The Heart Check (Daily Devotional)

Welcome again, thanks for tuning in, you have tuned into living supernaturally. In this edition, we are studying about our spiritual health. We're looking at various factors and various things that we can do to check, how our spiritual health is so that we can make some corrections and do some course corrections so that we can get back to our spiritual health, thriving and flourishing, the way God wants us to be. Today, we're going to look at one test or a check to find out how we are doing spiritually and that is the ‘heart check’. I just want to read from Proverbs chapter four and verse 23, it says, ‘keep your heart with all diligence, for out of its spring the issues of life.’ Keep meaning to maintain, protect, guard. So, we need to ask this question, is my heart brimming with gratitude and thanksgiving? Is my heart burdened with offense, bitterness, and anger? What is the state of my heart? So, we need to check and see, are we overflowing with gratitude? Or is there bitterness and anger and hatred? This is again Paul testifying and he's saying in Acts chapter 24 and verse 16 says, ‘I myself always strive to have a conscience without offense towards God and men.’ He's saying that he strives, he trains, he exercises, takes effort, labors, to make sure that he does not have any offense, anything that stumbles or anything that gives cause for stumbling, towards God and also towards men. Sometimes we feel we are offended with God, we feel we are let down by God and we encounter some disappointment, maybe unanswered prayers and we are offended with God, we are angry with God, we are bitter with God. It happens to most of us, that something that we've been hoping for, something that we've been asking God for, and maybe it's delayed or maybe it didn't happen the way we thought it would and we are angry, and we are offended with God. We could be offended with people because maybe people say some things and do some things and they disappoint us, and we get offended with people. The thing is that when we have offense in our hearts, then it results in unpleasantness in relationships with people and with God. So, when offense and bitterness enter, then thanksgiving and gratitude exits. So, we need to reverse the order and we need to make sure that there is thanksgiving, a thankful heart cannot remain an offended and a bitter heart. So, let's pray and let's ask God to help us to release all unforgiveness and all offense and bitterness and make sure that our heart is thriving and flourishing with gratitude towards Him. Let's pray, Father, we thank you that you really want us to thrive and flourish and do well spiritually. You do not want us to be stumbling blocks, you don't want us to stumble and fall and today we pray that you would give us strength to release; if we have any kind of bitterness and offense towards people or towards you, Lord, I pray that we might put it away, receive forgiveness from you and release forgiveness to others as well. Make our hearts tender towards you O God. We thank you, in Jesus’s name we pray, Amen.

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Daily devotions to strengthen your faith each day. Daily Devotional for Spirit filled living. Each daily devotion is about five minutes in duration. These daily devotionals are centered around a weekly theme. So there are seven daily devotions that focus on the theme and bring you insight, understanding and revelation from the Bible. Each week's theme is listed as a series. So you can listen to the current week's devotions or go to any previous theme/series that speaks to your present need (https://apcwo.org/resources/daily-devotions ). Also available free sermons (https://apcwo.org/sermons), and free Christian books (https://apcwo.org/books) to nourish and strengthen your faith.