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This morning we turn to the first
book of Kings in chapter 8. 1 Kings chapter 8. And the text is found in verse
61. 1 Kings 8 and verse 61. Let your heart therefore be perfect
with the Lord our God to walk in his statutes and to keep his
commandments as at this day. Solomon, one of the greatest
of the Old Testament kings, began to reign in Israel in the year
970 BC, ending his reign in the year 930 BC. His crowning achievement was
the building of God's temple at Jerusalem, which when finished
was solemnly dedicated to the Lord. In this chapter, the eighth
of one king's describes for us what took place in the service
of dedication. First of all, in verses 1 to
13, there was the installation of the Ark, awaiting the coming of Jehovah,
the Great King, who would henceforth be seated upon it in the midst
of his people. Secondly, there was Solomon's
address to the congregation in which he reminded them of God's
promise to David and its wonderful fulfilment, stressing that the
temple was God's house. where he would dwell. Verses 14 to 21. Thirdly, the king engaged in solemn prayer, in which he offered praise to
Israel's incomparable God, requesting him to continue his favor and asking that God's eyes may
ever be focused on this place and his ears ever tuned to Israel's
prayers. The rest of the prayers in this
section from 22 right through to 53 are
such as might be offered in various circumstances and
situations and Solomon asks that when such prayers are presented
to God Most High, he would hear and he would forgive and he would
answer those prayers. That prayer of 22 to 53 and following that Solomon rose from prayer
and he turned to the people and he blessed them, exhorting them to right response and right conduct. And that is where we pick it
up at verse 61. Let your heart therefore be perfect
with the Lord our God. to walk in his statutes and to
keep his commandments as at this day. He's calling upon them to show
devotion and commitment to the Lord their God. And he expresses his desire and
his hope in these words. Now Solomon in that verse, verse
61, stresses two things, as you will observe. The first is the
inner life. Let your heart therefore be perfect
with the Lord our God. And the second is the outer life,
to walk in his statutes and to keep his commandments as at this
day. And this is true religion, to mind the affairs of the heart and to mind also the conduct
of the life. I want to take those two headings
and speak to you this morning on the necessity of preserving
the inner life First of all, the inner life. Let your heart therefore be perfect
with the Lord our God. The heart, of course, is another
word for the soul. And it refers to what scripture
calls the inner man. Sometimes it is used of the mind
as when Paul describing the condition of the heathen in Romans 1.21
says, their foolish heart was darkened. Now their heart means
specifically the mind or the understanding, part of the soul. Then we have in Matthew 22, our
Lord's great summary of the law, that thou shalt love the Lord
thy God with all thy heart. And there the emphasis is not
upon the mind, but upon the affections, that which desires God and that
which delights in God. And sometimes it's used of the
will, as in Deuteronomy 11, 13. Hearken diligently to what I
command you this day, to love the Lord your God and to serve
him, that is to resolve to do his will with all your heart. So heart can be used in a narrow
and specific way for an aspect of the soul. But often in scripture,
it simply means the soul itself. Mind, heart, will, the whole
inner person. Now as in nature the health of the body depends
upon the heart, so in grace the health of our
outer man depends upon the health of the inner. Let your heart be perfect with
the Lord your God. I want to make several observations
here and the first is that God desires and he requires the heart. So often in Scripture, we read
that it is the heart that God seeks above everything else. Remember in the book of Proverbs,
God is heard saying, my son, give me thine heart. In the fifth book of Moses, We
read these words in chapter five and verse 29 that God says, oh,
that there were such a heart in them that they would fear
me and keep my commandments always. Since this is what God clearly
wants, The believer's greatest sacrifice
is to yield his heart to God. Then again, we ask ourselves why it is that
God wants the heart. And the answer to that is that
he's not satisfied with anything else. What else might that be? Well, he's not satisfied with
mere profession to the effect that someone is
a Christian. Simon the Sorcerer in Acts 8
made a profession. He said he believed and he was
baptized on that basis. But when Peter and John came
down from Jerusalem, they perceived that that's all
that it was. Outward profession. And Peter says to this man, I
perceive that thine heart is not right. Nor is God satisfied with conformity, that is outward conformity to
his law, to his word. You remember Isaiah's complaint
to the people in Isaiah 29 and verse 13. This people draw near
me with their mouth and with their lips to honor me, but they
have removed their heart far from me. Isaiah 29, 13. It's not therefore surprising that scripture time and again
says that whereas man looketh on the outward appearance, God
looks upon the heart as if he's not taken up with
the superficial. with that which constitutes the
veneer of the believer's life, but he looks for the heart. And the question he asks is,
is thine heart right? Why the heart? Well, because The heart has been
called the fountain of life. The spring from which all our actions flow. Remember Solomon's words in Proverbs
4.23. Keep thine heart with all diligence
for out of it are the issues of life. It is the fountain. And what we think and what we
say and what we do proceed from the heart. Out of it are the outgoings of
life. The Lord Jesus taught the same
thing, didn't he, when he said, out of the heart precede all
manner of things. They may be good things, they
may be evil things, but it all stems from the heart. And for this reason, there must be a turning to the
Lord And the prayer of David, as in
Psalm 51, create in me a clean heart, O
God, and renew a right spirit in me. Whatever else I do, if the fountain be foul, in my life. So I want a purging, a purifying
of the fountain's waters. And I want a spirit within me
which is adjusted to God and to his revealed will. And the answer to that prayer
will not be something which is vacillating and alternating. The people in Antioch were exhorted
to cleave unto the Lord with all their heart. So the heart must not be yielded
to God to be made anew in any fickle sense or any feigned sense. But we must with purpose of heart,
when we are converted, resolve that this heart shall be for
God, as God shall be for this heart. It will then become God's throne. God by His Spirit The apostles' prayer for the
Ephesians in Ephesians 3 is this, that Christ may dwell in your
hearts. No other there, not self, but God. Not the world and its pleasure, With that heart that is yielded and desirous of his presence,
the Lord will come and he promises to dwell with the true heart. You will
recall the words of Isaiah 66. where God says that the earth
is his footstool. And in 57 he says, he will dwell
with him that is of a lowly and contrite heart. To this man will I look, even
to him that is poor and of a contrite spirit and trembleth at my word. Isaiah 66 and verse 2. It is essential that the Lord
has the heart, access to it, and control of it. For we cannot give him the heart
and then determine what we please, what we desire. The hard fact of the matter is
that if God does not have the whole of our hearts, Satan will take it. We read of Judas, whose heart
was never holy for the Lord, that Satan entered his heart. 22 in verse 3. We read of Annas in Acts chapter 5, and Peter's
words to him, so searching, so severe. Acts 5, 3. Why hath Satan filled thine heart." To be God's in any meaningful
sense, it must be that everything within us is for Him. Paul could speak in Acts 27 of
God whose I am and whom I serve. Now, my friends, there's reason
for this. There's creatorial reason for this because Genesis
2 tells us that God made the first man of the dust of the
ground and then breathed into his nostrils the breath of lives. and man became a living soul. He has a creatorial right because
he made us and not we ourselves. But he also has a redemptive
right. Because in 1 Corinthians 6 and
verse 20, Paul writes, you're bought with a price. Therefore
glorify God in your body and in your spirit,
which are God's. What has he bought? Not only
our bodies to be delivered from death at the resurrection of
the just, but our spirits. That all through our earthly
lives, we may seek him and love him, and submit ourselves to him, and serve him, and trust him. He has a redemptive right to
our hearts. And those hearts are something
we all can give. He doesn't ask, as in the reading
this morning, for rivers of oil and a thousand realms. He simply says, give me that
heart. And that is the sacrifice with
which God is well pleased. And in the light of these things
we are moved to say, oh, for a heart for God. Everything goes wrong when that prayer is neither uttered
nor answered. If your heart is your own, you'll
live an entirely selfish life, not caring who you hurt, what pain you inflict, what good
you break and shatter. If you keep your heart, you will destroy your lives. But if you lose your heart, as
Jesus said, and give your heart to God, you will save your life. For that is the best way to be with the heart for God. Now Solomon says, you let your
heart therefore be perfect. You may stumble at that and say,
but that's an impossibility. Well, there are two kinds of
perfection in God's word. There is what we call absolute
perfection, such as is known after death. And the Bible speaks of the spirits
of just men in heaven made As it speaks of the Lord presenting
his people before the Father's throne at last in Jude 24. Without fault. Without blemish. Perfect. After death, the soul will be
made perfect. At the resurrection, soul and
body too. shall be presented perfect. That
is one perfection of which the Bible speaks, but there is another which theologians describe as
the perfection of grace. And what does that mean? It means such purity and holiness of heart
as sinners may attain to in this life. When God said to Abraham in Genesis
17.1, walk before me and be thou perfect. There is a marginal
reading which accurately translates and
literally translates the Hebrew word, be thou perfect or be thou
upright and sincere. So there must be no hypocrisy
when we say my heart is for God. Be thou sincere about that. The heart to be perfect must
not only be sincere, but it must also be united. There is a verse in the prophecy
of Hosea and chapter 10, where it says, their heart is
divided. It's an awful thing to have a divided
heart. To have a little bit of God and
religion, but a little bit of sin and indulgence. That is why David in Psalm 86
says, unite my heart to fear thy name. A perfect heart
is a heart sincere and a heart united and a heart that will be faithful to the very end. We read in the scripture of one
man. Let me turn to what the Bible
says of him. In 2 Kings chapter 20 in verse 3, it's good
King Hezekiah. I beseech thee, O Lord, remember
how I have walked before thee in truth and with a perfect heart. and have done that which is good
in thy sight." He was looking back, he was dying, he was looking
back upon the whole of his life and he said, I have lived with
a perfect heart. Meaning he had been faithful
with God up to that hour. Now the heart cannot be perfectly
perfect. But it can be true. And it can be united. And it can be faithful to the
end. To the Lord your God. And that is what Solomon refers
to, let your heart therefore be perfect. with the Lord your God. Maybe in this past year, we have been tempted and maybe
we have slipped. This morning, God calls us to
examine our hearts and try our reign. And has the world, its pleasure, its sin encroached
upon God's domain? Who sits upon the throne of your
heart today? And then just a word about the
outer life. Let your heart therefore be perfect
with the Lord our God to walk in his statutes and to keep his
commandments. There are two things belonging
to the outer life which is stressed here. Walking in his statutes. It means that as far as outward
behavior and conduct is concerned, we are under God's directions, not the directions of a lusting heart, a sinning
heart. It was to prevent the dominant
of such desires that we enthroned the Lord there, that he might
put down these rebels and slay these usurpers. God is the sovereign upon my
heart. Therefore, in life, I will heed his directives and obey his counsels. Now we don't do that in any proud, independent way. We can't walk in his statutes without grace. without the Lord, because he
says, without me, he can do nothing. So every day we commit ourselves
to him as we take this narrow way of
obedience to God, reliant upon his support and his succor. I go, the psalmist
says, of the strength of the Lord my God. But although we're under God's
direction and dependent upon him to keep us close to that
direction, what results is essentially practical. It is living the life. It is walking steadfastly, diligently,
consistently in his statutes. Let your heart therefore be perfect
with the Lord our God in his statutes. Friends, if you do not have practical
Christianity that is lived out in holiness, in righteousness,
I fear you have nothing. It should affect your whole walk. And the second expression is
keeping his commandments. Much the same, not quite though.
Keeping his commandments must involve first of all keeping
them in the sense of receiving them and believing this is God's
will for my life. And I cannot dictate a better
way, neither can the world present me with another option. This
is the way to live. You receive them and then You
are most careful about them. Keep in the sense of tenderly guard them and mind
them. Like an infinitely precious jewel,
keep looking at it, adjusting your life. recalling what God
has said, keeping his commandments. And the third thought is this,
holding fast to it. As the role of your life, as the guidance of your God,
Hold fast the form of sound words. Hold fast that which thou hast. And at a time when political
winds and religious winds are seeking to move us away from
God's word and God's will, Hold it tight. Let no man wrench the Bible from
your hands. Keep his commandments. For how long, you say? For always,
I answer. To the end of your earthly life. Keep walking. Take fast hold and keep until you arrive in heaven. I put you on self-reflection
this morning. as I put myself on it. Is your heart right? Is it God's? Is your life right? Is it godly? Let your heart therefore be perfect
with the Lord our God to walk in his statutes and to keep his commandments as at this day and to those who keep them. there is great reward. Amen.
Right Heart, Right Conduct
| Sermon ID | 115121516526 |
| Duration | 41:11 |
| Date | |
| Category | Sunday - AM |
| Bible Text | 1 Kings 8:61 |
| Language | English |
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