Understanding Your Heart

UNDERSTANDING YOUR HEART

Job 10:8 & Selected

Jeff Seaman

Proverbs 27. We’re in a series I’m calling "You are Shaped for Significance". The theme verse we’ve been using is Job 10:8 "God’s hands formed me and shaped me." God made you unique. You’re a unique combination of numerous factors, abilities, interests, etc. To summarize that for you, I’ve put it into an acrostic S-H-A-P-E. God has given you Spiritual gifts. God has given you a Heart, things that you love to do. God has given you Abilities, Personality and Experiences. All five of these make up who you are.

Today, I want us to look at the second one -- the Heart that God has given you. Living Your Heart’s Desire.

I. UNDERSTANDING YOUR HEART

You need to understand your heart. The Bible uses the word "heart" to describe the bundle of motivations that you have -- your desires, your hopes, your longings, your dreams, your ambitions, your affections, the things you care about, the things you love to do. All these are composed in your heart.

Every human being physiologically has a unique heartbeat. Every human being’s heart beats just a little bit differently. There’s a slight variation in the pattern of every heartbeat. The same is true emotionally. Would you agree that there are some thing you care very deeply about and there are other things you couldn’t care less about? Would you agree that those of you who are married, married someone who is very different and often the opposite? God gave you a unique heartbeat. The Bible says in Proverbs 27:19 (Good News) "It is your own self that you see in your heart." Your heart is what makes you, you! And God made you so that your emotional heartbeat races when you’re interested in certain things and when you encounter other things, it doesn’t race at all. That is intentional. The interests that you have were put in you by God for a purpose. The Bible says that your heart determines three things.

1. Why I say the things I do. "The mouth speaks what the heart is full of."

2. Why I feel the way I do. "God’s word examines the thoughts and motives of the heart."

3. Why I act the way I do. "Guard your heart -- for out of it flow the actions of life."

If my heart determines the way I think, the way I feel, and the way I act then what my heart is, is the internal guidance system that God has placed in me and in you for a purpose. It’s not by accident. You are shaped for significance. You may have the same spiritual gift as somebody else, but your heart may be different so you’re motivated to use it in a different way. Same gift, same ability, different heart, different motivation, different passion.

II. THE RESULTS OF LIVING YOUR HEART’S DESIRE

There are some results of living your heart’s desire, living based on what God made you interested in. The Bible says, "Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord." We are always to work from our heart. We’re always to work from the inborn motivations He put within us.

How do you know when you’re working from your heart? How do you know when you’ve got a job that matches the internal heart that God has given you? Three characteristics of living to your heart’s desire:

1. Enthusiasm

When you do what you love to do you enjoy it. When you do what you’re gifted and shaped to do. When your job fits your heart you don’t have to be motivated. You don’t need anybody to supervise you. You don’t need anybody to motivate you, challenge you. You do it simply because you love to do it. There’s natural enthusiasm there. You don’t need any rewards, applause, limelight. You do it because you love to do it. There’s enthusiasm.

Eccl. 2:10 "My heart took delight in all my work." Circle "delight". Do you delight in your work? If you don’t, that is a spiritual problem and you are likely in the wrong job. God doesn’t want you just to endure life, He wants you to enjoy life. He doesn’t want life to be a drag. He wants it to be a delight. If your heart isn’t in the work you’re doing, it’s a drag.

Once in a while I have someone say to me, "Someday I’m going to make enough money so I can quit work and do what I love to do." That’s a spiritual problem. God says,"NO! Don’t waste your life in a job that doesn’t express what I made you to be." That’s called wasting your life. It’s a lot more important than many of us have given consideration to.