The heart in Christian preaching symbolizes the core of human nature, encompassing desires, intentions, and spiritual condition (Jeremiah 17:9; Ezekiel 36:26). Illustrations often use images of conflict, disease, and deception to reveal inner struggles and the need for divine transformation. The heart's true state shapes speech, actions, and destiny, emphasizing genuine renewal over outward appearances.
Worldly success cannot satisfy the deep longings of the human heart.
Unsatisfied. Rossini, the great Italian musician, said to a friend who congratulated him on his continued triumphs, "I would give all this glory that the world envies me, all my operas, all that I have done, for some sweet days of youth and love."
The pope demanded hearts, showing that true devotion cannot be forced by law.
Voice of the. When a law was made, in the reign of Elizabeth, that all the people should attend the church, the papists sent to Rome to know the pleasure of his Holiness. He returned for answer, "Tell the Catholics in England to give me their hearts, and the queen may take the rest."
A fixed, anguished thought in the heart can wear a person down into despair.
Wearing the. It has been truly said that the human heart is like the milstone, which, if there be wheat beneath it, will grind to purposes of health: if not, will grind still, at the will of the wild wind, but on itself. So does the heart wear out itself against its own thought, — one fixed idea, one remembrance and no other, one stationary, wearing anguish. This is remorse, passing into despair; itself the good to fresh and wilder crimes. F. W. Robertson.
The human heart is like a rock that bears the marks of every ambition and folly.
Writing on the. Famous public places, as mountain-summits or battle-monuments, are often covered over with deep-cut inscriptions of every kind and age, — records of ambition or folly. How like the heart of man, that, more lasting than the granite rock, invites every corner to cut his name upon it!
Early impressions shape character and destiny like a river’s course.
I think we may assert, that, in a hundred men, there are more than ninety who are what they are, good or bad, useful or pernicious to society, from the instruction they have received. It is on education that depends the great difference observable among them. The least and most imperceptible impressions received in our infancy have consequences very important, and of a long duration. It is with these first impressions as with a river, whose waters we can easily turn by different canals in quite opposite courses; so that, from the insensible direction the stream receives at its source, it takes different directions, and at last arrives at places far distant from each other. And, with the same facility, we may, I think, turn the minds of children to what direction we please. Locke.
Holy intentions give meaning and value to actions, like a soul to a body.
Holy intention is to the actions of a man that which the soul is to the body, or form to its matter, or the root to the tree, or the sun to the world, or the fountain to the river, or the base to a pillar; for, without these, the body is a dead trunk, the matter is sluggish, the tree is a block, the world is darkness, the river is quickly dry, the pillar rushes into flatness and ruin, and the action is sinful, or unprofitable and vain. The poor farmer that gave a dish of cold water to Artaxerxes was rewarded with a golden goblet: and he that gives the same to a disciple, in the name of a disciple, shall have a crown; but if he gives water in despite, when the disciple needs wine or a cordial, his reward shall be to want that water to cool his tongue. Bp. Taylor.
The morality of actions depends on the motives behind them, not just the outcomes.
The morality of an action depends upon the motive from which it is done. If I fling a half-crown at a beggar, with the intention to hurt his head, and he picks it up and buys victuals with it, the practical effect is good to him, but, with respect to me, it is very bad. Locke.
The soul's innate yearning for God remains constant despite differing religious systems.
The heart yearns and calls for God; not because of outward solicitation, but because of the want it feels within. No difference of teachers or systems can change this nature of the soul. The ocean is the same, whatever craft sail up and down upon it, whether they be pleasureboats, brigs, merchant-ships, pirates, or menof-war: so, whatever religious navigators may be going up and down the sea of life, its depths and shores and distant haven remain the same. The stars never change for astrologers or astronomers. They roll calmly above storms and above opinions. So man's nature does not vary for circumstances, or conflicting views, but still wants God above, and fellowman below. Beecher.
Self-interest often blinds people to truth, causing them to oppose godliness.
Nothing more hinders men from going to, or going from an opinion, than the interest they have by holding it. Men do not care so much for the opinions they hold, as for what they hold by their opinions. Many a man thinks what Demetrius said: "This craft, by which we have all our wealth, is like to be set at nought." Hence they begin to fly in the face of truth, and oppose it with outrageous rage, so dearly sweet, and sweetly dear, is their darling gain. They see they cannot have the honey unless they burn the bees, and therefore fire them forthwith: they cannot possess the vineyard, unless Naboth be put to death, and therefore he must be despatched. When once the copyhold of gain and honor is touched, men begin to look about them, and will never call godliness gain, because gain is their godliness. Venning.
Anger and insults echo back to us, revealing that we betray ourselves by our words.
A little boy cried out in the meadow. "Hurrah, hurrah!" From the nearest woods, he heard a voice, "Hurrah, hurrah!"—"Where are you?" he shouted. The voice cried, "Where are you?" He answered back, "You are a foolish boy!"—"Foolish boy!" echoed back the woods. He became very angry, and shouted nicknames; but they all came back again. He searched the woods to find the boy that had treated him so, and then ran to tell his mother of the bad boy. She told him he had heard nothing but his own words. Had you spoken friendly words, they would have echoed back to you again. You have betrayed and accused yourself.
Our passions and actions are invisibly recorded, revealing our true spiritual condition.
A rich landlord once cruelly oppressed a poor widow. Her son, a little boy of eight years, saw it. He afterwards became a painter, and painted a life-likeness of the dark scene. Years afterwards, he placed it where the man saw it. He turned pale, trembled in every joint, and offered any sum to purchase it, that he might put it out of sight. Thus there is an invisible painter drawing on the canvas of the soul a life-likeness, reflecting correctly all the passions and actions of our spiritual history on earth.
— The Happy Home
People judge others better than themselves and favor those who agree with them.
Human nature is so constituted, that all see and judge better in the affairs of other men than in their own. — Terence. — We seldom find persons whom we acknowledge to be possessed of good sense, except those who agree with us in opinion. — La Rochefoucauld.
God desires heartfelt service, not just outward actions without love.
God cries, "Bring thy heart, or bring nothing." Like a jealous husband when he hath a wife, yet he is jealous whether he hath her heart; so, whatsoever thou do, yet God is jealous still, and respects not what thou doest, but whether thou do it from the heart, that is, of mere love towards him. If Pilate had washed his heart when he washed his hands, he had been cleaner than Naaman when he came out of Jordan; if the Shechemites had circumcised their hearts when they circumcised their flesh, they had saved their souls when they had lost their lives; if Cain had offered his heart when he offered the fruits, his offering had been as acceptable as Abel's. But as swine's flesh was like sheep's flesh, yet was not accepted because it came from an unclean beast; so Cain's offering, Pilate's washing, the Shechemites' circumcision, the Pharisee's prayer and fasts and alms, were as fair as the apostles': yet they had no reward, but "Woe to you hypocrites!" because they wanted the heart, which is like the fire that kindleth the sacrifice. Henry Smith.
The soul's passions are powerful and enduring, needing Christ's healing balm.
How mighty are the passions of the soul, how strong its hate! When once it penetrates an object, its hold is unshaken. The principle that binds the planets lets go its grasp in the wreck of dissolving Nature; but mortal hate rises victorious over the dissolution of all things. Survey its love. The shock of battle, the loss of all things, the flames of the martyr's stake, death itself, which destroys every thing physical, cannot shake it; for "it is stronger than death." Behold its ambition! Earth is lost in it as a drop in the ocean. The universe cannot fill it. Measure now the depths of its deathless passions, and then all the depths of its capacity to suffer. Oh for some fountain to cool its passions! Oh for some balm to heal its wounds! Oh for some anodyne to moderate its pulsations! Religion leads to "a fountain filled with blood, drawn from Immanuel's veins." Ep. Thomson.
More inner light reduces darkness in life, like light in a room.
In Germany, when light is first brought into a room, they say, "God grant light eternal!" and, in some parts of England, "God grant us the light of heaven!" Were there more light in our hearts, there would be less of the works of darkness in our lives. We are like the actor, who, looking upward, cried, "O heaven!" and with his hand pointed to the earth.
A good outward temper can hide an unrenewed, hard heart within.
Easy, good-tempered, affable persons, whose hearts are nevertheless unrenewed by grace, may be compared to ripe plums and apricots, which, however soft and smooth on the outside, yet have a hard stone within. Dr. Arrowsmith.
Examining all one's thoughts reveals the true sinful condition of the heart.
Suppose a man should find a great basket by the wayside, carefully packed, and, on opening it, he should find it filled with human thoughts, all the thoughts which had passed through one single brain in one year or five years,—what a medley they would make! How many would be wild and foolish, how many weak and contemptible, how many mean and vile, how many so contradictory and crooked, that they could hardly lie still in the basket! And suppose he should be told that these were all his own thoughts, children of his own brain: how amazed would he be! how little prepared to see himself as revealed in those thoughts! And how would he want to run away and hide, if all the world were to see the basket opened, and see his thoughts!
— Dr. Todd
Without strict watchfulness, the heart will stray and be hard to regain control of.
Use of. Never trust thou this heart of thine, that it will be well ordered and kept in good frame though thou carry not always so heavy a hand and narrow an eye over it. No: if thou look not thus straitly to it, it will be gone, as a wild horse, if a man once let go the bridle as he is walking on his journey; and then, when he is once gone, he will not be gotten again in haste, but a man must spend as much time in recovering him as would have been sufficient to have despatched the whole journey. So will it fare with thy heart, if once thou let go this bridle of watchfulness: it will run out so far, that it will be long ere thou wilt catch it again.
— Dyke
Our impure world reflects the darkness and disorder within our own hearts.
This disordered universe is the picture of your own mind. We make a wilderness by encouraging artificial wants, by creating sensitive and selfish feelings; then we project every thing stamped with the impress of our own feelings, and we gather the whole of creation into our pained being. "The whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now." The world you complain of as impure and wrong is not God's world, but your world: the blight, the dulness, the blank, are all your own. The light which is in you has become darkness, and therefore the light itself is dark.
— F. W. Robertson
A boy's vanity reveals the human desire for approval and the need for humility.
"I once knew," says Mr. Abbott, "a little boy of unusually bright and animated countenance. Every one who entered the house noticed the child, and spoke of his beauty. One day a gentleman called upon business, and being engaged in conversation, did not pay that attention to the child to which he was accustomed, and which he now began to expect as his due. The vain little fellow made many efforts to attract notice, but not succeeding, he at last placed himself full in front of the gentleman, and asked, 'Why don't you see how beautiful I be?'
# 175 FORB.
Despotic power can harden the heart and produce hypocrisy in character and conduct.
A lady, now in the West Indies, was sent in her infancy to her friends, near Belfast, in Ireland, for education. She remained under their charge from five to fifteen years of age, and grew up every thing which her friends could wish. At fifteen, she returned to the West Indies—was married—and after some years paid her friends near Belfast a second visit. Towards white people, she was the same elegant and interesting woman as before; apparently full of every virtuous and tender feeling; but towards the colored people she was like a tigress. If Wilberforce's name was mentioned, she would say, "Oh, I wish we had the wretch in the West Indies, I would be one of the first to help to tear his heart out!"—and then she would tell of the manner in which the West Indian ladies used to treat their slaves. "I have often," she said, "when my women have displeased me, snatched their baby from their bosom, and running with it to a well, have tied my shawl round its shoulders and pretended to be drowning it: oh, it was so funny to hear the mother's screams!"—and then she laughed almost convulsively at the recollection.
What but the exercise of despotic power could have thus steeled her sensibilities and corrupted her mind?
The cruelty of slave-dealing reveals a heart hardened by corruption and disregard for suffering.
A person who resided in a slaveholding country, sold a black woman and her mulatto child to a negro trader. The woman knew nothing of the sale until she and her child were taken possession of by the purchaser. She was, it appears, a female of spirit, and as she was now out of the hands of her former master, and must go, she knew not whither, she took occasion to vent her indignant feelings in language that showed at once the courage of the Roman matron, as it respected herself, and the heartless villany of a slave-dealer, when applied to him. Walking toward him with her child in her arms,
### 319. POWER,
A new heart from God is necessary to truly live by the golden rule.
Tedynscung was a celebrated chief among the Delaware Indians of North America, about 1780. The efforts of the Christian missionaries had been the means of diffusing much scriptural knowledge among the native Indians, and their doctrines were frequently the subject of conversation among them. One evening, Tedynscung was sitting by the fireside of his friend, who mentioned the golden rule to him as very excellent, "For one man to do to another as he would the other should do to him!" "It is impossible; it cannot be done," said the Indian chief. After smoking his pipe, and musing for about a quarter of an hour, Tedynscung again gave his opinion, and said, "Brother, I have been thoughtful on what you told me. If the great Spirit that made man would give him a new heart, he could do so as you say, but not else."
## THE CHRISTIAN.
Everything we make is available for free because of a generous community of supporters.
Donate