“We love because he first loved us” (1 John 4:19).

When I was a little girl, many was the day that I prayed when I awoke to get through the day without a spanking. I genuinely wanted to be a good girl and to please my parents. I am still a goal setter, but I’m realizing that most of my goals are still about what I want to be or do (or in some cases what I want to quit doing or being).

This devotional is continuing in the theme of “Heart” for this Lenten season. Remember how we defined the heart last week? We said: “In this case, the heart is more than the organ that pumps blood. Biblically, the heart is our soul; it is “basket” term for our mind, our will, our emotions, and our conscience.” Last week we talked about God’s heart. This week we will continue by looking at our hearts.

Recently I have been challenged through a Bible study that my goals are not as transformational as they should be. These were the questions which challenged me:

1. Are my family and friends closer to Jesus because I am in their lives?
2. Are my family and friends absolutely confident of my love for them?

Wow! When you put it that way, I feel that I fall far short. These questions have really convicted me. They called to mind Jesus’ teaching on the two greatest commandments:

“Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind; and, love your neighbor as yourself.” (Luke 10:27)

What is vital to know is that we cannot achieve the best answer to these questions, and we can’t be fully obedient to these commands, through our own power. We can try to do all the right things and to think all the right things, but we will always fall short. We will always tire and lose our enthusiasm when operating under our own steam. So how can we hope to accomplish goals like these? The fact is, we cannot initiate any good thing, even achievement of a good goal or obedience to Jesus’ teaching; we can only respond to what God has done for us. “We love because he first loved us” (1 John 4:19).

God always makes the first move. It is God who regenerates our hearts. It is the Holy Spirit that initiates our spiritual rebirth.

• “Jesus answered, ‘Very truly I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless they are born of water and the Spirit. Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit. You should not be surprised at my saying, ‘Youmust be born again.’”  John 3:5-7).
• “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come” (2 Corinthians 5:17).
• “I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you…” (Ezekiel 36:26).

No amount of good works will change my heart. No amount of good works will get me to heaven. No amount of effort on my part will make me love God and love others to the fullest. But when we are spiritually reborn, then we have a new heart that is God’s own heart in us. We will be transformed. And our response will be to love God and to love others as God loves us.

When our hearts are transformed, when we are reborn, then our relationship with God will be at the center of each of our relationships—with our spouse, with our children, with our friends. As we mature in our walk with Christ, we will desire to become more and more like Him. Not just to read, not just to study, not just to know, but to use this love, give it away, lose it all for God’s glory. When God is a priority in our lives, then we don’t just love others, they become a priority for us. There is no good thing God has withheld from us. And there will be no good thing we will withhold from those we love. We will delight to take up our cross daily and follow Him, and to lay down our lives for our friends.

Our prayer will truly be as Paul wrote to the Philippians 2:1-11:

Therefore, if you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any common sharing in the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and of one mind. Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others.

In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus:  Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death—even death on a cross!

Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

In Christ,

Judy