“But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.” 1 Peter 2:9 NIV
I read this interesting quote the other day that said: “We don’t just need more of Jesus, Jesus needs more of us.” Although I do like the classic prayer request for “more of Jesus,” this quote reminds us to ask ourselves, “does Jesus really have all of me?” We all go through seasons where we happily give Jesus some parts of ourselves, but then other parts seem too messy, unimportant, painful, or just too embarrassing to surrender to Jesus. And we tell ourselves that it doesn’t really matter; we can hold back a few things; what’s the big deal? It’s not like this will make a difference… Right?
But the Bible tells us that the human heart is deceitfully wicked. The Message translation puts it this way: “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.” (Jeremiah 17:9-10 MSG) It’s not super encouraging. But it does help shed some light on the little dance we just discussed earlier where we convince ourselves that holding back parts of our lives and our hearts is totally fine. The Oxford dictionary defines “deceit” as “concealing or misinterpreting the truth.”
But the truth is, “all have sinned and fall short of God’s glory” (Romans 3:23 CEB). If the human heart is a puzzle no one can figure out but God, then we need to bring it to the Physician who understands our hearts better than anyone else. We need to surrender. We need to let Him in, all in. We need to welcome Him in this place. And that is a beautiful place of repentance, of realigning ourselves with God and letting go of anything that does not come from Him. Repentance is partly about turning away from sin, but the powerful part, the heart of it, is turning to God!
The Beatitudes in the book of Matthew tells us that it’s the pure in heart who will see God (Matt 5:8). I love how C.S. Lewis explains this verse by saying that the heart is the instrument through which we see God. Just like if we were bird watchers, we would use binoculars to see the birds. But if our instrument, the binoculars, wasn’t clean, then we couldn’t see the birds well or maybe even at all. It’s important to maintain our instrument and continually clean it. In our relationship with God, that means repenting and asking God to cleanse our hearts so we can see Him. That is how revival starts.
The Apostle Paul tells us that we are the temple of God because the Holy Spirit lives in us. But in the Old Testament, when King Solomon dedicated the first temple to God, we read that God’s glory filled the entire temple. In fact, it says: “The priests could not enter the temple of the Lord because the glory of the Lord filled it.” (2 Chronicles 7:2 NIV) Just like God filled every corner of the temple of stone back then, God longs to fill every corner of our lives today and reveal His goodness and glory.
“Make yourselves holy! Tomorrow the Lord will do wonderful things among you.” (Joshua 3:5 CEB)
Heavenly Father, thank You for the amazing plans You have in store for us! Come Holy Spirit; You are welcome here. You’re all we want! Come purify us, come clean our hearts so we can see You in all Your beauty and splendor. We repent of partnering with anything that is not of You for compromising and seeking satisfaction in places where You are not. God come, give us clean hands and a clean heart. Come and have Your way among us. In Jesus’ name, amen!
