by Kevin Burton
If I say, “God knows the heart” you know just what I mean, right? Because you know the heart, somewhat, sometimes.
Much of the time people speaking to you in the name of a corporation will lie to you outright for the sake of profit. Or, they will emphasize the things they know you want to hear and sweep some other things under the table. You can see through that mostly.
Phoniness fits on people like a false plastic skin. Sometimes people can fool us, perhaps by means of an eloquent speech. But nobody fools God, ever.
God knows the heart perfectly, we don’t. The prayers of men reach an all-knowing God. And the difference between the prayers of a person in tune with God versus those from all others, is the difference between life and death.
This is the thought explored today by Alistair Begg, speaker on the Truth For Life radio ministry, as he looks at Ecclesiastes 9:4 (NKJV) “But for him who is joined to all the living there is hope, for a living dog is better than a dead lion.”
Spiritual life versus spiritual deadness. We can discern it sometimes. God always can.
“Life is a precious thing, and in even its humblest form it is superior to death. This is eminently true in spiritual matters,” Begg writes. “It is better to be the least in the kingdom of heaven than the greatest out of it. The lowest degree of grace is superior to the noblest development of unregenerate nature.”
“Where the Holy Spirit implants divine life in the soul, there is a precious deposit that none of the refinements of education can equal. The thief on the cross excels Caesar on his throne; Lazarus among the dogs is better than Cicero among the senators; and the most unlettered Christian is in the sight of God, superior to Plato.”
“Life is the badge of nobility in the realm of spiritual things, and men without it are only coarser or finer specimens of the same lifeless material, needing to be made alive, for they are dead in trespasses and sins,” Begg writes.
“A living, loving gospel sermon, however unlearned in matter and lacking in style, is better than the finest discourse devoid of unction and power.”
“A living dog keeps better watch than a dead lion,” Begg writes, “and is of more service to his master; and so the poorest spiritual preacher is infinitely to be preferred to the exquisite orator who has no wisdom but that of words, no energy but that of self.”
“The same holds true of our prayers and other religious exercises: If we are quickened in them by the Holy Spirit, they are acceptable to God through Jesus Christ, though we may think them to be worthless things, while our grand performances in which our hearts were absent, like dead lions, are mere carcasses in the sight of the living God.”
So fellow Christian, your sincere efforts to spread the gospel are noticed in Heaven, though they may seem small. The power is in God and the Word of God anyway, not in you.
“For the word of God is living and active, and sharper than any two-edged sword, even penetrating as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart (Heb. 4:12 NASB).
“We need living groans, living sighs, living despondencies rather than lifeless songs and dead calms. Anything is better than death,” Begg writes. “The snarlings of the dog of hell will at least keep us awake, but dead faith and dead profession—what greater curses can a man have? “
“Quicken us, quicken us, O Lord!”
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