Terry and I were at a Garland restaurant not long ago where our server, an older man with a big smile and over-friendly manner, couldn’t stop talking and interrupting us. After the 4th or 5th interruption I felt pure wrath rising in me. I wanted to hurt the man!

So I did. I complained to his boss. Quietly but with venom, I vented my rage and made scornful remarks about the poor server. In my anger, I wanted to do him harm. (Matt 5:21-24)

It took the Holy Spirit a few days to get my attention and drive me to my knees. I’d been arrogant and entitled (the exact opposite to “poor in spirit”). I had regarded as worthless a unique person God saw as a priceless treasure worth dying for. I had indulged in a “fit of rage” that is listed, right along with sexual immorality, witchcraft, drunkenness and the like, as an act of the flesh in Galatians 5. In fact, I had grieved the Holy Spirit of God.

I went back to the restaurant, told the manager I’d been very wrong, asked to be seated with that server, and tipped him royally. It was as close as I could get to washing his feet.

Whenever I startle and disgust myself by things I say or do (arrogance, attempts to impress, anger, selfishness, the list goes on), it takes me back to Luke 6:45: “A good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and an evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart. For the mouth speaks what the heart is full of.”

The big problem isn’t what I say or do; my sins are forgiven! It’s my heart, which is “deceitful above all things and beyond cure”. (Jer 17:8) A New Year’s resolution or more self-discipline rules will never fix my heart. So what will?

Recently I’ve been looking at David, the oft-sinning shepherd king who was nonetheless “a man after God’s own heart”. Why on earth did God favor a murderer and adulterer? After reading and re-reading the Psalms and stories of David, I finally saw it: David, despite all his failings, loved God passionately. He was never lukewarm in obedience (or in sin). He had an intimate relationship with the living God, not a legal arrangement or a defined lifestyle. His heart was fully engaged with God… and God loved that.

Jesus confirmed that by saying that the first and greatest commandment is to love God with all your heart, soul, and mind. (Matt 22). Loving Him. Everything else–obedience, purity, worship–naturally springs from a heart that loves God. Loving God pleases Him and transforms you into His image.

Let that be my prayer: to love God more passionately each day of my life, and to mirror His love to others.

© 2014 Deborah Morris

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