Week 48 – November 24-30, 2024: What’s In Your Heart?
This week’s daily readings:
November 24-30, 2024
This week’s devotional:
What’s In Your Heart?
by Erica Bethke
Scripture:
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.
— Luke 6:45 (NIV)
Reflection:
If you’ve ever grown food in your own backyard or had a neighbor who did, then you are probably familiar with the glut of late summer produce when plants are producing far more fruits and vegetables than one family could ever consume before it goes bad. As a gardener myself, if I couldn’t use it or give it away, my excess produce might have otherwise ended up in the compost pile until I discovered canning. If you do it right, canning food at home can be a safe way to preserve food for months, and without a fridge or freezer.
Canning requires that food be processed for a certain amount of time and at a certain temperature. But before anything else, what you put into the jars must be good quality produce. If done right, when it comes time to open the jar, you and those gathered around your table are rewarded with something nourishing and satisfying. If done incorrectly, when it comes time to open the jar, you, and all you share it with, will suffer the consequences of your own carelessness.
This reminds me of what Jesus shares with us in the parable of the tree and its fruit. He explains that what we’ve stored in our heart – whether good or bad – comes out: “for the mouth speaks what the heart is full of.” How then can we expect to respond to others in a way that honors God through love, peace, forgiveness, kindness, gentleness, goodness, faithfulness, or self-control if we’ve allowed things like bitterness, envy, or anger to creep in and reside in our heart? If we’ve not invited God in to examine our hearts and purify what’s there, how can we hope that anything truly good will come out? For a time, we might look good on the outside, but much like a batch of jam from moldy fruit, what’s really inside will eventually come out.
Prayer:
Heavenly Father, may we seek you in all that we do. We ask that you search our hearts and purify our thoughts and motives. Give us new desires and new hearts that want to honor you by blessing others in this Thanksgiving season and beyond! We ask in Jesus’ holy name. Amen