Why One's Heart Is so Important to God

First, it's nice to have a hymn, which also has to do with this coming Feast of Trumpets. We plan to bring the ram's horn, so for the feast we will have that shofar to announce that wonderful day this coming Thursday, God willing. Now this year, it just happens that Mr. Rick Shabe mentioned it would be good for us to go over the book of Deuteronomy and the Bible commentary that we have on our website. And so many have been going over that book of Deuteronomy in preparation for the coming Feast. We have been translating, Kadi and I, the commentary into Spanish, so the Spanish brethren can benefit as well. So it's being sent out in the same synchronicity of what is being done here in the U.S. We are going to be happy when we get Chapter 34 over, believe me. It takes about three hours to do each one. Now Deuteronomy literally means the second law, but it's actually, it's not like God is changing the law, but it's actually the second time that God gives His law. It's being repeated after 40 years that they had been in the wilderness and they are prepared to enter the Promised Land. And one thing as you go through the book of Deuteronomy, at least for me it stood out, it emphasizes the importance of one's heart to be prepared before God to fulfill His wishes. Now when the Bible talks about one's heart, it's funny, but it's not anything to do with as far as anatomy and the heart is just a pump, right? It just pumps blood all day. But actually in ancient times they realized that when you are scared, your heart will pump faster. When you're going through grieving, it actually beats slower and you can have what is a heartache. So they felt that there was something there inside of you that was affected by things that happened around you. And so it came to symbolize your motives and attitudes, your inner thoughts and your emotions and actions as well. So basically you can reduce it to a person's attitude and motives. Even when you're a young kid, sometimes your mother or father will say, be careful because that person's heart is not right. What does it mean? It's not talking about pumping. It's the attitude, the motives. You have to be careful. And so that's the way it's expressed also in the Bible. And as we prepare for the coming feasts, starting next week on Thursday, we should prepare spiritually our hearts before God. What kind of attitude are we going to have before Him? Are we going to have joy? Is this something we're going to rejoice? Or is it just a routine, something that the church does that doesn't have much meaning? Now, unfortunately, in Israel, many people did not have the right heart. And in the book of Deuteronomy, God is warning His people, now don't take these commandments for granted. Don't disobey them because it's going to show what kind of heart you have. And I'm going to judge you according to your heart. Notice in Deuteronomy 4, God talks about the heart here.

Deuteronomy chapter 4, starting in verse 1, He says, Now, O Israel, listen to the statutes and the judgments which I teach you to observe, that you may live and go on in and possess the land which the Lord God of your fathers is giving you. So Moses is speaking here what God has given them. You shall not add to the word which I command you, nor take from it, that you may keep the commandments of the Lord your God which I command you.

So this is an important principle in God's church. You're not to add laws to what the Bible says, and you shall not take away laws because this is the inspired word of God. And as mentioned in the prayer that we're dealing with God's truths here.

He goes on to say, verse 3, Your eyes have seen what the Lord did at Baal-Pior, for the Lord your God has destroyed from among you all the men who followed Baal of Pior. He talks about the time there where the Moabites came in and the men started having sex with them and God punished. So he says, you're not to follow false practices and that type of mixture. He says, but you who held fast to the Lord your God are alive today, every one of you.

And this also applies today. Where would we be if we weren't following God? We might have perished because of our sins. We might have paid a very dear price for following the world, following their practices, and where people end up sometimes. Could have happened to us. He says, you God has spared and protected because you have followed God. You have chosen His way. He says, surely I have taught you statutes and judgments, just as the Lord my God commanded me, that you should act according to them in the land which you go to possess.

Therefore be careful to observe them, for this is your wisdom. This is right and proper and wise for you to do. And your understanding in the sight of the peoples who will hear all these statutes and say, surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people.

For what great nation is there that has God so near to it, and the Lord our God is to us? Whatever reason we may call upon Him. And what great nation is there that has such statutes and righteous judgments as are in all this law which I set before you this day? Only take heed to yourself and diligently keep yourself lest you forget the things your eyes have seen, unless they depart from your heart all the days of your life and teach them to your children and your grandchildren.

That's why we have Sabbath classes. So these children can be taught. They can learn God's way before it's too late because there's only one way that is the true way. And that's God's way. It's what Jesus Christ taught. Continuing, we see the problem was that, of course, Israel did not have the right heart, the right attitude, the right motives.

They were pretty carnal. They were unconverted. They didn't have God's Spirit. And in Deuteronomy 5 verse 29 is one of these key verses. These are memories verses because God exclaims. He says, Oh, that they had such a heart in them that they would fear me and always keep all my commandments that it might be well with them and with their children forever. They're going to be blessed. Their children are going to be blessed. Have you noticed when the children follow their parents' way of life, they are blessed.

And that's the desire to have the right heart before God. Continuing in Deuteronomy 11 verse 13, it says, And it shall be that if you earnestly obey my commandments, which I command you today, to love the Lord your God and serve him with all your heart and with all your soul. In other words, purity of heart, dedication, you're doing it with the best motives, the right attitude, putting him first. Then I will give you the rain for your land in its season, the early rain and the latter rain, which was so important at that time for the crops that you may gather in your grain, your new wine and your oil.

So again, it's all conditional. It's all dependent on our hearts and how our hearts please God or they don't.

Then in the following chapter, chapter 12 verse 14, let's see here if I have it right.

Chapter 12.

I think I've got that scripture off.

Let's go to chapter 31. Chapter 31 verse 26. These are all talking about the heart, the right attitude that we should have.

Verse 31. Moses knew they weren't converted. He knew that they wouldn't obey even with the laws that God set up. And by the way, these laws had to be strict because it was for people that were very carnal, very stubborn. And so just like if you go bowling and we have little kids and what they do is they put those guardrails so that no matter how bad they throw the ball down, it doesn't go into the gutter. And so God had to put these guardrails and make it very strict because if he took the guardrails off, everybody was going to end up in the gutter just like the ball does. And so you see there that he had to really discipline because of their hardness of heart. Notice in Deuteronomy 31 verse 26, Moses is close to dying. He says in verse 26, Take this book of the law and put it beside the ark of the covenant of the Lord your God, that it may be there as a witness against you. For I know your rebellion and your stiff neck, if today while I am yet alive with you, you have been rebellious against the Lord, then how much more after my death? Gather to me all the elders of your tribes and your officers that I may speak these words in their hearing and call heaven and earth to witness against them. For I know that after my death you will become utterly corrupt and turn aside from the way which I have commanded you, and evil will befall on you in the latter days because you will do evil in the sight of the Lord to provoke him to anger through the work of your hands. So they ended up in the gutter anyways. God tried to make it very much the punishment had to be severe so people wouldn't repeat it and even so they disobeyed God, they disregarded, they became just like the nations around them. We have a scripture that tells us the basic problem they had in Acts chapter 7, Acts chapter 7 and verse 38 and 39. This crystallizes the problem that they had in Israel. It just shows here in a nutshell what was the problem. Acts 7 verse 38.

And actually it's talking about the one who became Christ, the Word, says, this is he who was in the congregation in the wilderness with the angel. So he is Moses who was in the congregation in the wilderness with the angel. That's the pre-existent Christ, the Word, who spoke to him on the Mount Sinai and with our fathers, the one who received the living oracles to give to us, whom our fathers would not obey but rejected. And in their hearts they turned back to Egypt. In their hearts, in their real attitude, their inner motives, they wanted to be back in Egypt.

So they left Egypt, but they took Egypt with them in their hearts. They never really took the Egypt out, the false system of the world. And that can happen to us too.

We have to follow God without having secretly wanting the world's ways. Notice what happened because of that rebellion they had in Numbers 14.

Again, how important the heart is to God, the right attitudes and motives. In Numbers 14, verse 20, and while they were in the wilderness, this is at the beginning, they were rebellious.

It says, then the Lord said, I have pardoned them according to their word. They wanted to go back to Egypt. He said, but truly as I live, all the earth shall be filled with the glory of the Lord, because all these men who have seen my glory and the signs which I did in Egypt and in the wilderness and have put me to the test now these ten times they defied God and rebelled, and have not heeded my voice, they certainly shall not see the land of which I swore to them their fathers, nor shall any of those who rejected me see it. But my servant Caleb, because he has a different spirit in him, different attitude, he truly was repentant, he truly wanted to follow God, and has followed me fully. I will bring into the land where he went, and his descendants shall inherit it. And it goes on to say in verse 29, The carcasses of you who have complained against me shall fall into this wilderness, all of you who were numbered according to your entire number from twenty years old and above. Except for Caleb, the son of Jephthah, and Joshua, the son of Nun, you shall by no means enter the land which I swore I would make you dwell. But your little ones, whom you said would be victims, I will bring in, and they shall know the land which you have despised. So that whole generation just was rebellious to God, even if he gave them these wonderful laws, even if he did these miracles, their heart was not right before him. And so God had to give a lot of sacrifices because of the people's unclean heart and rebellion. God set up a system of sacrifices that had to do with sin-bearing animals. They had to have all kinds of sacrifices to keep a separation between them and God. Notice what it tells us in Jeremiah chapter 7 verse 20. Jeremiah chapter 7 verse 20. This is another one of those memory scriptures that are so important.

Jeremiah is inspired to God to write this. Verse 20 says, therefore thus says the Lord God, behold my anger and my fury will be poured out on this place, on man and on beast, on the trees of the field and on the fruit of the ground, and it will burn and not be quenched. So the punishment was coming. Their hearts were wrong before God. It says, thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, add your burnt offerings to your sacrifices and eat meat. Yes, you got sacrifices, but your heart is not right. And those sacrifices is not what I was looking for. Killing animals and burning them and that was not my idea. He says, verse 22, for I did not speak to your fathers or command them in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt concerning burnt offerings or sacrifice. So he was hoping it would be obedient and that they wouldn't need this whole ritual system in place. He says, but this is what I commanded them, saying, obey my voice and I will be your God and you shall be my people and walk in all the ways that I have commanded you that it may be well with you. Yet they did not obey or incline their ear, but follow the counsels and the dictates of their evil hearts, evil attitudes and motives, and went backward and not forward. Since the day that your fathers came out of the land of Egypt, until this day I have even sent to you all my servants the prophets daily rising up early and sending them. Yet they did not obey me or incline their ear but stiffen their neck. They were worse did worse than their fathers. So you see the sad condition of the people of Israel at that time.

And as we prepare for the feast, we have something that they did not have, and that is the access to God's Holy Spirit in us. Notice in Galatians, let's go to the New Testament now, in Galatians chapter 3 verse 17, it talks about the rituals. Now God always was going to have free will offerings and offerings at the feasts to praise Him, but not all of these animals sacrificed that took place, the blood letting. That was something that God did not impose at the beginning. So it says in verse Galatians 3 17, as in this I say, that the law which was 430 years later, later than Abraham, when God gave him statutes and commandments to keep, God did not have a ritual system for Abraham. He says, it cannot annul the covenant that was confirmed before by God in Christ, that it should make the promise of no effect. For if the inheritance is of the law, it is no longer of promise, but God gave it to Abraham by promise. Now the best translation I found of verses 17 through 19 is called the Farrar-Fenton translation. This was a British scholar. You know, he was an evangelical, but he was a very studious expert in Hebrew, and he had a version. And this is the way he translates it. Verse 17, and I assert this, the rituals beginning 430 years after could not cancel a settlement previously established by God so as to abolish the promise. For if the inheritance comes from a ritual, it is no more from a promise, yet God granted it to Abraham through a promise.

Why then the law, the law of rituals is talking about. It was established because of sins. This is what Jeremiah 7 was saying. If you would have been obedient, you wouldn't have had all this whole enormous system of sacrifices and rituals. It was established because of sins until the heir should come in. Whom were the promises arranged through messengers in the hand of an intermediary? So it talks about the heir, talking about Jesus Christ. So all these sacrifices pointed to Jesus Christ, but once he gave his sacrifice, that's why we don't have to be doing sacrifices on the Sabbath day because Christ fulfilled that part. And we are a people with God's Spirit in us. We don't need all of those sacrifices to keep us distant from God. So the goal of the ritual law was to get the people ready for accepting the coming of the Messiah and to be converted, to have God's Spirit. That's what you read in Jeremiah 30 about the new covenant that would be established and the circumcision of the heart and not just physically. Notice what it mentions in 2 Corinthians 3, 7 through 18. This is an important section of Scripture comparing the two covenants, the one given to the unconverted Israelites with all the sacrifices and the system that should have pointed to them accepting Jesus Christ. And even if they have the temple and all of the priests and all of the feasts, they still had an uncircumcised heart. They did not have a right heart before God. As the Apostle Paul points out, 2 Corinthians 3 in verse 7, it says, but if the ministry of death, written and engraved on stones, was glorious. So this was the administration where if you broke the law, you could face a death penalty. You know, such breaking of the law as adultery and other things. There was just one sentence, death by stoning. And then you'd be hung up on a tree so people could see the infamy of the crime.

It says, but if the ministry of death, written and engraved on stones, was glorious, so that the children of Israel could not look steadily at the face of Moses because of the glory of his countenance, which glory was passing away. You know, that shining face that he had finally faded. How will the ministry of the Spirit not be more glorious? So now you're talking about having God's Spirit in you. Much better than having a carnal Israelite trying to obey God's laws and doing sacrifices to appease him. For if the ministry of condemnation, yes, the administration that condemned you to death, had glory because it still came from God, these were the guardrails that he set up so that people wouldn't just go off into the gutter. If that was glorious, the ministry of righteousness exceeds much more in glory. For even what was made glorious had no glory in this respect because of the glory that excels in comparison. For if what is passing away was glorious, what remains is much more glorious. The new covenant with the baptism and the receiving of God's Spirit. Therefore, since we have such hope, we use great boldness of speech, unlike Moses, who put a veil over his face so that children of Israel could not look steadily at the end of what was passing away. But their minds were blinded, for until this day the same veil remains unlisted in the reading of the Old Testament because the veil is taken away in Christ. You have to accept Christ, you have to accept his sacrifices, his way of life, the New Testament covenant that we all follow. He says, but even to this day when Moses is read, a veil lies on their heart. They still can't see the spiritual significance. Nevertheless, when one turns to the Lord, that they would have repented, been baptized, received God's Spirit, the veil is taken away. Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. The Spirit in us gives us that. We're not enslaved as they were. Have you ever thought that all of those Israelites that perished in the wilderness, they're going to be resurrected in the second resurrection. They're not part of the first. They're going to be resurrected with the Africans, and the Chinese, and all the people, and they're going to go and say, how could you have avoided keeping God's laws? You had all of these things God did for you, and you still didn't, but they will have a chance. That's why it says there in first in Romans 7, 11 that Israel will have a chance for salvation in the future. And then it goes on to say verse 18, but we all, those that are New Testament Christians, and of course that New Covenant is just going to be fulfilled fully when we are resurrected as spirit beings. So we're in the betrothal stage of that New Covenant but that's why it says we're going to have a wedding feast with Christ when He comes back. But we're already betrothed to Him, which is already part of the pact. We're living it now.

But we all with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror, the glory of the Lord are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, the spirit of God growing in us, just as by the spirit of the Lord. So it's important to understand why that heart is so important to God. Because people can have all kinds of sacrifices and do all kinds of things, but if they haven't truly repented, gone through that process of baptism, laying on of hands, and receiving God's Spirit, they're still not of Christ. Notice in Colossians chapter 2.

Colossians chapter 2 in verse 11.

Here it sums up the true circumcision that God told the Israelites. He wanted them to be circumcised but of the heart. Verse 11, it says, in him you were also circumcised with a circumcision made without hands. This wasn't a physical circumcision. He says by putting off the body of the sins of the flesh, that's removing the sins that were weighing you down by the circumcision of Christ. What is that? Buried with him in baptism. In which you also were raised with him through faith in the working of God who raised him from the dead. And you being dead in your trespasses after baptism, they don't have any power over you. And the uncirconsision of your flesh, you don't have that hardness of heart. He made alive together with him, having forgiven you all trespasses, having wiped out the handwriting of requirements that was against us. In other words, this was the sentence that was upon us. We're all condemned to die. And he removed that because he took our place, which is contrary to us, and he is taken out of the way, having nailed it to the cross. So he removed the effects of that condemnation. Now, going back to the lessons of Deuteronomy, there's one book in the New Testament that helps us understand we're talking about the right attitude, what God is trying to do with all of us in preparation also for the feast to have the right attitude. Let's go to Hebrews chapter 3.

And this is the last part of the sermon, Hebrews chapter 3 verse 5.

Now, remember, Hebrews is talking about the Hebrew Christians. These were church members. Most of them were still in the area of Israel at the time, but also in other churches. But some of them were thinking about going back to Judaism. And so this epistle was written to them, warning them. If you go back, you know, to the Old Testament covenant. You are in deep trouble. Notice what he says in chapter 3 and verse 5.

He says, and Moses indeed was faithful in all his house as a servant for a testimony of those things which would be spoken afterward. But Christ as a son over his own house, whose house we are, if we hold fast the confidence and the rejoicing of the hope firm to the end. So he's saying, you haven't won it yet. You haven't triumphed. You're still running the race. So don't give up on it.

And then he mentions verse 7, therefore, as the Holy Spirit, which is God's spirit talked through Moses, he says, today, if you will hear his voice, do not harden your hearts, as in the rebellion in the day of trial in the wilderness where your fathers tested me, tried me, and saw my works forty years. Therefore I was angry with that generation and said they always go astray in their heart, and they have not known my ways. So I swore my wrath, they shall not enter my rest. They're not going to go into the Promised Land. Beware, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God, but exhort one another daily while it is called today before the coming of the kingdom of God. Exhort one another. Encourage one another. Don't give up. We are spiritual Israelites walking toward that kingdom of God in the wilderness right now. We're being tested. Don't give up. Lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin. And then in chapter 4, he goes on to say, verse 1, therefore since a promise remains of entering his rest, talking about that kingdom of God coming, let us fear lest any of you seem to have come short of it. That was in the first century. Now we're in the 21st century. We still have the same dangers.

For indeed the gospel was preached to us as well as to them, but the word which they heard did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in those who heard it. For we who have believed do enter that rest, as he has said. And so now he reveals something very interesting, and it has to do with the double meaning that the Sabbath has. The first is the weekly Sabbath that we rest. So then he says here, verse 6, it says, since therefore it remains that some must enter it, and those to whom it was first preached did not enter because of disobedience. Again he designated a certain day, saying in David today, after such a long time. In other words, you're still looking forward to that coming kingdom. Whether Israel inherited that physical promise land, there is this other one.

And so as he said, today if you will hear his voice, do not harden your hearts. For if Joshua had given them rest, that would have been the ultimate and the final rest, then he would not afterward have spoken of another day. Therefore, there remains therefore a rest for the people of God.

The Bible in basic English says in verses 8 and 9, for if Joshua had given them rest, he would not have said anything about another day, so that there is still a Sabbath keeping for the people of God. So we have two applications about the Sabbath and what it means. One is, okay, they entered the promised land, they were able to keep the Sabbath there, but for all the rest of the believers, through time we enter into a rest on the Sabbath day, but also there is a rest to enter in the future, in the kingdom of God. And that one we have to be certain of being able to enter.

He says in verse 10, for he who has entered his rest has himself also seized from his works as God did from his. We're resting, but we know there's an ultimate rest that we haven't entered yet. He says, let us therefore be diligent to enter that rest, lest anyone fall according to the same example of disobedience. And so as we finish, let's go to Hebrews 11, because it talks about the right type of faith, the right heart that God looks at. Hebrews 11 verse 1, the classic definition of faith, says, now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. Now this sounds like poetry more than it does some technical way of explaining it, there is in the easy English Bible version, it says, this is what it means to trust God.

We will be sure about the things that we hope for. Yes, we're sure that kingdom is coming. We're preparing for it. We will be sure in our minds about things that we cannot even see. We know that's coming, that rest every Sabbath. We not only look at what we're resting, but in the future rest in God's kingdom. It's very important to take into account. So remember, the word for faith can be translated as obedient trust in God and His word, obedient trust in God and His word.

We have to do one part that comes from God, and then we have to add trust in God to do His part. Isn't that the way it always is? You have to step out on faith, trust in Him, but you have to do your part, and God will enable us. We cannot do it on our own.

So as we spiritually prepare for the feasts that are coming to have the right hearts and attitudes before Him in these upcoming feasts.