Clean House and Clean Heart

This is a devotion I enoyed this morning from Proverbs 31 Ministries.....cleaning time!

November 10, 2008

Clean House and Clean Heart
Tracie Miles

“Create in me a clean heart, O God. Renew a loyal spirit within me.”
Psalm 51:10 (NLT)

Devotion:
I was tired of tripping over shoes, left over belongings, stray hangers, and dirty clothes!

I finally admitted I had to clean out my closet. After hours of sorting clothes, I stepped back to admire my clean, neatly organized closet. I breathed a sigh of relief and reveled in my success. Although it took quite a long time, it was well worth the effort. I could hardly wait to get up the next morning and enter my tidy closet, looking for my clothes with a fresh, new perspective.

Cleaning is something we all prefer to avoid, but its something that is necessary. When it comes to cleaning house, the more we neglect doing what is needed, the worse things get, and the longer it will to take to get clean again. That was the case with my closet.

As I admired my coordinated closet, I considered how our hearts are like messy houses at times. On the outside we look in order, but on the inside our hearts are full of clutter – clutter such as unforgiveness, bitterness, self-condemnation, sadness, lack of joy, worry and much more. All this clutter makes for a huge mess behind the closed doors of our hearts. Just as putting off cleaning our homes creates chaos around us, the longer we allow our hearts to stay cluttered and messy, the more messes our bad habits make in our lives. Think about the havoc negative self-talk, selfishness, or grumpy attitudes have caused in the past.

I felt God nudging me to do a little house cleaning, or should I say, heart cleaning. For example, in a house with two young teen daughters with changing hormones, busy social lives, and lots of drama, sometimes I have to remind myself that they need a happy mommy, not a grumpy mommy. They need a patient mom, not an impatient mom. They need a forgiving mom, not a mom who constantly reminds them of their mistakes. My husband needs a happy wife. My friends need a faithful friend. My church needs a willing servant.

The mentality of cleaning up our heart can apply to every area of our life – marriage, family, work, relationships, and even self-image. Let’s face it, as nice as a clean house is, it is more important to have a clean heart!

Today’s verse reminds us how we should desire a clean heart. When David prays this prayer, he desires a new heart, a clean heart, and a spirit that desires to be like Christ. David knew that the only way he could achieve a clean heart, was through the power of Christ. So it is the same with us. Therefore, we must ask God to create a new heart, a clean heart, within us and believe that as a result, our spirits will be renewed.

Maybe you know you have some serious house cleaning to do, but could it be you have some heart cleaning to do as well?

Dear Lord, I seek Your face today and ask You to restore in me a clean heart. Help me to rid of all the clutter in my heart which is keeping me at a distance from You, and preventing others from seeing You working in and through me. Infuse me with a desire to maintain a clean heart throughout each day. In Jesus’ Name, Amen.

Related Resources:
Cleaning up the Clutter by Emilie Barnes

My Heart’s At Home: Becoming the Intentional Mom Your Family Needs by Jill Savage

Visit Tracie Miles’ blog

Application Steps:
Pick an area of your home to de-clutter this weekend. As you clean, pray for God to purify your heart.

Reflections:
What has been burdening your heart lately? Is there some unforgiveness there? Bitterness? Or doubts?

Ask God to renew your perspective and help you begin the cleaning process.

Power Verses:
Jeremiah 17:9-10, “The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it? ‘I the LORD search the heart and examine the mind, to reward a man according to his conduct, according to what his deeds deserve.’" (NIV)


© 2008 by Tracie Miles. All rights reserved.

Encouraging Words....

Under God's Mercy



Here is the really liberating truth: Everything is not going to get fixed and healed in this lifetime—that’s what Heaven is for. You have to decide what can go under the mercy of God (not to be confused with “under the rug”—because when stuff is swept under the rug, it always sneaks back out and eventually makes a gargantuan mountain that you can’t navigate around). Under the mercy of God is a place where you put things when you know that they are not going to be healed in this lifetime. These are the things you can’t fix in [other people] and they just need mercy. Grace. Forgiveness. And that is a perfectly okay place to start building something new—on the platform of mercy, forgiveness, and grace. . .

We all have “junk in the trunk”—the baggage and hurt that accompanies living. Your choice is whether you will put it up in the front seat, ask God to help you deal with it, allow Him to heal you from it, release it, and even laugh about it . . . or leave it in the trunk to rot and make you sick.

Anita Renfroe


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Excerpted from Glimmers of Grace: Sparkling Reminders to Encourage You
© 2008 Women of Faith, Inc. All rights reserved.

Morning Manna

Let us acknowledge the LORD; let us press on to acknowledge him. As surely as the sun rises, he will appear; he will come to us like the winter rains, like the spring rains that water the earth.

Hosea 6:3

Battlefield of the Mind

What a great reminder my devotional was this morning. It is from Joyce Meyer's Battlefield of the Mind series.

Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus.

Philippians 2:5

Joyce writes:

If a person is thinking according to the mind of Christ, what will his thoughts be like? They will be positive, that's for sure. Enough can never be said about the power of being positive. God is positive, and if you and I want to flow with Him, we must get on the same wavelength and begin to think positively, I am not talking about exercising mind control, but simply about being an all-around, positive person.

Morning Manna

The Love of God

From The One Year Book of Hope by Nancy Guthrie

I pray that Christ will be more and more at home in your hearts as you trust in him. May your roots go down deep into the soil of god's marvelous love. And may you have the power to understand, as all God's people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love really is. May you experience the love of Christ, though it is so great you will never fully understand it. Then you will be filled with the fullness of life and power that comes from God. Now glory be to God! By his mighty power at work within us, he is able to accomplish infinitely more than we would ever dare to ask or hope.

Ephesians 3:17-20

Morning Manna

Because of the Lord's faithful love, we do not perish, for His mercies never end.

Lamentations 3:22

Hear Me O Lord

In her Battlefield of the Mind devotional, Joyce Meyer says, "They ways of the Holy Spirit are gentle; most if the time He speaks to us in a still small voice. It is therefore vital that we learn to keep ourselves in a condition conducive to hearing."

This devotional really spoke to me this morning. I don't know about you, but my world is FULL of noise. Mickey Mouse, Dora, children screaming, singing, laughing, Duffy barking, phone ringing, dryer buzzing, and on and on. Am I in a condition condusive to hearing a still small voice?

I can not count how many times I have asked the Lord to answer me LOUDLY and CLEARLY. "Scream it at me Lord, hit me over the head with your answer," I have requested over and over. One more instance the Lord says to me, "Let's work on YOU, Brooke."

Praise God that He is willing to refine my ways over and over and over. He WANTS me to hear Him, but in His way and in His time. A still, small voice will be heard when I decide to turn off or get away from the noises of my everyday world. When I come before Him, condusive to hearing his Spirit is when he will do great works in me. The love and beauty in the Holy Spirit's voice is what I want to be conditioned to hear.

Then a great and powerful wind tore the mountains apart and shattered the rocks before the LORD, but the LORD was not in the wind. After the wind there was an earthquake, but the LORD was not in the earthquake. 12 After the earthquake came a fire, but the LORD was not in the fire. And after the fire came a still small voice.
1 Kings 19:11-12