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A Discerning Heart from FAAD on Vimeo.

“My son, do not forget my teaching, but keep my commands in your heart, for they will prolong your life many years and bring you peace and prosperity. Let Love and faithfulness never leave you; bind them around your neck, write them on the tablet of your heart. Then you will win favor and a good name in the sight of God and man. Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight.” Proverbs 3: 1-6

     In our lives, we all start out as an infant and grow to adulthood. Through this growth we mature from childlike thinking to adult thinking. When we put this in the perspective of being a Christian, it is very much the same. We start out as young Christians and through our walk with Jesus, we learn through the ups and downs of our walk and mature into a more seasoned Christian than when we began.

     It is through these trials that God teaches us. Proverbs is a book we can all collect in memory and it provides some really good advice on a daily basis. However, in contrast, adult life is somewhat different. We live and we learn. For example, as a child we were told not to touch a hot stove, but till we actually felt the hot stove, we actually did not know it was hot. But as a child, we trusted the person that told us to not touch it as it was hot.

     So in our young childlike minds, we knew never to touch a hot stove. As a young Christian we are not as trusting, are we? It is rather ironic that it seems we start out to be the opposite. We start out believing and knowing God gave his beloved son to die for our sins and accept him as our Lord and Savior, but the truly trusting part does not come into play till we ‘actually’ touch the stove. We are told to Trust in the Lord with all our hearts and to not go by our own understanding but by his, for we are to commit ourselves to God and accept Jesus as our savior but yet we have to see to believe, we have to live to see.

     In looking up the word Discernment, Webster’s definition of the word tells us it is having “the quality of being able to grasp and comprehend what is not clear or cloudy”. Having a heart of discernment does not trust our own understanding but the understanding of God. In this Proverb, it tells us not to forget his teachings or what we have learned. To never allow Love and Faithfulness leave us. It tells us to bind them around our neck, I think of terms such as a necklace. Forever write them in our heart, I think of who loves me more than anyone?

     When we are faced with decisions or we are confused trying to comprehend what is not clear, the one person we can go to is Jesus. We all know in our hearts we can trust him, but have we really learned to trust him? The only way we will trust him is to give him a try. I have learned when things seem unclear or cloudy, I immediately pray for God to open the door I am to go through or to slam it shut in my face. Once I pray for this, I leave it. I wait for his answer, one way or other he will give us the answer. Sometimes we may linger a bit at the door and realize the door never opened and move on. We have to put ourselves out there to learn to have a heart of discernment and we have to learn that we may not see things as God sees them to understand but just trust him that the reason he slammed the door is of his understanding.

     The more we learn to do this, the more mature we become as Christians the more trusting in God we become. I truly believe this scripture gives us a clear understanding that we will win favor and a good name in the sight of God and man and he will make our paths straight. It is during the times we pull away from God and attempt to do things on our own that we lose sight of what is clear in our lives. We begin to struggle and grow weary but as a child it was simple. We trusted the ‘who’ that told us the stove was hot. Why not as an adult trust the Almighty the same? Jesus tells us in Matthew 18:3 “truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”

     So let us pray for God to give us a heart of discernment by allowing him to guide and lead us in every aspect of our life and become like little children. Let us trust him in his teachings through our battles for God loves us more than anyone could love and remember to never walk away from his love or faithfulness.