After reviewing the You Might Have a Hard Heart If . . . list, I know I have some hard, rocky places. I have my work cut out for me.
My Uncle Dennis used to prepare my mom's garden with a tiller. It broke up the soil and turned it over . . . it prepared the unplowed ground.
Jesus described the people whose hearts are unplowed.
16 Others, like seed sown on rocky places, hear the word and at once receive it with joy. 17 But since they have no root, they last only a short time. When trouble or persecution comes because of the word, they quickly fall away.
No fruit from those seeds because the ground wasn't ready. I'm committed to have a bumper crop of joy. So how do I till the soil/my heart?
Repentance – turning away from everything that is not like God.
Forgiveness – forgiving offenses quickly and not holding grudges.
Humility – realizing that God is in control and I'm not.
Gratefulness – giving thanks instead of complaining.
Trust – leaning on God and not myself.
The biggest thing for me though is to stop feeding my heart with junk. I felt as if I was becoming a TV and movieholic. I was filling my time watching TV shows and movies online. The quality of programming wasn't necessarily the problem; the quantity was the problem – hours upon hours. It was an easy way to be a vegetable and I didn't have to think too much to allow all of that garbage in my heart. When I say garbage, I don't mean profane or explicit content. Too many family movies turn into junk food for the soul.
So now, I have to stop with the garbage and put in the good.
Right now as I read the joy scriptures daily, I am using them to break up the hard places. I love it that God says in Jeremiah 23:29 in the Amplified version:
Is not My word like fire [that consumes all that cannot endure the test]? says the Lord, and like a hammer that breaks in pieces the rock [of most stubborn resistance]?
My heart has been that rock of most stubborn resistance lately. It's as if I can feel the hardness. But I am daily applying the hammer and I will continue to till until the soil is ready. I feel a WOOHOO! coming on.
