Apples of Gold
Radio Script for June 3, 2008
“Lord, Give Me an Undivided Heart”
Hello, I’m Doug Apple…with Apples of Gold.
It’s not that hard to be good on the surface.
After you’ve been in church for a while, you know what’s expected. It’s no big deal to keep a good Christian image if you want to.
In fact, you can be one of the better Christians – just do something sacrificial. I’m telling you, bro, do something sacrificial and you’ve hit the mother lode of looking like a good Christian.
It works, it really does . . . on people.
But you know what? God doesn’t buy it.
When God looks at me, He sees right through my image. He even sees right through my actions. He sees through my prayers and my many, many words. His eyes penetrate deep into my heart.
He sees it all. Everything.*
And now get this. As a true believer, I know that God’s Holy Spirit lives inside me. I don’t know where, but somewhere in there, somewhere, is the Holy Spirit.
There is a fount of holiness inside me, a source of holiness. And He is here to teach me and to guide me, to counsel me and convict me. He will lead me, if only I will follow.
So why don’t I follow, all the time?
Because I am divided. Part of me wants to go all the way with God, and part of me seems stuck – partly stubborn, kind of willful, don’t want to be too different from everyone else, want to walk in the flesh sometimes – and why? Partly because it’s what I’m used to. Partly because I have a sinful nature that wants to be enticed. Partly because we have an enemy that wants us dirty.
But I know that anything apart from God is just messed up. His way is the true way, and every other way is . . . really, it’s just a disaster. Not always an immediate disaster, but an eventual disaster. Houses built on sand are an eventual disaster.
I don’t want that.
When God’s eyes penetrate to my deepest parts, I want Him to see no shades of variation.
Imagine digging deep into the earth. There are different layers with different colors. Those are divisions.
But when God sees my heart, I want no layers, no divisions. At each stage that He digs, I want Him to find the same thing: holiness.
That’s not an easy thing to say, because I think, “Holiness, yes, but at what price?”
Ah, but the better question is, “Unholiness at what price?”
Any area of unholiness is an area of darkness instead of light. An area of friction instead of smooth. An area of stumbling instead of running strong.
So I must let the Holy Spirit have His way. I must have no divisions, no layers. I must be one layer through and through: holiness.
And you know what? I can’t do it. I don’t even want to, at least part of me doesn’t. But I want that part banished. That’s my sinful nature, my “old man,” and I want it starved and I want it gone.
Instead I want what Galatians 5:16 talks about. I want to “live by the Spirit” so that I “will not gratify the desires of the sinful nature.”
I want to walk in the Spirit and be led by the Spirit. I want the Holy Spirit to teach me to be holy in all circumstances. I want His holiness to well up within me and overflow through me. I want His nature to become my nature, and my sin nature to be drowned by a flood of holiness, by those streams of living water.**
I want what it says in Ezekiel 11:19, “I will give them an undivided heart and put a new spirit in them…”
My prayer is Psalm 86:11, “Teach me your way, O Lord, and I will walk in your truth; give me an undivided heart…”
Won’t this make us stand out?
Oh, yes. We will be like Philippians 2:15, …blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation in which we shine like stars in the universe.
Yes, we will stand out like beacons of light in the darkness. This is what God wants. And He gives us His Spirit to make it happen. And the Holy Spirit will do His great work in our life – once we decide that we simply must have an undivided heart.
Comments?
E-mail me: dougapple@wave94.com.
May God bless you today! With Apples of Gold…I’m Doug Apple.
* In Acts 1:24 they prayed, “Lord, You know everyone’s heart.”
Psalm 44:21 says, “…He knows the secrets of the heart…”
First Samuel 16:7 says, “Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.”
** In John 7:38-39 Jesus said, “Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him." By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive. Up to that time the Spirit had not been given, since Jesus had not yet been glorified.”
© 2008 The Arrow’s Tip
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(Proverbs 25:11 – “A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in settings of silver.”)
Why “The Arrow’s Tip”? Each morning, after diligently seeking the Lord, I write Apples of Gold. Then before I release it to the public I pray one final prayer, “Lord, send forth your arrows.” I envision Apples of Gold as arrows, tips dipped in the river of the water of life that flows from the throne of God (Rev. 22:1), sailing toward the hearts and minds of men and women around the world.
Doug Apple
General Manager - Wave 94
Christian Radio for Tallahassee
PO Box 4105
Tallahassee, FL 32315
(850) 926-8000
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