Take Care of your Heart by Rose McCormick Brandon

Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it. Proverbs 4:23

 

Pepper Point Gardens, Manitoulin Island 

A woman bought a house because she liked the previous owner’s landscaping. As the new owner, she enjoyed the perennial garden with its peonies, roses, delphiniums and clematis.  After a few weeks she noticed changes. Roses hung their heads. Dead blooms tainted the appearance of flowering bushes. The neglected garden soon looked unkempt. 

Like a garden, the heart requires care. 

The heart is the inward person. Think of it as the garden of the soul. A good gardener tends the soil by adding compost and other beneficial material. She prunes stray branches to add symmetry and to let in sunlight. She waters and fertilizes, moves plants from one area to another and never seems to stop noticing areas that need help.

No one deliberately plants weeds, but they appear even in well-tended gardens. The diligent gardener pulls them while they’re small, when they can be easily removed. Weeds quickly develop strong roots that require a shovel and labour to remove them. Some pervasive weeds require extreme measures like laying a sheet of plastic over the ground and around the roots of plants. This keeps the sun from penetrating the soil, thus preventing weeds from growing. The passionate gardener uses every necessary means to keep plants and soil healthy.

Our hearts require the same diligent care. The wise keep their hearts free from resentment, lies, profane talk, perversions and all kinds of sin. Anything that destroys goodness is an enemy. Jesus said, “A good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and an evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart” (Luke 6:45).

Nurture your heart with God’s Word. Take care that it doesn’t become overgrown with weeds like worry and sins of all kinds. Listen to God's prompts. Replace anger, hatred and fear with a childlike trust in God. If your heart is in an overgrown state begin weeding out the offenders one by one. 

"Get rid of all bitterness, rage, anger, harsh words, and slander, as well as all types of evil behavior" Ephesians 4:31. 

Prayer: Father, make me more mindful of what I watch, read and hear.

***

Rose McCormick Brandon writes from her home in Caledonia, Ontario. Her award-winning Biblical essays, personal experience pieces and devotionals have been published in several periodicals in Canada and the U.S.