Guard Your Heart (Proverbs 4:23)

Record in progress. Here we go. And pin. All right. Here we go. We're back. All right. So, uh, Proverbs chapter 4, uh, built-in daily devotional of the Bible. Verse 23. Solomon says, "Above all else, guard your heart from for everything you do flows from it." So, we're going to rapid fire this bad boy. Cover some stuff. So, it says, "Above all else." And so let's but then he talks about guard your heart which means that above all else above above guarding everything else well what do we guard we guard our relationships we guard our money we guard our businesses we guard our car we guard our pick pick whatever you want.

There's lots of things that as humans we guard that are important to us. And so what Solomon says is that he's not saying that guarding those things is wrong. He's just making the statement that this needs to be moved up to the top. Guard your heart above all else. So, all right. Well, what does that look like? So, I got to guard my heart. I got to guard my emotions. No, we use the term heart in our culture today as emotion, right? We we have to we tell I tell my daughters, "Hey, man, you gota be careful who you give your heart to, right? That's a that's a term that we use in in this culture in this country today.

That is not what it was meant in the Hebrew. It's the word lev. And it's I want I want everybody to think about your heart back then was your computer. It covered everything. It covered your your thoughts, your desires, your emotions, your your will. It covered all of that stuff. And so it was basically you. It was who you are. And so it wasn't just your heart. So Solomon is not saying just protect your feelings. We're not This wasn't a feelings scripture. That's not what this is about. He's saying everything you do flows from your heart. That is your speech.

How you treated that person yesterday. what what what uh where you decided to go on vacation. Are you are you working out? Is that is that your desire? It's all of these things flow from your heart, from your computer, from the epicenter of who you are. And so that's what the heart means in this text. It's not your emotion. And so, uh we want that's what he's talking about guarding. So now, now why would he say guard something? He would say guard something because it's a military term or it can even be an act. It can even be a farming term, you know, for for livestock.

You have to guard it. Shepherds guarded their flock. Why would a shepherd guard his flock? Because he knew there were animals out there that wanted to come in to destroy and eat the flock. And so Solomon says the same thing. Above all else, guard your heart. Why? Because the world is after it. The world is after you. It's after what you are, who you are, what your desires are, what you see, what you hear, what you taste, how you spend your time. The world, the enemy, Satan, is after that every waking minute of the day. And so Solomon says above all else, this is what you have to guard.

You got to guard who you are and who you are in Christ. And so he tells us to do exactly that. And he says, "For everything that you do flows from it." And so I want you to picture there's a there's a a spring and a stream. Right? So there's a spring that's inside of you. And from that spring, waters flow. And so the the waters are where people get to understand and find out who you are. They get to taste who's Dwayne. And they get to taste who Dwayne is by how he treats people, how he conducts himself. uh what's what does he look like? What's important to him?

Um what does he do with his time? And so your waters are what tells society. It's what tells your church body that no one can inspect your spring. No. Someone can walk into my office and we can have all the conversations in the world, but he's never going to be able to inspect my heart. The way he gets to see who I am is by looking at what my stream produces down the road. And so again, Solomon says, "Above all else, guard this thing." So above all else, guard your heart for everything, not some of the things. Everything Everything you do flows from that.

It It points back to who you are. And that's what our church body sees. That's what the world sees, right? We're held to a higher standard. The our our non-believing friends, maybe even go to another church, are always pointing back and looking at us and and expecting us to be perfect. Well, we're not perfect. But then that's when we hear that word hypocrite come in. So Solomon's saying, "Guard that." [clears throat] Why do we have to guard that? Because the world is not only after you, the world is watching you. And when we guard this, which is most important as Solomon so clearly says, it's what establishes that stream that flows out from us.

So the heart is not an emotion. It can be emotion, but that's not the only thing it is. It it governs our emotions, our desires, uh our everything about us. It is the computer. It is our engine. And Solomon wants us to be able to guard that because there's always an attack on it. All right. some thoughts, comments, suggestions, and we're up to 33. Just throwing it out there. Yes, I have I have a suggestion. Um when when it comes to me, I like to guard my heart by striving not to take offense to things. When we take offense to things and don't let people off the hook, we're given the enemy, the devil, a foothold.

So, it's best to try to be unoffensible as best we can. Amen. I love that. I grew up listening to that. 17 million times I heard my mother re recite this to me and my brother love thinks no evil also I would like to add to that love thinks no evil that everybody's at a different place and when somebody doesn't know something or needs help we cannot just because something is totally obvious to us maybe that's not obvious to that person and when we react that is it should be obvious like nobody was born knowing everything. So that with the kindness that all right maybe maybe you didn't know that so it's just teaching because our conduct is teaching others in like how we get things also teaches people because Jesus didn't tell that how come you didn't know that was teaching everybody everybody's telling me to take it amen yeah so so if if you're a parent uh in the room and you you you know this.

Um and you don't even have to be a parent to know it. Um someone needs to to mute their themselves. We're hearing a lot of laughing in the background. Um you don't have to be a a parent for that purpose. But your kids are watching you and they're always learning from you and it isn't necessarily what you say. It can be just what you do. And so we don't always know and we we learn by seeing and we learn by hearing. And this scripture is saying your your spring is going to flow. Your your your stream is going to flow out from your spring. And that's going to show people who you are.

And yes, they they may not know, oh, this is how I'm supposed to be. And where are they going to learn that from? They're going to they're going to learn that from watching another brother or sister in Christ and how they respond and how they act. And listen, we're not perfect. I mean, I' I've been doing this now for a couple years, Monday through Thursday, and I I've probably shared with you guys two dozen times where I lost it, maybe even that morning where I blew it and I wasn't who I needed to be. Um, and and I thank God for the Holy Spirit because he convicts me in a second and lets me know you you missed that.

And then I get to repent. I get to ask for forgiveness and then I get to share that with with those of you that are on here, right? So, um, confess your sins one to another. And so, so that's important for us to do as well. So, anybody else thoughts, comments? I'll I'll try. Oh, go ahead. Yeah. So, on my my quest to become a better uh person and uh in Christ, I um I watch I I be mindful of the things that I allow on my TV or on my radio. uh pay attention to um things that I allow to be exposed to because the more things that I'm exposed to, I'm going to, you know, it's going to affect my character.

So, I'm exposing myself to less things that that may not be good for me. A Amen, Chris. And so, that's a practical application of guarding. That's what Solomon is talking about. You're guarding your eyes. You're guarding your ears. You're guarding your heart. You're guarding the very thing that makes you because it's not generally uh one thing that all of a sudden flips you into a bad spot. It's the it's the little thing. It's the every little day thing and all of a sudden before you know it, you're far so far from the line that sometimes it's hard to see the line back.

So that's an excellent application point, Helen. So, well, there's scripture that says the heart is wicked and deceitful and who can trust it, right? And so, that that there that's another scripture that we can tackle and maybe we'll tackle that one this week because they kind of go hand in hand together. But you have to be careful about that. And why? because that that if it's not guarded and all of a sudden you you're you're now walking because you were because you didn't follow some great advice like Chris and you started watching movies you shouldn't watch or hanging around with people that probably are are not the the the the sort that we should be continuing to hang around with.

There's a difference between going to sinners and bringing them to Christ and then just going out and having complete debauchery. So, um, uh, Dave Jarvis says, uh, in the text message, guarding requires, uh, intentionally intentionality, like like Christ said, which is true, which is exactly what Chris said. It's it's it's the fourth flaw. It's it's guarding. Guarding is active. It's not passive state. It's doing the thing. And that's what uh that's what Solomon is talking about here. All right, we're 9:28. Let's uh um it's interest time, I want to be able to close out in prayer, but thanks everyone for popping in.

We got 33 people, which is awesome. I can't wait to see this at 40 and 50 and and 100. Um, God willing. All right. Well, let's bow our heads. Let's pray. Father, thank you so much for today. Thank you for for your word and thank you so much for for those that uh that contribute. And I and it's so awesome to see different people on different days uh with a comment or a word. Um it's just different perspective. And I I think that's exactly what what you have for this group. I think it's it it uh I I can bring something, but someone else adds to that and it it may be the absolute perfect thing that someone else on here needed to hear, Lord.

And that's that's just a testimony to how fantastic and wonderful and amazing a God you are. And so, Lord, just keep us um allow us to continue to grow. Allow us to continue to walk in you. Allow us to to remember to guard our heart. Um allow us that that is the things that Chris talked about. It's it's what we allow in that when we when we think about guarding, we're putting up walls. We're putting up a barricade. We're we're putting up this force field to keep the enemy out. And uh and Father, just allow you in. And so uh Lord, I just pray that we would we would continue to work on that.

If we find ourselves slipping, we find ourselves not sure of where we need to be. U we find ourselves a little bit farther from the line, that's when we we we grab another brother and sister in Christ. That's when we jump in the word. That's when we come back. That's when we look at the examples of others, as Aggie said. So, Father, I just thank you for everything you're doing and each one of us. Continue to grow us. Father, we love you. We praise you. And as always, in your son, Jesus name, we pray. Amen. Amen. All right. I'll see you guys tomorrow.

Have a great day. Have a great one. Good morning, guys. Bye. Thank you. Holy Spirit

Transcript generated from the recording and lightly edited for readability.