THIS IS TABLE ROCK FELLOWSHIP – PASTOR RYAN LADEN (DEVOTIONALS)
Blinders
Have you ever seen an animal that has been fitted with blinders? Think of a horse that has those funny looking flaps on the sides of their eyes. The purpose of this piece of equipment is pretty simple, keep the animal focused on the ground in front of them.
This is useful when you are dealing with a work animal that is easily distracted or spooked. In this case, these limitations enable the animal to get their work done without leading to disaster or wasted time.
Limitation
However, when you and I are limited in our ability to see what is really going on around us, or in our hearts, we do not receive a similar kind of benefit. When we have blinders on, we tend to do little more than focus on the tasks, problems, pains, and challenges that lie before us.
This kind of narrow focus can seem like a good response to times of trial and stress, but it can also lead us to focus on the wrong things. In the passage that follows, we hear a line from the Prophet Jeremiah as he was speaking to the people about the need to remove their blinders when they seek to know their own hearts:
“The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it? “I the LORD search the heart and test the mind, to give every man according to his ways, according to the fruit of his deeds.””
Evaluation
I love how verse nine is given in the NIV: “The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it?”
The truth being given by God through the Prophet here is that we are not able to evaluate the condition of our hearts on our own. Because of our blinders, we just cannot see the whole picture when we try and look at our true emotions, our honest beliefs, and our real desires.
We are being encouraged to turn over the job of self-evaluation to the only one who truly knows our hearts and our thoughts.
Examples
In the the passages that follow, we can hear a few examples of how the child of God should turn over the job of evaluating the true condition of the heart to the Lord. Listen to these three examples of this kind of God-provided evaluation:
“Test me, O LORD, and try me, examine my heart and my mind; for your love is ever before me, and I walk continually in your truth.”
“O LORD, you have searched me and you know me. You know when I sit and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar.
You discern my going out and my lying down; you are familiar with all my ways.”
“Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts.
See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.”
God Knows
The Lord knows us better than we know ourselves. We can convince ourselves that we are right in all of our ways, justified in all of our attitudes and actions, but the Lord cuts through all of our self-deception and sees the truth.
Those who are seeking real wisdom and spiritual maturity need to accept the challenge laid before us in God’s word and allow the Lord to search us and know us, and lead us away from any area of sin and rebellion in our hearts.
Prayer
Lord Jesus Christ,
I thank you that you love me so much that you want to be involved in all parts of my life. Who am I that you would give me your attention? And yet you are always at work in me, searching me and showing me the better way. Help me to submit to your authority over all areas of my life, thoughts, emotions, and desires.
In Christ,
Ryan Laden
OUR MISSION AS A CHURCH
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