01 Aug W1: Honor God in Your Heart
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REFERENCE BIBLE VERSES
1 Peter 3:15-16 | but in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect, having a good conscience, so that, when you are slandered, those who revile your good behavior in Christ may be put to shame. (ESV)
OBJECTIVE
To understand what it means to honor Christ the Lord as holy in our hearts.
CONTENT
- Holy in our Hearts
- In 1 Peter 3:15 to defend our faith, we are first called to honor Christ the Lord as holy in our hearts. Why is it so? Not only to defend the faith but to also have faith in itself requires us to truly honor and set Him apart in our hearts.
- To honor God means to sanctify and set Him apart in our lives, realizing He is not only on top of our priority list, but He is also reigning above it. Everything we do, everything we are, it is all for God.
- Only when we truly believe this can our hearts be a resting place for the Holy Spirit, enabling us to have the wisdom and discernment to defend our faith in Godly love and to be hopeful. Putting God in His rightful place, as our Holy Creator.
- Crucifying our Flesh Daily
- It is a frightful thought to think that the heart, the one place we put God in is described as deceitful above all things and desperately wicked (Jeremiah 17:9-10).
- Dedicating our hearts might sound simple, yet it is a lifelong battle to dedicate our hearts between ourselves and God. Realizing that the most natural thing our fallen nature does is to follow what the heart and the flesh wants. To follow our sinful desires.
- What Christ wants and what is comfortable for us more often than not collides with each other. Therefore, we are to crucify our flesh daily, checking our hearts in prayer and constant reflection. Letting the Holy Spirit work in us to help us discern if the things we desire honor Christ or ourselves and to enable us to do what God calls us to.
- Heart’s Representation
- We are encouraged to guard our hearts because everything we do flows from it (Proverbs 4:23). What we keep in our hearts will show through our actions. When we truly honor Christ the Lord as holy in our hearts, it will manifest into fruits in our lives.
- We are called to defend our faith, but when we don’t truly honor God we may do it with the wrong intentions and defend only for the sake of our ego. We defend because we God loves us and hence, we love others too, we want to glorify God not because we are holy, but because God is holy.
REFLECTION/DISCUSSION QUESTION
- Personally for yourself, what do you think it means to ‘honor Christ the Lord as holy in your heart’?
- What are the struggles you face that make it hard for you to prioritize God in your life? What helps you when it gets hard?
- Share a time where you had to deny what you want to follow what God wants.
REFERENCES