We want to continue to explain the statement that your heart makes everything you say and do fit a pattern consistent with your self-concept, your master program.
Jesus said “Why do you call me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ and do not do what I say?”, “As for everyone who comes to me and hears my words and puts them into practice, I will show you what they are like.”
In Luke 6:46, 47
Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like someone who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. But whoever looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues in it—not forgetting what they have heard, but doing it—they will be blessed in what they do.
James 1:22-25
The Bible says we should be doers of the Word and not hearers only or we are deceiving ourselves. It is our hearts that deceive us because of our self-concept master program. Our hearts will deny truth about ourselves. (Pride) It will twist the facts for self preservation and self image. It will make excuses to preserve itself rather than admit it is wrong. It will justify itself so it doesn’t have to admit it is wrong. Even if there is an awareness that it is wrong it will procrastinate being a doer of the word because that is going against the whole self concept program.
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The fourth comparison we want to make is that the subconscious mind is subjective. It does not reason independently it merely obeys the commands it receives from your conscious mind. Just as your conscious mind can be thought of as the gardener, planting seeds, your subconscious mind can be thought of as the garden, or fertile soil, in which the seeds germinate and grow.
I have taken these facts about the subconscious mind right off the internet. You can Google it yourselves. This is exactly what Jesus said about the heart in the parable of the sower sowing the seed. The seed was the Word of God and the heart was the soil it was sown into. Then Jesus talked about the heart problems that would stop the Kingdom from growing and being released. Also only the good hearts through perseverance could grow a crop 30, 60 or even 100 times what was sown. (Luke 8, Mark 4)
The heart is the storehouse, but the conscious mind is the guard to the storehouse. With our minds we rationalize, sift and sort information and decide what is truth and what we will accept or let into our storehouse to become part of our programs so to speak. Once someone has been taught and trained a certain way and they have accepted it as truth, then it has become part of their heart. Romans 8 says it is with the heart man believes. With our minds we give mental assent, but faith is of the heart. Once it is believed in the heart then all the self preservation programs kick in and it is hard to accept truth if what they believe is wrong.
So the heart just reacts, it doesn’t reason. If someone strikes me on the cheek my heart doesn’t calmly think “Gee, I should get mad”. No, pride and anger automatically respond from my heart. This is why we must understand our hearts or we will go around that mountain in the wilderness for 40 years and never see the Promised Land.
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The fifth point is that the conscious mind commands and your subconscious mind obeys.
This is where the heart and mind are closely related. Thoughts come from our hearts to our minds. If the thoughts are evil coming from our negative emotions and we allow ourselves to think on them then our negative emotions can become very strong. This happens because thinking on the negative thoughts allows the sin nature in our flesh to become stronger which causes the emotions to get stronger. Then our will power to resists gets weaker and we give into the sin principle in our flesh.
This is why we must take every thought captive to the obedience of Christ. 2 Corinthians 10:5 says, “We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.” If we do not take the thought captive it will take us captive.
Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.
Romans 12:2
If we do not continually renew our minds by putting the Word of God into our hearts through meditation then the negative thoughts from our hearts influenced by our emotions and the sin principle in our flesh will control us. But if we are strong in the Word then we can take the negative thoughts captive and we can order our hearts to live by our born again spirit and release eternal life within us and through us. In this way we gradually purify our hearts.
Our minds are not completely renewed until we do what the Word says and we think that way all the time.
The scriptures for this truth are in Romans 8:5-17. James 1:19-27 also fits in with this. Sometimes we can think we are spiritual because of the revelation knowledge we have received. But if we don’t act on it then we are self deceived. The pride in our heart gets stronger because knowledge puffs up. So our hearts deceive us and tell us we are spiritual and we are living by the sin principle in our flesh. That is what deception is. You are living wrong, but you think you are living right.
The heart is deceitfully wicked above all things!
1 Peter 1:13-25 also talks about the mind being involved with purity of heart.
The battles are in the mind, but the war is won in the heart. If we want to win the battles and the war our minds must always be alert. Our minds should always control our hearts by the Word and the Spirit. But if we are not vigilant our hearts can control our minds also.
Our spirits should be the king, our soul or heart should be the servant and our bodies should be the slave.
