Because Of Your Hard Heart-- (Romans 2:5)

When a doctor diagnoses a patient with hardening of the arteries, that patient becomes very concerned and seeks further medical attention. However, many have a spiritual infirmity known as a “hardening of the heart” (2 Chronicles 36:14-16; Hebrews 3:12-15). Unfortunately, people are not as concerned with the spiritual “hardening” of their hearts as they are with the physical hardening of their hearts. What I am about to say may shock you - but I believe it with all my heart: The hardest hearts in this world are not among the ungodly but among God's people!

When we think of hardhearted people, most of us think of avid atheists such as Madalyn Murray O'Hair; the woman who was instrumental in removing prayer from public schools. Atheists like O'Hair ridicule the very idea of God. Whenever they refer to Christians, their words are harsh and judgmental. Other atheists flaunt their hatred for God - such as the rock performer Marilyn Manson, who rips up Bibles during his stage shows. Whenever we hear about people such as these, we think, "Those are the most hardhearted people in the world!" We may think of militant gay activists, such as those who marched up Fifth Avenue in New York City. Many of those marching homosexuals mocked Christianity and blasphemed God's name. One man I personally saw on television carried a sign reading, "Jesus Is Gay," and another went as far as dressing like Jesus and openly imitating sexual intercourse with another man as all eyes watched, including little children. Whenever we hear of such people, we think, "Their hearts have become hardened because of sin. They are impossible to reach!" Or, we may think about one of the many communist nations that for decades have persecuted Christians. In Cuba, for instance, in the 1960s just miles off of our Florida coast, Fidel Castro's communist regime closed all churches and began turning cathedrals into training centers for communism. Cuba's leaders boasted, "We have wiped out all religion!" And at the time, many Christians thought, "No one could be more hardhearted than these God-haters!" I could go on and on, describing all kinds of scoffers, mockers, blasphemers, rejecters of Christ. And, indeed, each of these could easily be described as being hardhearted.

It's unfortunate, but if you want to discover the hardest hearts of all - the ones the Lord most despises - you have to look in God's house. The hardest hearts are always found among his people! The tragic truth is that in spite of hearing fiery messages sent from heaven, multitudes of Christians do not practice what they hear. They refuse to allow God entry into certain areas of their lives. And as they continue to hear without heeding, a hardness begins to set in. In the end, they will be cut off without hope of ever being cured! You might be surprised if you read PSALM 95:8-10. Why? It is actually describing the Israelites, God's chosen people not the lost sinner. So many times it is the Christian who loses interest in Christ and their heart slowly but ever more surely turns cold and hardens to anything related to the faith they once professed. As time passes and the mundane matters of life replace their original religious fervor, they grow increasingly unconcerned with the things of God. Christ and his word and his will are simply not important to them yet in their self-deception, they are convinced that they are okay with God and they become Academy Award-winning hypocrites convincing themselves and others that they are the favored children of God, but over the course of their life, something very dangerous is occurring, something that they do not see.

It is because of the damning sin of unbelief, their heart becomes increasingly hardened to the things of God. They can come to a church service and the preaching of the word will have no impact on them. They have no desire to be like Christ, no desire to progress in holiness, no desire to obey what they know is against God's will. They become more and more like the world. And underneath their spiritual veneer, there is a growing contempt for God and for his glory and their hearts are filled with spiritual ignorance, ingratitude, rebellion, and even outright idolatry and the sad thing is none of this alarms them ... a perfect indication of a hardened heart! They don't see it and if you bring it up they are quickly offended. Paul described it this way in Titus 1, beginning in verse 15, "to those who are defiled and unbelieving, nothing is pure, but both their mind and their conscience are defiled. They profess to know God, but by their deeds they deny Him, being detestable and disobedient and worthless for any good deed." This was the Apostle Paul's great concern for the first century Hebrews, those who had attached themselves to the new Christian church but who were Christians in name only, those who had truly not believed the full Gospel, only parts of it. This is a deadly deception that eventually hardens a person's heart over time. It desensitizes a person to the truth of the word of God and produces in them a growing rebellion towards God and ultimately it provokes the wrath of God.

Sadly, these are the same issues that face every church today. You say you believe in Christ, you say you believe in the Gospel, but down deep you really don't. Oh, you understand intellectually but you're not personally committed to the Lordship of Christ. Your sinful heart has deceived you. Your heart has become hardened to the truth, to the word, to the will of God, but because of the deceitfulness of sin, you cannot see it. That's a great danger. You hear the preaching of the word and yet your life is unchanged. You are convinced you are fine. The person and the work of Christ have no real appeal to you. You simply live for yourself and you believe that God is good with you, that you're good with God, and you simply use God for your own needs. Why? Because your sin nature has deceived you and you can't see it. This is such great danger and I assure you that if that is true in your life, as time goes on you will gradually fall away from the truth because your heart has been trained to ignore it. Then after so long of a time, your conscience gradually becomes seared and insensitive like skin that has been badly burned; like the false teachers that Paul described in 1 Timothy 4:2, those who even believe their own lies that were destroying the lives of others. He said, "by means of the hypocrisy of liars they were seared in their own conscience as with a branding iron." You see, repeated deception will turn your heart into scar tissue and it will be insensitive to the truth. You will be desensitized from it and you will continue to live in rebellion to God when in fact you are quite convinced of the opposite. You have no healthy fear of God's judgment because your heart has become hard. You are insensitive to reality.

This is such a great danger within the church. A hard heart dulls the ability to understand truth. How? A person with a hard heart puts up walls that disable them to receive anything. Not only that, but darkness takes place meaning there is no room for revelation-light to enter in. Luke 8:10 says, "You have been given a teachable heart to perceive the secret, hidden mysteries of God’s kingdom realm. But to those who don’t have a listening heart, my words are merely stories. Even though they have eyes, they are blind to the true meaning of what I say, and even though they listen, they won’t receive full revelation. " Did you get that? My jaw dropped when I read this! Each person was given a teachable heart, but many people have allowed their heart to be hardened which causes scripture to be more like stories. Not only are people with a hard heart not able to listen, but they aren’t able to see either which in turn will disable them from receiving the true revelation from the Word. Luke 11:34 says, “The eyes of your spirit allow revelation-light to enter into your being. When your heart is open the light floods in. When your heart is hard and closed, the light cannot penetrate and darkness takes its place.” WOW!!
Hopefully now that you have reached this point you recognize just how dangerous and unhealthy a hard heart is. It’s time to do something about it! The only thing that is going to bring healing to your heart is the truth! The truth is what will set you free! And I believe once you spend time in the truth then the Bible won’t be merely just stories anymore; it will, in fact, bring revelation light to every core of your being.
Until next time,
-Pat-
** Romans 2:5 But because of your hard and impenitent heart you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath when God's righteous judgment will be revealed.