Guarding Our Hearts

“Guard your heart above all else, for it determines the course of your life.”

‭‭Proverbs‬ ‭4:23‬ ‭NLT‬‬

When I wrote about Fear, this passage came to me, but it didn't really fit with where God led that post. So here I am enjoying my study with my good friend Thomas the Toad, and God hits me with this again.

Guarding our hearts to me starts with guarding our minds. You see what we fixate on goes through our minds and becomes the desires of our heart. 

Let me give some examples:

• Mentally you notice the neighbors new Mazaretti. 
• The next day you think on just how gorgeous it is. 
• Then your mind starts saying, "Man, I wish I had a Mazaretti. 
• Then you become bitter you don't have one OR you make poor financial decisions to get one. 
• Your heart hurts either from the bitterness (souring relationships) or from the financial strain it is under. 

Now insert any number of things, new man, new girlfriend, child's athletic ability, friend's talent... our hearts get twisted into knots by what we focus on mentally. What we allow ourselves to daydream about. 

Fear/worry/anxiety/anger all come from that same place and can cause heart issues. It's not just about materialism, or jealousy. 

As mothers we can become so consumed with our children that we sacrifice other relationships, that we fear the unknown with them to a paralyzing level for us and sometimes for them. As wives, it's easy, especially before kids, to make our husbands our everything, putting them up on a pedestal, that I promise you they will fall off of at some point. 

Bottom line, when you focus your mind on anything other than Christ and His Word, your heart is no longer guarded. You are open season for Satan! And he would LOVE nothing more than to destroy you from the inside. So it is about filling our heads with those things that are righteous and holy. 

Right now cancer consumes our life, if it isn't appointments, it's setting up appointments, if it isn't that, it's talking about a plan, and if it isn't any of that, it's the concern over every groan he makes. And this is all understandable things, but cancer doesn't have to consume our hearts. In fact, it won't. Cancer can not claim our joy. Fear is a liar as I said before. So each morning and sometimes throughout the day, I refocus my mind on Him. Because without God at the center of this, really what hope do we have!