Our walk with God is always a matter of the heart.

God is always concerned with the heart. At times when I do not have words to express my emotions, I simply pray to my Lord, "You know my heart." He knows the sorrows, the bitterness and the joys that take refuge there. Due to sin, if the heart is not purified with the Word of God, like the mind, it can be deceitful, so constantly fill your heart with the Spirit of God through prayer, by imitating Christ at all times and by clinging desperately to the Word of God!!! "THE WORD OF GOD X-RAYS THE HUMAN HEART.... AND IT CONFRONTS THE INNER SELF!" "for out of it are the issues of life"

I don't know about you, but I sure do feel a wonderful sense of comfort and peace knowing that my Lord already knows the cries of my heart and He already knows what I need before I even come to Him concerning it. He is the ALL knowing, ALMIGHTY, Abba! Father! Who loves His children beyond measure!

Remember, we can be very religious while we withhold our hearts from true faith and worship of the Lord.

As I reflect on all that I have learned and come to know about my faith and about myself in the last month, I am wonderfully overwhelmed. Although in the process of thought, it "all" seems like an overload of information, it actually is not. I now realize that it all comes down to LOVE, RELATIONSHIPS, THE HEART.... all three stemming from the seed of GOD.

Think about this: What is God's first commandment? To love Him and to Love thy neighbor. To love Him - THAT IS A RELATIONSHIP! To love thy neighbor- THAT IS A RELATIONSHIP! The first commandment is ALL about relationships!!! God Himself is telling us that it is all about relationships! Therefore, when ministering to a Muslim person, we MUST demonstrate the loving Christlike relationship God demands from us!! Then..... how else can a Muslim person ever comprehend a  personal relationship with God (which is such a foreign concept to him/her!!!!)

The BODY OF CHRIST is a spiritual relationship we have as followers of Christ....we are all CONNECTED with the common thread being our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ! We are all brothers and sisters in Christ.... and this ETERNAL RELATIONSHIP connects our HEARTS for our love of Christ! Remember that the Lord said, BE A LIGHT TO THE WORLD. The light of Christ SHINES THROUGH OUR HEARTS AS WE EXEMPLIFY THE LOVE OF CHRIST THROUGH RELATIONSHIPS IN THE BODY OF CHRIST. WE MUST POUR OUT THAT LOVE IN RELATIONSHIPS WITH NON BELIEVERS TO ILLUMINATE GODS LOVE.

Let me explain......

Pastor Tim from Graceway recently explained to me in a wonderful and enlightening way that although each one of us represent ourselves to the world through our behaviors and our beliefs and values.......it is actually relationships and our hearts that hold our true essence, where God is most visible.  We often hold a view of someone through their behavior and the values they associate themselves with......yet, giving little value to relationships and the heart of the individual. Proverbs 4:23 says: KEEP THY HEART WITH ALL DILIGENCE; FOR OUT OF IT ARE THE ISSUES OF LIFE" We need to look into the HEART of a person because it is WHERE JESUS STARTS..... the beliefs, values and behaviors of an individual are often hijacked by the flesh, succumbing to the world.... therefore burying the true struggles, pure desires and love that is in the heart. 

Scripture clearly teaches us that the real issues of life are spiritual and are really matters of the heart, the inner man. Did you know that the Bible mentions the heart 963 in the KJV and only mentions the head 360 times and the mind 156 times.... The word "heart" is first mentioned in the Bible in Genesis 6:5:

"THE LORD SAW THAT THE WICKEDNESS OF MAN WAS GREAT IN THE EARTH, AND THAT EVERY INTENTION OF THE THOUGHT OF HIS HEART WAS ONLY EVIL CONTINUALLY"

Notice how specific and how intentional the Word of God is!! "Thought of his heart..." The Law of First Mention (that wherever you find a doctrine, a word or a theme mentioned in the Bible for the first time, that passage can be understood to set the tone for understanding it throughout all of the Bible) states: "Thought of his heart"... not thought of his mind. The first time the Lord talks about the HEART, He connects it with thinking. In the last 10 years, science has finally proved that the heart has the capability to think, yet the Bible states this clearly in Genesis! I don't know about you, but information like that excites me!!

ALSO NOTICE: In Genesis 8:21, it says, ".........The Lord said IN HIS HEART, I will never again curse the ground because of man......" Notice that the Lord's BIG promise to man was made IN HIS HEART!! God's words are intentional, and He could have just said, "The Lord said, I will......." but He made that promise in His heart as a "seal". The heart is sacred, confirmed in Proverbs 7:3, "...write them on the tablet of your HEART." We can obviously see the importance of the theme of the heart in the Bible..... so why is it that in society, we often forget and give little attention to the heart of others, but rather we focus on the external elements of man? God keeps His eyes on our hearts.... shouldn't we do the same? 1 Samuel 16:7 But the LORD said to Samuel, “.........for God sees not as man sees, for man looks at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart.” I choose to look into the hearts of those whom have pained me or have caused me to suffer, rather than their external behaviors, actions and worldly/flesh consumed beliefs. Why? Because the heart will show me WHY I must forgive!!  Their hearts will show and confirm to me that my fellow man is seeking and crying out to God just like mine is..........

Once I understood this, I asked myself an honest question: Why do I want to minister to Muslims? Why do I think that the Lord has truly called me to bring His truth to the Muslim heart? So, I wanted to answer this question by thinking from my heart..... and not my mind.

Answer: I WANT TO BRING GOD'S WORD AND TRUTH NOT INTO THE MIND OF A MUSLIM, BUT INTO HIS OR HER HEART. The secret is not to transform their mind, but to transform their heart!!! Remember, you can not argue or debate someone into the kingdom of God..... but you can LOVE them and open their heart into the kingdom of God. I TRULY BELIEVE THAT EVERY MUSLIM HEART (THAT THE FATHER CHOOSES TO DRAW HIS SON TO) IS DESPERATELY "SEEKING" THE LOVE OF GOD. THE MUSLIM HEART IS SEEKING A PERSONAL RELATIONSHIP AND INTIMACY WITH GOD THAT IS NOT PROVIDED IN ISLAM. YET, THE SOCIAL/CULTURAL AND RELIGIOUS CHAINS OF ISLAM HOLDS THEM CAPTIVE. As missionaries, our primary role as soldiers of Christ is to break these chains with the power of the Holy Spirit and set the Muslim heart FREE IN CHRIST. This is not a matter of conversion!!! IT IS A MATTER OF THE HEART! And to get to the heart, one must build a bridge through RELATIONSHIPS. I would say that the closest "silver bullet" to open the heart of a Muslim person to Christ is: RELATIONSHIP EQUITY COMBINED WITH THE POWER OF THE HOLY SPIRIT. When I was first presented the gospel, there were relentless attempts to DEFINE Christianity to me.... which is a matter of the MIND!!! What really brought me down to my knees? It was Christianity DEMONSTRATED to me through RELATIONSHIPS! Which is a matter of the HEART!!!! Hope that makes sense...... :)

Consider this!! Paul too looked at the heart when he went to proclaim the gospel to the world! We can see the importance of first looking into the heart with the example of Apostle Paul's speech to the Greek's in Athens. As he walked around and saw all the idols being worshiped, he was disturbed. However, when he said his speech in the courtyard, he DID NOT proclaim with frustration and anger that they were idol worshipers. Rather, he CHOSE to look into the heart of the Greeks instead of WHAT they were worshiping. He focused on their hearts and recognized the THEIR HEART'S were "seeking" and that their hearts were not satisfied, spiritually empty. They were looking for a God that could satisfy their heart's desires. We need to truly think about this and hope to do the same.

PLEASE NOTE: Only God through His Spirit can draw anyone to Himself. "YOU CAN NOT BUILD THE KINGDOM OF GOD. ONLY GOD CAN. YOU CAN ONLY REFLECT IT THROUGH YOUR WITNESS AND LIFE." Although we plant the seed, God alone can give the growth. "The man who plants, waters and reaps KNOWS NOT HOW the seed sprouts and grows!!!"

 I will use my own story as an example: For almost two years when I was first presented the gospel, I refused to embrace Christ. My mind, my education, and my own intelligence would not allow me to see the light of faith. I had in essence rejected the constraints of Islam and looked in distrust at the face of Western Christianity. Therefore, I was living as my own God. God fully knows us from the inside out. Therefore, He too knew that my stubbornness would be a problem. So, He knew to capture my mind because IT WAS MY MIND THAT WAS REJECTING CHRIST and IT WAS MY MIND THAT WAS NOT ALLOWING MY HEART TO HAVE ANY SAY IN THE MATTER. Therefore, the Lord needed to capture my heart and give it greater strength so that it could LEAD my MIND to His light...... As He set my HEART free with John 17, my MIND also began to be transformed. As missionaries, we must focus on the heart.... igniting the heart for the Lord, then the heart can lead the person's mind to Truth. It is then when all those lingering questions and debates that consume the mind, holding back a person to come to the Lord are answered THROUGH faith... in God's time! Jesus in all His love and mercy comforted my heart and mind, but in different ways because they were thinking differently!

It is obvious then to realize as Westerners that it is ALL ABOUT BUILDING A REALTIONSHIP WITH A MUSLIM PERSON IN ORDER TO KNOW THE HEART..... SEPARATE FROM THE MIND BECAUSE THE MUSLIM MIND HAS BEEN TAUGHT TO REJECT THE GOOD NEWS, AND HE OR SHE WILL REJECT CHRIST FIRST WITH THE MIND!!! KNOW THE STRUGGLE WITHIN THAT SPECIFIC INDIVIDUAL'S HEART.... AND THEN EXPLAIN HOW JESUS CAN AND WILL RESOLVE AND GIVE COMFORT TO THAT STRUGGLE!!!! Know the Muslim heart!!  "Since the heart is so important to what we think, say, and do, we each need to regularly do open heart surgery with the scalpel of the Word under the guiding hand of the great physician, the Lord Jesus. We accomplish this through the teaching, guiding, convicting ministry of the Holy Spirit. Like a sharp two-edged sword, the Word divides the inner man asunder to reveal the true condition and needs of our hearts" (http://bible.org/article/guarding-heart )

"Christianity and the promises of the Bible are matters of trust, and trust is a matter of the heart" (And remember, trust comes from building a solid "relationship")

We may worship our Lord with words, thoughts from the mind, or hymns, but OUR HEARTS MAY WORSHIP THE LORD WITHOUT WORDS.

FOR MORE ON THE "MATTER OF THE HEART", GO TO  http://bible.org/article/guarding-heart