God Is Greater Than Our Hearts - 41
If He left us to ourselves we'd be doomed.
Again, those two sentences of Jeremiah 17:9-10 say, “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it? ‘I the LORD search the heart and test the mind, to give every man according to his ways, according to the fruit of his deeds.’”
It is a good thing for us that God answers His own question, who can understand that deceptive and desperately sick heart of man?
His answer is our comfort. “I the LORD search the heart and test the mind…” This means that even though we battle between good and evil within ourselves; even though we cannot take the greatest confidence in our own intellects, consciences, and dutifulness; still God sees us clearly. God can help us. He can take what is broken and repair it.
So pray for clarity as you work at interpreting God’s Word. Pray for sincerity as you are faced with difficult passages. Pray for contrition. Pray for transparency. Pray for stamina. Pray to be thorough. Pray to handle God’s Word with utmost respect. This will be imperative to fulfill your duties as an elder in Christ’s Church.
And when you are uncertain as to the meaning of the text, keep studying. Keep searching. Keep asking teachers and theologians your questions. Never fake it. Jesus was known for asking marvelous questions at a tender age.1
Luke 2:46-47, “After three days they found him in the temple, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions. And all who heard him were amazed at his understanding and his answers.”