22 March 2015 - from the heart

I will place my law within them and write it upon their hearts; 
I will be their God, and they shall be my people.

Jesus, you want to change our hearts this morning. You are not satisfied with superficial change where we say one thing and do another. You want to make us not only holy but wholly holy. We have a hard time imagining what this would be like. As we try to be holy we experience what Paul describes. "For what I am doing, I do not understand; for I am not practicing what I would like to do, but I am doing the very thing I hate." He says, "the good that I want, I do not do, but I practice the very evil that I do not want." There is a struggle within. There is a battle between two natures which we cannot win. But it is winnable if we pray "Create a clean heart in me, O God."

If we try to will ourselves into holiness we experience all of the futility and struggle which Paul describes. We break the LORD's law just like Israel in Egypt. We know better. On some level we desire better. But we just don't succeed. Fortunately God does not leave us on our own or abandon us. He comes with a new covenant that actually changes us from the inside out. And the basis of this covenant, the reason it can do what it does, is because of how close to us God promises to be.

I will be their God, and they shall be my people.
No longer will they have need to teach their friends and relatives
how to know the LORD.
All, from least to greatest, shall know me, says the LORD, 
for I will forgive their evildoing and remember their sin no more.

And so when we pray, "Create a clean heart in me, O God" we take joy to realize how close he comes to do it. He does not stand in some distant workshop and then ship us a new heart via FedEx SmartPost. He comes to us to wash away the guilty and sinful parts of our hearts by the power of his Spirit. He sustains us to live this life because the Spirit himself is steadfast and he remains within us just as we now remain in the presence of God.

This steadfast Spirit makes us holy by giving us the power to follow the one whom we serve. The steadfast Spirit within is the only way we can lose our lives for the sake of God and neighbor and therefore preserve them for eternal life. Jesus himself reveals the steadfast Spirit in his perfect obedience. He himself becomes the source of this power in us. He enables our own obedience as we follow him on his journey to the cross.

Son though he was, he learned obedience from what he suffered; 
and when he was made perfect, 
he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him.

The Father glorifies his name in Jesus because Jesus is willing to be the grain of wheat the falls to the ground and dies to give life. As he does so he unleashes within us a Spirit of power to do the same. He makes his own holiness possible in us. And it is not simply superficial. It goes deep, which is why it can say "There is no greater love than to lay down one's life for one's friends" (Cf. Joh. 15:13). The Father wants to glorify his name in us as well. If we come to him for the clean heart he wants to give us he will be able to display his love in our loves. He will glorify his name again!