Day 193, Year 1

Renovating the heart

“For every house is built by someone, but the builder of all things is God.” (Hebrews 3:4 NASB) 

Human hearts have various designs and usages, which differ from one another. When Jesus wants to come into believers and dine with us, He is telling most of us that our hearts need a certain degree of modification or renovation. At least, we need a space in our hearts where we can sit and talk with Jesus. We should even prepare our unique thrones for Him individually.

Generally speaking, we have two approaches to the function of our hearts. First, we can use our hearts mainly to earn something from outside. For instance, as mentioned yesterday, some people regard their hearts as factories, focusing on giving outwardly and receiving remuneration. Second, we can always nourish our hearts. That means we can view our hearts as receivers that constantly absorb grace and useful things. Of course, the human heart often involves both giving and receiving, depending on which aspect is more prominent. To always welcome Jesus in our hearts, we need to adopt the second approach, which is to primarily receive all His grace, wisdom, and power that He is ready to grant us.

Today’s verse makes it very clear: houses, may include the space within the human heart, must be built by humans. But of course, God is the builder behind everything after all. In other words, if we want to modify the space of our hearts, we must take the responsibility to do it on our own. However, if God is the builder of all things, why not invite Jesus and ask Him for advice on how to transform our hearts into a place where we can frequently meet with Him? Surely He has His unique intentions in building the spaces of each person’s heart. So, we need to make some major or minor modifications to our existing inner space to accommodate the best place for the Lord Jesus to dine with us.

If Jesus is not put at the center of people’s lives and He is not allowed to direct everything, the place where He dines with us will sooner or later be replaced by other parts and eventually be demolished. Conversely, believers should let this place continue to exude His influence, or we will be followers of others. In my opinion, when we renovate our hearts, we need to consider Jesus’ presence and His residence as our primary concern, to change our core beliefs, significant people, and things. Then, we can design the setups surrounding Jesus so that He can reside comfortably in the center of our hearts forever. 

Reflection questions:

1) Would you like to invite the Lord Jesus into you to direct the modification or renovation of your inner space? If so, what core beliefs do you need to change or hold on to?

2) When you gather with the Lord Jesus, is He highly honored as the permanent center of your life? Why?