It's Not About You! It's About Your HEART.
As a Jesus follower, I’m sure at some point, you have read the story of Abraham and felt the familiar feeling of awe and inspiration in regard to his faith. After all, we’ve been taught for years about his amazing ability to believe the Lord, even to the point of almost sacrificing his own son.
And while that is all well and good… what if I told you this whole time we were focusing on the wrong part of that story?
What if the most awesome part of that whole story wasn’t Abraham’s “unshakable” faith? But, something much more important? Not to mention, much more freeing for you and me?
It’s a hidden treasure the Holy Spirit recently shared with me and I believe it will open up some huge breakthroughs for you, just as it has done for me.
So, let’s dive in, shall we?
In my last post, I talked about how the Holy Spirit had freed me from feeling “paralyzed” in regards to knowing God’s will. And how I could trust that my decision of surrendering to His will would in turn, ensure that He would indeed guide my steps, allowing me to relax and trust that He’s got me. Even when I didn’t consciously realize it.
But now, I want to dive a little deeper. When I talk about deciding to surrender to God’s will, it is a choice. It is a deliberate action - the laying down of our own will and desires, in exchange for His. But, it is also about taking up a certain heart posture before God.
Now, at first glance, the phrase “heart posture” may sound like Christian-ese to you. But, I promise you, it is a legit thing.
The word “posture” by itself means a particular way of dealing with or considering something; an approach or attitude. So then, heart posture would mean the particular way that you deal with or consider something in your heart. The approach you take toward it or attitude you have around it in your heart.
It is important to make this distinction because you can actually have a different posture in your heart than in your mind or your outward behaviors. But, your heart is where your true beliefs reside. You can fool others on the outside and even talk yourself into something else in your head. But, in your heart, it’s nothing but the truth.
Which is why “man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.” (1 Sam 16:7). God doesn’t want lip service from us or a bunch of outward actions, He wants our hearts. In complete honesty and transparency.
So, we need to be aware of what heart posture we have before God. But, NOT for a legalistic reason or to be a “perfect” little Christian. Because coming to the Lord with the right heart posture opens up the lines of communications, the channels of blessings and frees us from bondage!
Let me explain it with a personal story. Recently, I took off on a little 3-day “side trip” where I went off in my own fleshy ideas of how I thought God was going to bring some particular promises to pass. The details aren’t important as much as the reason behind them. After I finally got clarity about what was happening, the Holy Spirit showed me that I had headed off in the direction I had because it was the only thing that made sense to me in my natural mind. I was relying again on my own understanding and my own sensual perception of how these things could possibly manifest. Except, that’s the exact opposite of what the Lord wants us to do. He wants us to leave all of our senses and reasoning behind and jump off the cliff of faith with Him.
So, after getting my attention through Psalm 32 (that’ll do it!), I got back on track. But, what that experience did for me was expose both a hidden sin in my heart and a hidden (IMPORTANT!) truth about God. I hadn’t realized it… but somewhere along the way, I had become prideful in my ability to have faith.
It was a good thing… this “crazy” faith that I had… this outlandish ability to believe God at nothing but His word and move on it in what seemed to be impossible-looking situations. And He had brought forth some crazy testimonies and amazing experiences through it! BUT, what I hadn’t realized is that along the way, I started becoming prideful about my faith… meaning, I had started to think that my faith is what made the miracles happen.
Now, this is where your brain may start to get a little twisted up, but stick with me here cuz it’s important.
YES. Faith is extremely important in the Kingdom of God. YES. God does require us to believe Him and when we do, miracles, signs and wonders can take place. YES. Faith like Abraham and all those others in the “Hall of Faith” (Hebrews 11) is meant to encourage and inspire us and fill us with hope. BUT…
Their “perfect faith” is NOT what caused the blessings/promises of God to manifest.
Because when it comes down to it, none of them had perfect faith. Even our dear, beloved Abraham.
Don’t believe me? Go back and study it in the text. Not only did Abraham doubt God’s promise enough to go along with his wife’s plan to bring about an heir through her servant Hagar, but he also lied about Sarah being his sister and not his wife, not once… but twice! Because he doubted God’s ability to protect them and keep them safe. Not to mention, his disobedience when he let Lot come along with him, right after God specifically told him to leave all of his relatives behind.
And he’s not the only one. David took a census when he wasn’t supposed to and caused a whole mess of trouble. Moses copped an attitude and struck the rock instead of speaking to it and got himself kicked out of the promised land.
Over and over again, God came through on His promises and blessed people in the Bible even when their faith was not perfect. But, that’s because it’s NOT about having “perfect” faith.
So, you know how I realized this was a “thing” for me? Cuz when I was sitting there talking to God and repenting of going off course, He convicted me of doing it because down deep, I didn’t really believe that He could do something as miraculous as what He had promised me. And at that moment, a sentence fell out of my mouth that immediately made me tear up… “I guess I don’t have the faith of Abraham after all.”
And just like that, God revealed some hard truths to me:
I had become prideful about my faith.
I thought my faith was what was going to bring forth His promises (or prevent them if it wasn’t “perfect” enough).
I had idolized Abraham as some sort of “superhero.”
But, the truth is (as the Holy Spirit practically shouted at me)… God is the superhero of these stories, not man!
We have been taught to idolize men like Abraham, David and Moses for their faith. But, they aren’t the true heroes of the stories! The hero is God. HE is the one who is faithful. HE is the one who is good. HE is the one that brings the victory, manifests the blessing and saves the day.
In the end, God brings these things to pass simply because He is faithful and He promised He would. And when God ordains something, it will come to pass. Period.
Which, guess what? Takes the pressure off of us. Hallelujah!
So, to go back to the idea of “heart posture” then. What is the correct posture to take?
Well, it is one like David actually. It is the posture of understanding just how small we are and just how BIG God is. It’s being able to walk right up to “giants” (those impossible-looking situations in our lives) and saying with full confidence, “you ARE going down… because do you know who my God is??”
Or Ezekiel who stood before the valley of dry bones and when God asked him if they could live again, he confessed, “O Sovereign Lord,” I replied, “you alone know the answer to that.” (Ezek. 37:3)
It is humility before Him. Knowing that we are nothing without Him, but that with Him, anything is possible. But, remembering that it is because of HIM, not us. So, although we DO need to have faith and believe God… we don’t need to be prideful about our ability to do so.
“God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.” (1 Pet 5:5)
Because in the end, who is supposed to get the glory when these things DO happen in the natural? God. So, if we attribute it to our ability to believe or our unshakable faith… then wouldn’t it be about us? The beautiful thing (the glorifying thing) is that God still blesses us despite the fact that our faith is imperfect.
When He called me out that day on my little side-trip, He showed me that deep down in my heart, no matter how much I wanted to believe that He is going to do this miraculous thing in my life, I still had doubt and unbelief. Because as humans, we simply can’t fully grasp how something can happen that has no logical explanation.
Hence… the blessings not being about us. But, being about Him and His goodness.
So, for us, faith is a decision. And it may be one that you have to make continually, day after day. It’s a decision to believe God and trust He will do what He says. Even if your feelings don’t match up and your brain wants to fight you every step of the way.
It’s not about perfection. It’s about choosing.
“O my son, give me your heart. May your eyes take delight in following my ways.” (Prov. 23:26)
Your actions matter more than your words because your words can betray you. You can have the very best of intentions and still find words of doubt and fear slipping out of your mouth. But, your actions will demonstrate what you choose.
“But I, the Lord, search all hearts and examine secret motives. I give all people their due rewards,
according to what their actions deserve.” (Jer 17:10)
For instance, even if I struggle with thoughts, feelings or even words of doubt or unbelief, I still live my life in a way that demonstrates my belief and faith in God. I may not have “perfect” faith, but I have enough faith to go up the mountain and put my life on the altar.
And that’s what the Lord cares about. Your heart, not your perfection.
So, to bring things all the way back around to my last post… all of this can help you to rest in His ways. Instead of putting all this pressure on yourself to make things happen by your faith or worry that you might miss them by doing or saying the wrong thing, rest in the fact that His promises and words will come to pass in your life because He said so.
And remember that He is guiding you and directing your steps even when you don’t realize it.
It’s like this beautiful short film by John Bevere demonstrates the love of God - we may not always know it at the time, but He is always watching out for us and always leading us. If He wants us to take a certain step or go a certain way, He will direct our steps. We just have to trust Him and His ways, even when we don’t understand them.
Recently, I saw a post about a new innovation that Google had released called “Google lens” that allows you to look through your phone’s camera in real time and see superimposed arrows and signs pointing you in the direction you should go. The signs aren’t actually there in the world, but the app gives you step-by-step assistance to help you get where you need to go.
But, when we’re surrendered to the Lord and walking with Him, we don’t need an app! Because the Holy Spirit is our GPS! He’ll tell us (or lead us) where we need to go to get to our destination and make sure that we get there at His Divinely appointed time.
“Your own ears will hear him. Right behind you a voice will say, “This is the way you should go,” whether to the right or to the left.” (Is. 30:21)
We can trust that even when we don’t get it perfectly right, when our faith stumbles or when we take a misstep or go the wrong way, the Lord is always right there patiently and lovingly guiding us back on track. Because He is the Good Shepherd. He is a good Father. And He is faithful to His word.
So, it’s time to take the pressure off of yourself. Because it’s not about you. It’s about Him.
Lay down your pride.
Choose to believe His promises.
And rest in His faithfulness to deliver them.
