2/10/21 A Matter of the Heart

  • Jim Corbett
  • 02/10/2021
  • 0 Comments

“In My house, the cost of the gift is what counts. I gave everything when I gave Jesus. He gave everything when He died for you. Now I judge your gifts to Me with the same standard. If I give you much and you give little, it means little. Think of the widow’s mite. She gave all. The rich gave little in comparison, even though the amount was greater. She gave everything she had. What they gave really cost them nothing. Their gifts meant nothing to Me because they owned My treasures in their hearts and would not give them back to Me. Remember, I look at your heart. It is deceitfully wicked until I am allowed to change it through Jesus. It is the test of who you really are. Don’t minimize the gift that Jesus gave. Surrender fully to Me. I will bring your heart priorities in order.”

Isa.30:18 TLB

“Yet the Lord still waits for you to come to him, so he can show you his love; he will conquer you to bless you, just as he said. For the Lord is faithful to his promises. Blessed are all those who wait for him to help them.”

Luke 21:1-4 NIV

1) As he looked up, Jesus saw the rich putting their gifts into the temple treasury.

2) He also saw a poor widow put in two very small copper coins.

3) “I tell you the truth,” he said, “This poor widow has put in more than all the others.

4) All these people gave their gifts out of their wealth, but she out of her poverty put in all she had to live on.”

Hebrews 10:14 NIV

because by one sacrifice He has made perfect forever those who are being made holy.

 

When we read the story of the widow’s mite, we usually think of money. In fact, many times we make it a money issue to bring home some money point. I am convinced that the Lord was expressing a heart issue. How people act is simply an expression of their true heart priorities, as it always is.

God is in the business of bringing our priorities in order. He knows that we can’t do anything to be right in His eyes, so He first makes us right through Jesus and then keeps making our priorities right as we keep coming to Him.

As the Father reveals all aspects of His heart, sometimes I reel with the overwhelming challenge that I am called to face. I begin to condemn myself for who I am not, cower at the prospects ahead of me as a Christian in the coming times, stagger at the weight of my responsibility to represent Jesus properly; and become discouraged as I attempt to prepare for His return. It is then that I remember that none of this was my idea in the first place. My Father has ordained my life and has promised to fulfill His plan for it and in it. My job is simply to need Him desperately.

In the above verse in Hebrews 10, I am so encouraged by the statement “those who are being made holy.” The wonderful part of “have [already] been made perfect” [in God’s eyes] is pretty incredible and difficult for me to understand fully, but “being made holy” soothes my heart.

At this very moment - and every moment until we are with our Father in Heaven - the process of making us holy is being accomplished, because we have surrendered our lives to Jesus and His completed work on the cross. When God is in the process of breaking us, He’s not trying so much to get us to say “uncle” as He is trying to get us to say “Abba.”

Give me the power to surrender fully to You, Lord,

Jim Corbett

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