We need the Lord to Establish our Heart Blameless in Holiness to live a Holy Life

In order for us to live a holy life for the church life, we need the Lord to establish our heart blameless in holiness; our heart is “the switch of life”, so it needs to be renewed, purified, and established by the Lord. Amen!

A very simple yet effective way for us to be sanctified is to be in the word of God; we need to exercise our spirit over God’s word and turn our heart to Him as we read the Bible, and He will sanctify us.

We need to love the Lord and exercise our spirit in prayer and in reading the word of God every day so that our mind would be filled with the mingled spirit.

Although we do not realize this, the philosophies of this age are being infused into us; when we go to school, to high school, and to college or university, we are being infused with the darkened understanding of our teachers.

Many of the professors in the college and high school are very dark; no matter how many PhD’s they have, their mind and understanding is darkened, and their darkened understanding gets into the young people.

Although we are regenerated, simply by having contact with people with darkened understanding, our mind is infused with darkness and death, and we have all kinds of opinions, concepts, and philosophies that match this age and are against the word of God.

The way for us to have a proper family life, church life, and Christian life, is for us to pray-read the word of God so that God’s thought and heart would be infused into us.

Our mind needs to be renewed with the Holy Scriptures. By loving the Lord, reading the Word day by day in a spirit of prayer, our mind is changed and renewed.

When our mind is renewed, we do not have any more old or contemporary concepts concerning the things of the human life but we are made new again by the teaching of the Holy Scriptures and the enlightening of the Holy Spirit.

Our mind needs to contain the new thoughts of God that are in the Holy Scriptures; so we need to read the Bible consecutively, pray over the verses that touch us, and take time to allow the Lord to infuse us with His thoughts and His desires.

We need to turn the word of God we read into prayer, and it will become God’s instant word to wash us metabolically and to sanctify us in our thinking.

In this way our mind is renewed, we think the same way that God thinks, and we can have a holy life for the church life, for the Lord will establish our heart blameless in holiness.

To Live a Holy Life for the Church Life we need the Lord to Establish our Heart Blameless in Holiness

The subject of the book of 1 Thessalonians is, A holy life for the church life; for us to live a proper church life, we need to live holy life.

To live a holy life for the church life, we need the Lord to establish our heart blameless in holiness (1 Thes. 3:13).

The book of 1 Thessalonians was written to brand new believers, and at the end of each chapter the coming of the Lord Jesus is mentioned; Paul wanted to infuse them with the aspiration and view that the Lord is coming again.

The word for “coming” is “parousia”, which literally means presence; the Lord’s coming is His presence.

The Lord is coming not only outwardly on the clouds but from within us in His sanctifying work in our spirit, soul, and body.

We want to have the Lord’s presence, His parousia; we do not want to lose His presence.

The Bible enjoins us to fear the Lord, having our heart single in fearing His name, and being filled with the Spirit of the fear of Jehovah.

More specifically, we need to fear offending the Lord and losing His presence; such a fear needs to be infused into us, so that we would have a proper fear of offending Him and losing His presence.

The Lord’s presence is everything to us – if we have His presence, we have everything, but if we lose His presence, we lose everything.

Our heart is a composition of all the parts of our soul – the mind, the emotion, and the will, plus one part of our spirit – the conscience (see Matt. 9:4; Heb. 4:12; John 14:1; 16:22; Acts 11:23; Heb. 10:22; 1 John 3:20).

On one hand we need to pay very much attention to our spirit, for it is in our human spirit that we can worship God, contact God, and contain God.

However, our heart is also important, for our spirit is the hidden man of our heart (1 Pet. 3:4).

Our heart surrounds our spirit, and for us to take care of our spirit – which is the hidden man of our heart – we need to take care of our heart.

For us to live a holy life for the church life we need the Lord to establish our heart blameless in holiness.

We need to turn our heart to the Lord again and again so that the veil may be taken away and we would behold Him and reflect Him like a mirror (2 Cor. 3:16, 18).

We also need to have a pure heart, being purified in our heart from anything else that replaces Christ, and having our heart pure and single toward the Lord in all things.

Even more, we need that our heart would be separated unto the Lord, occupied by the Lord, and saturated with the Lord.

When our heart is separated unto the Lord and saturated with Him, we not only have a turned heart but also a pure motive; the heart is in such a state that it is established blameless in holiness.

Once our heart has been established, it will be set, and it will no longer be movable or changeable; rather, our heart is blameless in holiness at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and before our God and Father.

We need to cooperate with the Lord day by day to have our heart turned to Him, renewed by Him, separated unto Him, saturated with Him, and occupied by Him, so that we may be established blameless in holiness in our heart; in this way we will live a holy life for the church life.

So we need to have many conversations with the Lord, asking Him in all honesty,

Lord Jesus, establish our heart blameless in holiness before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ with all His saints. You know our heart, Lord, and You know what is in our heart. Purify our heart, separate our heart unto You, saturate our heart with Yourself, and occupy our heart. May our heart be established blameless in holiness so that we may live a holy life for the church life. Amen, Lord Jesus, we treasure Your presence with us; we do not want to do anything that will cause us to lose Your presence, for Your presence is everything to us!

The need for a Renewed Heart for Life to Flow in us and Sanctify us Wholly

We thank and praise the Lord for revealing to us the crucial importance of our spirit; in our spirit we can contact God, receive God, contain God, and contact God.

Our spirit is so important, for we can worship God only in spirit and in truthfulness, not in our mind or in our feelings.

However, as seen in Prov. 4:23, our heart is the “switch” of life, for out of it is the issues of life.

The heart is the entrance and exit of life, the switch of life; if our heart is not right, the life in our mingled spirit is hindered, and the law of life cannot work freely and without obstruction to reach every part of our being. Oh Lord!

Although the divine life in us has great power, this great power is controlled by our small heart. We need to keep our heart with all vigilance, for out of it is the issues of life.

It is out of the abundance of our heart that our mouth speaks; whatever fills our heart, that’s what our mouth will speak.

If our heart is filled with golf, basketball, cars, and hiking, what comes out is what is in our heart.

Out of the abundance of our heart, our mouth speaks; if our heart is filled with the Lord and saturated with Him, our mouth will speak out of its fullness.

Some people love a particular sport or hobby to the point that their whole life revolves around it; when you meet them, the only thing they can speak of is their sport or their hobby.

The good man has a good treasure in his heart, and he speaks out of this good treasure; however, there are some who have an evil treasure, and when they speak, they speak evil things (see Matt. 12:33-37).

Our heart is changeable, incurable, and deceitful above all things (2 Tim. 4:10).

God is the unchanging One, but according to our natural birth, our heart is changeable, both in our relationship with others and with the Lord (Matt. 13:18-23). Oh Lord!

Even Paul said that Demas has forsaken him, having loved the present age; he was a close co-worker of Paul, but his heart changed.

There is the possibility that our heart would be turned to the Lord and love Him today, but in a few weeks or months our heart would grow cold toward Him and love the present age. Oh Lord!

This is why we need the Lord to establish our heart blameless in holiness before our God and Father.

Our heart is corrupt, rotten, to such an extent that it is incurable; this is the condition of the psychological heart of all descendants of Adam.

But praise the Lord, in His salvation God promises to give us a new heart (Ezek. 36:26); He takes away the heart of stone and gives us a new heart, a renewed heart.

Daily we need to cooperate with the Lord to have a renewed heart; on one hand we have received a renewed heart from the Lord, and on the other, we need to cooperate with the Lord daily to have our heart renewed.

We all have experienced having our heart turn away from the Lord little by little….then, by God’s mercy, our heart has turned to Him again.

We do not know our heart; we cannot change our heart, and we cannot establish our heart, but we can open to the Lord again and again and tell Him,

Lord Jesus, we want to cooperate with You daily to have our heart renewed. Establish our heart blameless in holiness day by day. May our heart be saturated by You, occupied by You, and possessed by You as we spend time with You in Your word and prayer. Oh Lord, our heart is corrupt and deceitful, and it is incurable; we cannot change our heart, but we come to You again and again to be renewed in our heart so that we may live a holy life for the church life. We open to Your renewing work daily so that the old heart of stone would be removed and our heart would be renewed daily!

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Sources of inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, the message by Ed Marks for this week, and portions from, Life-study of 1 Thessalonians, msg. 21 (by Witness Lee), as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, The Will of God (2020 spring ITERO), week 5, The Will of God – our Sanctification.
• Hymns on this topic:
  – If our hearts would be established; / If in spirit we would be; / If we would be overcomers; / Follow Jesus constantly. / Follow Jesus in the spirit; / Be the overcomers true; / Follow Jesus every moment— / Jesus, help us follow You. (Hymns #1247)
  – A heart in every thought renewed, / And filled with love divine; / Perfect and right, and pure and good, / A copy, Lord, of Thine. (Hymns #410)
  – Renew my mind, oh Lord, day by day dispense Your life; / My wandering thoughts purify completely; / Replace my will, oh Lord, with Your will that I would say / “Oh Lord, Amen,” always trusting You, following You. (Song on, Oh Lord, for this I pray)