sodas daily have 62% more dental decay, fillings and tooth loss!”

http://www.dentalgentlecare.com/diet_soda.htm

I say...SO! I’ll drink 2 a day and not have 62%. I like diet Pepsi and even though it will rot my teeth I’m still going to drink it.

But let’s just say that I drink 4 a day, 6 a day, 10 a day, and my favorite dentist spends her years to retirement drilling holes in my head or teeth.

What have I done? I’ve done what many are doing to their hearts. They are letting anger, bitterness, bad attitudes, grudges, build up on their hearts and it is causing the one thing they need to guard to decay. The hardness of the heart has caused many well directed Christians to get off course.

Their lives have become misdirected because something in their life has caused heart trouble. Their Spirit is decaying. The Bible says, ”A merry heart does good, like medicine, But a broken spirit dries the bones.” Proverbs 17:22

Dry bones are worse than rotten teeth. The whole character and countenance changes when are hearts get hardened by the things of life.

That’s what happens you know. Day by day, little by little things eat away at our moral fiber. Gossip gets a grip, Bitterness takes a bite, slander slides our way, anger acts out and then pride takes a place of prominence in our hearts.

Without our guard being up we get puffed up. We stand on bad attitudes and sit in wrong motives. The first Psalm warns us about that, “Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked or stand in the way of sinners or sit in the seat of mockers. But his delight is in the law of the LORD, and on his law he