RELIGION IS IN THE HEAD, BUT JESUS CHRIST IS IN THE HEART
Our world is full of head religion without a heart. Jesus Christ said it perfectly, “This people draw near unto Me with their mouth, and honor Me with their lips; but their heart is far from Me.” (Matthew 15:8) A person that is “Born Again” and right with God is ruled by their heart. Soon after anyone becomes a transformed person, the head and the heart will experience a certain level of conflict. The head says, “I’m the boss” but the heart says,“No you are not, He’s the boss,” and the war is on. This is where the old Methodist would say,“You need to be sanctified.” Sanctification is death to the head and holiness to the heart.
The head can know great facts about truth and Christ, but the heart must be under His mastery before you become a transformed Christian. The Bible says it plainly, “For as he thinks in his heart so is he.” (Proverbs 23: 7a) The heart is where the claims of Jesus Christ are established. Until the heart is involved in total surrender and all life is on the alter that soul is lost.
Head religion alone will guarantee an empty heart. No wonder the joyful shouts have departed from our churches. There is no gloom in heart religion. A heart under Christ’s saving graces is a place of happiness and blessings. It’s impossible to be sad and full of Christ in the heart at the same moment. Nothing can stop a heart full of Jesus Christ and His Holy Spirit. Jesus Said,“If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink. He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.” (John 7:37b-38)
The independent person may have a head full of religion but they have an empty heart. The word independent is not in our Bible, not one time. “And he said to them all, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me.” (Luke 9:23) The secular world has filled our thought life with the idea that everyone is self sufficient and subject to no one. That’s the sin nature that will always end in despair. Its Satan’s lie!
The Head is where you think and argue but the heart is where you move out of the squalor onto main street. It’s a miracle to see an old decimated alcoholic or harlot become the prize of Christ’s Kingdom. It didn’t happen until the head said, “I give you my heart.” The transformed heart loves things it has never loved before and hates things it has never hated before. That’s the new man or women with a new heart.
The head can never experience “Agape Love.” Agape Love is the product of Jesus Christ in mastery of a surrendered heart. Our world needs love that flows out of the Christ filled heart. Marriages are quickly healed when Christ takes charge of two hearts. This kind of love is the greatest witness for Christ than all our words.
Head religion can be bull-headed, stubborn, rebellious, worldly, cantankerous, and lost. Give Jesus Christ your heart today and tell your head, the war is over, Jesus Christ has won my heart. You have passed from death in the head to life in the heart. “That he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man; That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God.” (Ephesian 3:16-17,19) PLEASE LISTEN TO THIS SERMON FROM OUR SANCTUARY!
THE OPENING SONG IS WORTH YOUR TIME,
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Bob Elliott
Very good message and timely. We are ever so close to the Last Trump evidenced by what is happening
in India where they are collecting ‘biometric’ data from its 1.2 Billion citizens in order to have a cashless society. The time is at hand saints.
Ed Wood
Hello Pastor Joseph.
There is certainly no way to reach God with the intellect alone (Proverbs 14:12, 1 Corinthians 1:18-31). No one will ever be able to prove he exists scientifically. Nor can we rely entirely on the heart, because the Bible tells us that it can be hardened (Mark 8:170 and it can be the source of evil as well as good (Matthew 12:35).
Unless we allow God to direct both heart and mind, we will never get on the right path. To do that means we have to admit that we aren’t the greatest things that ever existed and for humans, that is a very difficult thing to do. From my own point of view, there is an inherent selfishness in us all that wants to make us “god” of our own lives.
I suppose this gets harder the olde we get. A child is much more willing to trust someone else, like a parent. I have a hunch this humility to recognize that someone is wiser is very much the idea of Jesus saying one must become like a child to come to the kingdom of heaven (Matthew 18:1-5).
The selfishness and arrogance which is so much part of our secular world today is now also on display for all to see in much of the modern church which has decided that the doctrines of men are more valid that the doctrines of God. It is nothing less than people deifying themselves or other people, putting what they say about God above of what God says about himself in the Bible.
But God can and will work with our hearts and minds to show us the truth. However, we have to ask.
Kenneth Acushla
Yes, only True Ecclesia Christianity is in the Hearts with our Lord Yahshua living there. All the world religions including churchinity is in the heads.
melvin
Most people don’t know what holy is. Holy is being set apart. The Father and Son Feast Days are what set you apart from religious days as christmas and easter and sunday. Jesus set apart holy day is the 7 day Sabbath. Jesus kingdom is the 7th millennium. Sunday the 1st day is Adams fall.
Garry Dougherty
Amen & Amen – Religion is just what it says ( rely on your religion) – hogwash, or was it white wash –
we serve a jealous God (Ex 20:5) an intimate, loving relationship – we go to church to edify one another sharing showing the glow He is growing brighter daily
One may get touched at the church, on the street corner or anywhere they may be especially that Gods love is in the air – but if our relationship is only at church then we must be in love with ourselves for God is not in it.
tom russell , canada
super service the holy spirit is there. may god bless you.
Dave
Dear Brother Joseph, the head verses the heart, the New Testament verses the church (the building, not the body), us wanting God on our terms, instead of needing God on His terms, using bibles that God has not given to us, (niv plus and alpha course), not finding out things for ourselves if we are not receiving it from the pulpit, (our walk before God found in Christ Jesus revealed by The Holy Spirit), the Body of Christ is almost unrecognizable as belonging to Him, “Icabod” is written over the door of most churches in the world today.
How on earth have we allowed our stand in God to deteriate to such degrees as it has, what makes us think for one moment that God will receive that which WE offer Him in the way of ministry and worship, that which WE are satisfied with, when He has no part in it at all?
They that are led by the Spirit of God remember, Romans 8 verse 14, NOT Matthew chapter 7 verses 21, 22, 23.
We all must pray that God does not say to us, “Depart from me, for I never knew you.
jaimie
Dear Pastor
Heb 12:1 KJ Let us lay aside every weight and the sin which so easily ensnares us and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us.
Religion unto itself can be the most deceptive of all sins.
Luke 11:35 Therefore take heed that the light which is in you is not darkness.
Jonah 2:8 for they that observe lying vanities forsake their own mercy.
God Bless Paw Creek Ministries and the beloved Brethren that worship in spirit and truth.
Oh come quickly Lord Jesus
jaimie
Robert
I think the Kings James Bible is GOD breathed word for the English speaking people
Those that tamper with the WORD of GOD are in serious trouble. Not you that read it.
Valerie Furr
I pray every night that Jesus will return soon. Our world has become a place of evil and selfishness. It needs to end so we can all be with Jesus and be at peace for eternity. God Bless America for she is going down so quickly.
jaimie
Dear Pastor
Hi Melvin
If Adam fell on the first day, then Jesus the second Adam of a type rose victoriously on the first day.
Did not the Lord God say let there be light on the first day of creation, is not Jesus the Christ the first of a new creation, do we have his light or do we still have the law?
After we spend the seventh day in his perfect rest do we not see a new heaven and earth for the former things have passed away, so then this must happen on the first day as well.
or as some may say on the eighth day or 15th day from creation. depending on what perspective of time one wished to use.
We are to evangelize while he is preparing a place for us, please let Pastor Chambers assist in preparing this church to do so.
God Bless
jaimie
Douglas Kudasik
Your writing is great:)
locnguyen
Much beloved Pastor Vance Havner wrote, in his commentary on Revelation i ‘s Seven Letters
to the Seven Churches in Asia, in particular about The Ephesus Church’ s lack of Love
“One can be theologically as straight as the barrel of a gun,
and spiritually as empty as the barrel of a gun.”
locnguyen
The Gnostics teach that we can reach salvation by knowledge(gnosis) alone.
H.G.Wells wrote that the Triangle of Socialism, Law and Knowledge frame the revolution that
can save the world. He wrote that before “Mind At The End Of Its Tether”.
So much for man-made Utopias which turn out to be just Brutopias.