Jeremiah 17:9-10 “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.”
During this shelter-in-place
time at home during the Coronavirus, I’ve been able to spend some time reading
in This Dallas Willard book on the Great Commission commandment of our Lord
Jesus Christ. It makes sense that the first step is getting our own heart right
with God. The heart, according to the Bible, is part of man's spiritual makeup.
It is the place where emotions and desires begin; it is that which drives the
will of man towards action. the inner man is a frequent topic in the
Bible. It is known as the center of oneself, the very core of a person. The
seat of the affections and passions, as of love, joy, grief, enmity, courage,
pleasure. The seat of the understanding. The seat of the will. Our heart is who
we are – the real me inside.
Willard states that any
thoughtful treatment of the human being will eventuate in a list of our natural
capacities and their interactions. The list necessarily includes our capacities
to represent or think, to feel, and to choose or will. It is our thoughts that
evoke actions. It is our perception that leads us. It is anger or our lust that
sways us towards doing what we know to be wrong and our reverence for people or
for God that enables us to treat others with compassion and truthfulness. The
representations and judgments on our train of thought affect each other. Our
selection of inclusive goals affects our particular choices. Out of the rich
texture of interrelationships within and between the various capacities and
dimensions f the human being there arises the individual human personality and
its life.
Deuteronomy 6:5 “Love the
Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your
strength.”
The soul is the spiritual,
rational and immortal substance in a human being, which distinguishes them from
brutes; that part of mankind which enables them to think and reason. The most
illuminating and rational way of thinking about the soul is to regard it as
that component of the total person that coordinates all of the capacities and
dimensions of the human being and leads to their interactive development to
form an individual life. The soul is the source of life within the individual,
and simultaneously as its ordering principle; the inner character. If the inner
source and ordering principle is functioning rightly, the life that flows from
it can be as it should be.
Proverbs 4:23 “Keep
your heart with all diligence, for out of it spring the issues
of life.”
In the biblical teachings,
the force of revelation is added to the human insight that the source is within,
in the deep levels of personality, and that the order or disorder of life as a
whole is to be traced to order and disorder at that deeper level. Willard
states that the soul has an inherent nature that allows it to coordinate the
various activities and states in the system as a whole. Its own ability to
function depends upon it being appropriately positioned in the larger whole. The
soul operates all dimensions of the human system by governing and coordinating
what goes on in them. It touches us at the deepest level of our lives, far
beyond our conscious thoughts and endeavors. It expresses and helps us express
the most profound parts of our lives. The soul is the source and unity of our
life. Hebrews 10:22 “Let us
draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts
sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure
water.”
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