Supernatural Transformation: Change Your Heart Into God’s Heart (40 page)

As we saw earlier, one of David’s virtues was that, whenever he failed God, he was quick to repent. He had a tender heart and a passion to be in God’s presence. When he repented of the above incident, he prayed,
“Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me. Do not cast me away from Your presence, and do not take Your Holy Spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of Your salvation, and uphold me by Your generous Spirit”
(Psalm 51:10–12).

Our true repentance always brings us back to the presence of God.

There are people who refuse to repent because they love their ego or fleshly pleasures more than they love God, and sin has hardened their heart. Consequently, they begin to feel that their ungodly behavior is acceptable and within their rights. Yet when a person genuinely repents of his sin, he can then produce fruit that is characteristic of a heart after God’s own heart.

The sin that we refuse to repent of is the sin that will mold
our character.

Is there any sin in your life that you have not repented of? One important reason we must dedicate time to reading the Bible is that, in the Scriptures, we discover what pleases God and what displeases Him. If we have an ongoing, daily relationship with God, His Spirit will continually reveal to us His will. If you have experienced the conviction of the Holy Spirit with respect to any sinful attitude or behavior in your life, repent of it right now so that your heart can remain a heart after God’s own heart.

It is impossible to repent if we don’t acknowledge our sin as sin.

At the beginning of my Christian life, I was taught that when I sinned, I was not to hide from God but to repent and go before Him immediately, confessing my wrongs. However, in time, I began to develop a mentality of sinfulness, because I was focused on my sins rather than on God’s grace. I was constantly aware of my weaknesses, so that I could not enjoy my Christian life. I needed to receive God’s revelation on this subject. That is when the Holy Spirit led me to understand the processes involved in the transformation of the heart and the renewal of the mind. I comprehended that God had given me His supernatural grace so that I could experience a clear conscience, having a heart that not only repented of sin but also desired to live in holiness, integrity, and righteousness before Him. I learned that I am continually being transformed by God’s Spirit and that I should not expect myself to have yet reached perfection. And I realized that I may still sometimes sin and fail God—but also that God has changed my heart so that I no longer sin
as a lifestyle
.

Today, every time I enter God’s presence, I repent and ask Him to remove all sin, transgression, and iniquity that might be in my life. I do this even when I am not aware of any explicit sin. I wash my humanity in the blood of Christ every day as an element of the process of transformation. Now, every time I feel conviction for sin, it is not the result of a guilty conscience on my part but because the Holy Spirit is prompting me to repent in order to change my heart. Therefore, whenever He convicts, I repent immediately and experience His forgiveness and grace so that I may move forward in the life and power of God.
“If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness”
(1 John 1:9).

We can overcome the strength of sin by repenting of our sin immediately and by accepting God’s forgiveness and grace on our behalf. Otherwise, we will establish a repetitive cycle of sin
in our life.

5. A Heart After God’s Own Heart Has the Quality of Innocence

David prayed to the Lord,
“Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in Your sight, O L
ord
, my strength and my Redeemer”
(Psalm 19:14). David was not innocent of sin—as none of us is. However, he desired that his thoughts and words would be fully acceptable to God, enabling him to live in a state of innocence before Him.

Jesus told His disciples,
“Be
wise as serpents and harmless
[
“innocent”
niv, nasb]
as doves”
(Matthew 10:16).
There is a difference between innocence and ignorance. Innocence means not knowing what God doesn’t want us to know. Ignorance means choosing not to know what God
does
want us to know, which is equivalent to disobedience. I believe that when God commanded the first human beings not to eat of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, it was because He didn’t want them to have personal, specific knowledge of evil. However, they wanted to have the knowledge that God had forbidden them, and, as a result, they fell from grace.

Jesus also emphasized,
“Unless you are converted and become as little children, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven”
(Matthew 18:3). Here Christ was referring to the innocence of a young child’s heart. A child’s heart isn’t hardened, because he hasn’t yet experienced the disappointment and emotional pain that many teenagers and adults have known after being mistreated by others—feelings of hurt and betrayal that lead them to hold on to offenses. That is why it is easier for a child to trust in God’s goodness and promises than for many adults. Such a nature of innocence is one of the characteristics of a heart after God’s own heart.

We need to recover a heart of innocence—one that is not hardened and that trusts in God and believes in Him 100 percent. If you have lost that quality due to past hurts and offenses, so that your faith has been undermined, today is the day for your heart to return to innocence. Ask God to forgive you for hard-heartedness and to restore your heart. Then He can manifest His grace and power in and through your life.

6. A Heart After God’s Own Heart Has the Attitude of a Servant

David was a true worshipper of God who had the heart of a servant. For example, when he was merely a youth, he offered his services to single-handedly strike down the giant Goliath, who was part of the Philistine army attacking Israel. David volunteered out of devotion to God, as His servant, because the Philistines had
“defied the armies of the living God”
(1 Samuel 17:36), and no one else in God’s army was doing anything about it. David said with holy confidence,
“
[God]
will deliver me from the hand of this Philistine”
(1 Samuel 17:37). And God did.

Our service for God should never be disconnected from our worship of Him. The book of Isaiah describes the heavenly beings called the seraphim, who are special angels of God. In the Old Testament, the Hebrew word translated
“seraphim”
(Isaiah 6:2, 6) means “burning.” The prophet Isaiah related the appearance of the seraphim:
“Each one had six wings: with two he covered his face, with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew”
(Isaiah
6:2).
I believe that the wings that cover the faces and feet of the seraphim represent worship and reverence of God, while the wings with which they fly represent service to God. The seraphim have four wings dedicated to worship and two dedicated to service. Similarly, we should devote ourselves first to worship and then to service, in order to keep these two aspects of our relationship with God in proper proportion in our life.

Our worship of God should always be our first priority; then, as a result of that worship, we will render a life of service to Him. However, we must also recognize that worship alone—without service—is hypocrisy. As Jesus said,
“You shall worship the L
ord
your God, and Him only you shall serve”
(Matthew 4:10). His statement reinforces the idea that worship should always be followed by service.

Unless our service is born of worship, we will often perform it mechanically, and it will not be characterized by
God’s presence and power.

7. A Heart After God’s Own Heart Fears God and Seeks to Please Him

One of my greatest holy fears is that I will stand up to preach but God will not be with me because my disobedience will have caused Him to grieve. Consequently, I continually ask the Lord to give me a heart that holds Him in reverence, so that I will always seek to please Him, and so that the most important pursuits of my life will be to reflect His heart and to obey His Word.

The apostle Paul wrote,
“For do I now persuade men, or God? Or do I seek to please men? For if I still pleased men, I would not be a bondservant of Christ”
(Galatians 1:10). Sometimes, when we try to please other people, we end up dishonoring and displeasing God. To avoid doing so, we must be sure that we have not elevated other people above Him in our heart.

The “fear of God” refers to reverence and respect for Him.

The Scriptures say,
“Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption”
(Ephesians 4:30),
and
“Do not quench the Spirit”
(1 Thessalonians 5:19). It is sad but true that many churches and ministries systematically violate these Scriptures. Each time the Holy Spirit wants to move among the people, He is suppressed by the erroneous attitudes and actions of church leaders who are afraid of what people might think or do. Then we ask why there is no movement of the Holy Spirit in our churches, or why God doesn’t manifest His supernatural presence and power in our midst with miracles, signs, and wonders.

The Holy Spirit doesn’t manifest on our terms but according to His own terms. In the Scriptures, the Holy Spirit is depicted as a dove. A natural dove is sensitive to sound and sudden movements. God uses the dove as a symbol of His Spirit because He, also, is very sensitive, especially in relation to the condition of our heart. We must treat Him with reverence, respect, tenderness, and spiritual knowledge—hence the necessity of knowing God’s nature. If we are rude and unthinking in our relationship with Him, and if we do not concern ourselves with pleasing Him, we will “scare” away God’s presence—we will
“grieve”
or
“quench”
His Spirit—and He will not move in our lives.

Our resistance or indifference to God is a clear sign that we are displeasing Him.

“The fear of the L
ord
is to hate evil; pride and arrogance and the evil way and the perverse mouth I hate”
(Proverbs 8:13).
During the time that King Saul persecuted David, David had opportunities to kill the king, but his fear of the Lord—including a respect for His delegated authorities on earth—kept him from doing so. David said,
“I will not stretch out my hand against my lord
[Saul],
for he is the L
ord
’s anointed”
(1 Samuel 24:10). Many believers who lack the fear of God in their heart end up judging various leaders in the church. As a result, these believers often experience various troubles, such as sickness, failed marriages, and rebellious behavior in their children. To avoid grieving God by judging other believers, especially His delegated authorities, we must develop a heart like David’s—a heart after God’s own heart—with a healthy fear of the Lord.

Knowing God produces a reverential fear of Him; the more we know of God, the more we will develop a profound respect for Him.

8. A Heart After God’s Own Heart Loves God Deeply

David’s psalms are filled with expressions of his deep and enduring love for God. For example, in Psalm 18:1, he prayed,
“I will love You, O L
ord
, my strength,”
and, in Psalm 31:23, he urged God’s people,
“Oh, love the
Lord
, all you His saints! For the
Lord
preserves the faithful.”

Love is the essence of God. (See 1 John 4:8, 16.) He manifests all the characteristics of love, such as patience and kindness. He never
manifests
attitudes
that are contrary to love, such as
envy, boastfulness, pride, rudeness, and selfishness.
(See 1 Corinthians 13:4–5 niv.) The love of God goes above and beyond human comprehension and reason, because it is supernatural, unconditional, and unlimited.

Anyone who has a heart after God’s own heart will be filled with His love. Our love for God is a response to the love He first gave us. (See, for example, 1 John 4:19.) Our love comes from Him, because He pours out His love into our hearts by His Spirit (see Romans 5:5) when we are born again.

In the Old Testament, human beings received the mandate to love God, but they struggled to fulfill it because they were living under the law and had not received the indwelling Holy Spirit, as we have. We must understand and receive the truth that God loved us first and that we can love Him in return because of His powerful work of grace within us.

The reason we must first
be
loved
in order
to
love is that we cannot give what we do not have. We need a revelation of the love of God that has been given to us so that we can, in turn, give His love to others. I needed this revelation after I had children. When my oldest child was four years old, he would come to me seeking affection and hugs, but I didn’t know how to give them to him, because I had never received affectionate love during my own childhood. Because such love was not “in” me, I couldn’t give it to him. It was then that God filled me with His own love, so that I was able to love my dear son.