We’ve finished up a series on Why Jesus?, and the answer was because He is Better. And so, I felt it natural to move on to—because Jesus is better we should place our faith in Him, then get to our New Year's lesson. The topic that we're going to consider this morning is A New Year Requires a New Heart. This would really prove true regardless of whether you're a member of the church or not. We should constantly be renewing our heart in our service to God.
We shouldn't take this—if we've been faithful members of the church for any length of time—and sit back and say, “This just doesn't apply to me. I've got this covered. My heart's already been changed.” Because there's always work that we can do in our heart in service to God.
But we're in that time of year where many have—maybe you are among those who do, and that's spoken their New Year's resolutions, you've made them out loud. And basically what you've done is you've told the world what it is that you want to accomplish, or there's some certain things about you that you want to change over the course of this year, fully realizing that the majority of those are not going to happen. You've just told everybody what you want to do and that you're probably not going to do it.
Some have taken New Year's resolutions now to be somewhat laughable. They don't make them with very much of a serious nature. They're not necessarily sincere when they say those things. Others are well-intentioned when they start, but we're already two weeks into the year.
Do you know how long it takes for most New Year's resolutions to go by the wayside? About now—until the end of January, beginning of February—life goes back to normal and you're like, well, nothing's gonna change.
Let's examine this idea that a new year requires a new heart from a biblical standpoint. We should be examining our hearts, whether or not we are in the faith.
- 2 Corinthians 13:5
Create a New Heart
Let's notice first of all a saying as a part of the prayer of King David.
“Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me.” — Psalm 51:10
And that's the foundation for even bringing this lesson before you: the words of David. We go back to verse 1 and we recognize that David expresses this prayer to God. This was something that he said out loud to God as a result of Nathan the prophet coming to him after he had committed that horrible sin with Bathsheba and the subsequent murdering of her husband, Uriah, to cover all of this up. Nathan goes to David, and that great illustration there in 2 Samuel chapter 12 illustrates very specifically that David is at fault. David is pleading with God to forgive him of his iniquities and trespasses.
Now you might say that you don't need a new heart because you're already a child of God. Well, David was faithful to God. He momentarily took a sidestep out of that deliberate faithfulness to God when he went about to cover up his sin with Bathsheba. And so it was definitely necessary for him to repent. But David before and then after this time is considered to be the friend of God, but he needed to have his heart renewed.
There are certain times in our lives, even today, when we do the best that we can, that we need our hearts renewed in our service, and maybe sometimes in our dedication to the Lord.
It Is Possible for Our Heart to Depart from God
So if you will study this with me for a few moments this morning, and then hopefully you will have some notes that you can take with you and study them further.
We need to first of all understand and point out that it is absolutely possible for our heart to be separated or depart from God. There's some people—you might not necessarily realize this—they don't believe that's the case. Our heart cannot fully be separated from God. It cannot depart from God.
But the Bible teaches something very differently.
“Thus saith the Lord; Cursed be the man that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm, and whose heart departed from the Lord.” — Jeremiah 17:5
- Jeremiah 17:9-10
The question is asked by the prophet Jeremiah, given him the message from the Lord: Who is it that can know the heart of man? And God says, I can. I search the hearts of men.
We think concerning this idea of the heart and its meaning to God, we're going to discover that the heart is very precious to God, but the heart can be turned away from God. And who does that? Does God turn our heart away from him? Certainly not. We do that. We depart from the ways of God.
- Hebrews 3:12
We need to pay attention. The Hebrews writer is saying, lest we fall as those in the Old Testament fell. Jeremiah was foreshadowing some of that in his prophecy concerning the destruction of Jerusalem by the city of Babylon. We need to be careful to make sure that our hearts don't fall because of unbelief. It is absolutely possible for our heart to depart from God.
This is not something that God wants. He does not want our hearts to depart from him. He knows our hearts because he's the one that created us and our ability to have desires and wants and wishes and to make informed decisions, and he wants those decisions that we make to be in search of him.
Jesus Knows Our Hearts
- Matthew 6:33
- Matthew 11:28-30
- John 14:6
- John 6:44-45
It's the word of God. It's the gospel. It's the inspired word that draws us in the direction of God. So God is not interested, He is not desirous of our hearts departing from Him or turning away from Him. But it is a reality that some will. It is a reality that there are many in this world that are not going to be found in a right relationship with God.
But here's the good news of that particular message: It doesn't have to be any of you in this room. That doesn't have to be any of us here, and it really doesn't have to be anyone. But we all choose. And we will all make a decision one way or the other to either serve God or to serve ourselves.
How Does Man's Heart Become Evil?
Noticing that man's heart can depart from God, let's notice: How does man's heart then become evil? How does man's heart become evil and therefore depart from God?
Well, first of all, I would suggest that through the hardening of our heart, we become evil by causing our heart to be so callous and unfeeling. Whether you take heart as the mind of the Christian or as the emotions of the Christian, I think you could argue for both of those and that would be correct. We have the ability to make our hearts in such a way that the word of God has no effect on us.
You think back to the Book of Exodus when God's people are enslaved in Egypt. God sends Moses to Pharaoh and the message from God to Pharaoh through his prophet Moses is, “Let my people go.” It is the appropriate time for God to fulfill his promise to Abraham, to Isaac and Jacob. Now the descendants of those three generations are supposed to inherit a specific land, a promised land, and it was told that they would spend some time enslaved in Egypt. Now is that time for them to come out of Egypt and to possess the land that God had promised to them.
So Moses stands before Pharaoh and he says, on behalf of God, “Let my people go.” You remember the question that Pharaoh in turn asked Moses as an answer: “Who is this God that I should obey him?”
And Moses will answer and God will certainly provide an answer for himself over the next 12 chapters—the Book of Exodus and the 10 plagues. Over and over throughout the giving of the 10 plagues, you find this particular phrase that Pharaoh hardened his heart. You find it 15 times. Actually, every time in the Book of Exodus you find the word “hardened,” it's in reference to the heart of Pharaoh. At 15 of those times, specifically nine of them, it references Pharaoh hardening his own heart. Six of those times it says God hardened Pharaoh's heart.
Now, did God physically prevent Pharaoh from being obedient to his message? Well, that would be cruel, wouldn't it? God was not preventing Pharaoh from obeying him. Pharaoh had demonstrated previously he was not going to relent. He was not going to let the people go. He was not interested in doing what God said. He didn't even recognize Jehovah as being the Almighty God.
But when the truth of God's word was presented to him—when Moses told him who God was, when Moses instructed him in the name or by the authority of the Almighty—Pharaoh didn't care. He didn't care one bit.
When the truth of God's word is presented, it will have one of two effects on the heart that it's presented to. To those who are already disposed to the idea that there is no God, there is no supreme deity that I have to give an answer to, the odds are they will reject that particular message and they will be calloused against it. Their hearts will be hardened because they're not willing to obey and humble themselves to the truth.
You look at the other side of that particular coin and the word of God when it is presented to an honest heart—one that is receiving of the information, understanding that there is a God, and maybe I just need to know a little bit more about who this God is so I can then worship this God and be faithful to this God and be righteous before this God—the Word of God has a softening effect on that particular heart, and it's well received.
That's the only two responses to the word of God when it's preached, when it's taught and read and studied by individuals. The word of God has the power to harden your heart, but it's not the gospel that's hardening your heart. You're doing it because you don't like what the word says. You don't like the message that's been presented to you, and you believe there's another way. You believe there's a better way. You believe you might even have the answer to the sin problem that is within mankind's society. And so you refuse to accept and you refuse to trust in the will of God, and you refuse to obey what the word of God says.
We can harden our hearts.
Hardening the Heart in the New Testament
But we can also, just for a moment, let us look at this word “hardened” as it applies not only to the Old Testament, but also into the New Testament. Specifically, “hardened” is found in the New Testament in reference to our heart. A couple different words are actually translated “hardened” in the New Testament.
One of those is translated five times and it's “Pōróō”. The idea is to cover with a thick skin, to harden with a covering, with a callous, and also to make the heart full, to grow hard, callous, become dull, lose the power of understanding.
We find this word in passages like:
- Mark 6:52
- John 12:40 (quoting Isaiah 6:9-10)
- Romans 11:7
- 2 Corinthians 3:14-15
There's a way in which you and I can become calloused in our hearts to the reading and the instruction of the word of God. That's what Paul's getting at there in 2 Corinthians chapter 3. The word of God could not penetrate because they had intentionally caused their heart to be hardened or calloused or blinded so that they could not receive the truth.
There's another word in the Greek that is translated “hardened,” and it's “Skleruno.” It means to make hard, hardened, or render obstinate, stubborn.
We read the passage already.
- Hebrews 3:8, 15
Do not render the heart insensible to the divine voice and admonition. A hard heart is that where the conscience is seared and insensible, where truth makes no impression.
That's what we can do to ourselves. If we don't approach the word of God with honesty, if we don't approach the word of God with a desire to learn and an understanding that when we read the word of God, we're reading a communication from God instructing us on how to be right with him—if we don't approach the word of God from that particular mindset—we're most likely gonna be hardened to the message that we find within it.
So we need to be careful so that we do not harden our hearts just like those did in disbelief in the Old Testament.
How God Renews Our Hearts
But with the time that we have remaining this morning, I would like for us to consider: How does God renew our hearts?
- Psalm 51:10
How is it that this happens?
God can and God does. But it's not going to be through some miraculous operation on our heart outside of the word of God. You're gonna find that particular idea expressed that man cannot change his heart, only God can change the heart of man, and God has to do the operation while man's just receiving. That's simply not true. That's not what the Bible teaches.
You and I are certainly responsible for the changing of our hearts, and you and I are certainly the ones that are in need of our hearts being changed. But how does this renewing of the heart take place?
- Romans 1:16
What is it that has the power to save? According to the Apostle Paul, it's the gospel.
- Matthew 13
- Mark 4
- Acts 8:12, 14
- 1 Peter 1:22-23
Notice what he says there concerning the truth that has the ability to purify our souls. Where does it come from? It comes from the Holy Spirit. No one in their right mind should deny that the gospel message was given miraculously to those apostles and writers in the first century by the Holy Spirit, and that's what was recorded for us to read and study and apply to our lives today.
When we look at the message that was given unto us, we can be born again. According to verse 23, it's the power of that message as it works upon our heart that is going to be the catalyst that brings about change within us. We don't start the change. The word of God starts the change in our heart. And then we become malleable to that particular gospel.
But we have to be careful because there are those that will insist that there are other methods whereby you and I can be saved. We need to understand the words of Paul are very clear when you go to Galatians chapter 1.
In Galatians chapter 1, there is a warning given to the churches there in the region of Galatia. Paul had been there, he'd been through that particular area, had established most of those congregations. You go back to the book of Acts and you read beginning his missionary journeys and where he went, and you look, follow it on the map and you'll find he goes through the region of Galatia. He establishes some of these congregations and now he writes to them;
- Galatians 1:6-9
Sadly, this is not just a first century issue that Paul was writing about. It's just as much a 21st century problem for us today as it was for the churches in Galatia that Paul was writing to. There were some individuals that were preaching a different gospel, calling it the gospel of God, a gospel from God, or a gospel of Jesus. And really the only thing that it accomplished was it perverted the hearts and the minds of those that paid attention to it.
He gives a warning that includes himself in this warning.
“But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed.” Galatians 1:8
There's whole religious movements dedicated to this idea of another gospel, a continuing revelation, that there's a New Testament that helps fill in the gaps of the Bible. That's simply not the case.
- 2 Peter 1:3
We have everything that we need and we should be confident in the scriptures to being our only way to get out of the sinful life where our heart is departed from God into a right relationship with God, where we demonstrate an honest and good heart.
What Does Your Heart Say?
The question then comes to each of us: What does our heart say about us? You and I have to answer that for ourselves and there's no one else that can answer that particular question for us.
I think we've been able to demonstrate how precious the heart is to God—so precious that he sent his son to die on the cross for our sins.
- John 3:16
- Romans 5:8
- 2 Peter 3:9
Is your heart in such a condition where it needs to be renewed this morning? Is your heart in a condition where you stand separated or departed from the love of God, from the saving grace of God, from the blood that removes sin from your record and threatens your ability to be in heaven with the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit, and the saints forevermore, when you leave this world? Are you ready to make your life right with God?
Is there something that we can do to help you? We hope and pray that you'll have the courage to contact us so that we can assist you.
