Have you ever been surprised by what comes out the mouth of some believers that you could not believe your ears? I have. Or have you heard something like, "I didn't mean to say that." We all have. But I really think that what some really meant was that they did not expected to be caught saying what they were saying. Also, I am quite sure that many of us have witnessed at one time or another someone vowing to fulfill a promise that we well knew they were unable to keep. Why is that?

The Word of God declares in Matthew 12:34, "..out the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh.". It is unavoidable that what you fill your heart with will eventually come out, especially when we are under pressure. Fill a balloon with water or air, pinch it, and you do not have to wonder what is it that is going to come out. That's right, it does not require any science to figure it out.

In the book of Psalms 57 and verse 7 David wrote, "My heart is fixed, O God, my heart is fixed: I will sing and give praise." He wrote this psalm after he fled from Saul in the cave. The prophet Samuel anointed David as the future king. Saul persecuted him without justification and he had all the reasons in the world to release himself of the pressures that life so unfairly brought him. But he chose to take refuge under the wings of his God, the One that always performed all things for him and trusted in Him declaring that his heart was fastened on Him, prepared, ready, meet, fitted, established, faithful, framed, perfect, in one word fashioned after God's own heart to deal with all the affairs of life, expected or unexpected.

In the book of Proverbs 30:9, the writer, inspired by the Holy Spirit, cries out, "..feed me with food convenient for me." The word convenient literally means " of my allowance." When the disciples asked Jesus to teach them how to pray in the gospel of Luke 11, as part of the model prayer that he gave them, in verse 3 He said, "Give us day by day our daily bread." The world has a motto that states that you are what you eat and the scientific community backs it up to a certain extent. If that is true for the natural body, how much more it is for the new creation that we are in Christ. Very often we do not know what is best for us but God does. We must ask Him every day to give out of the inexhaustible riches of His Word the sustenance for our daily walk.

A volatile heart is unstable and unpredictable. The Spirit of God compels us to secure, to fasten our hearts in Him. This task is impossible apart from His Word. In Psalms 119 verse 11 the psalmist indicates, " Thy word have I hid in mine heart, that I might not sin against thee." One of the meanings of the word hid is to hoard. I like this connotation because it makes me think of a big warehouse where you can store lots of things. It speaks of someone that is passionate about the Word and that walks and wants everything it has to offer to make sure that his or her walk is what pleases Him. In Colossians 3:16 we are challenge to "Let the word of Christ dwell in you (us) richly in all wisdomÉ" Richly means in abundance, copiously. We must allow the Word to inhabit us with profusion, that is plenty of it. What a great promise the Lord has given us if we do this: John 15:7, "If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you."

In Proverbs 23:11 the Bible tells us, " As he thinketh in his heart, so is he: Eat and drink, saith he to thee: but his heart is not with thee." and in the book of Psalms 19:14 David prayed, "Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart, be acceptable in thy sight, O Lord, my strength, and my redeemer." It is interesting to notice how many passages of scripture yoke the heart with the mouth, as a balance with a fulcrum, the mouth and the mind are kept in balance by a well-nurtured heart. If what we put in our hearts is not right, our thinking is not going to be right, and neither will be our confession. If what we think and speak is not of faith you can be sure that it is not pleasant to God. It does not give Him any pleasure or delight. It does not make Him happy. Feeding on the wrong things will produce in us the wrong kind of thinking and the wrong kind of confession that will lead us away from God. In Isaiah 55, read it, the Lord tells us what He thinks about this matter. If we want to please God then we must think what He thinks and walk in His ways and we cannot do this apart from trusting His word. He is His Word. Trust, faith can only be built up in our hearts through His Word- Romans 10:17.

The writer of Proverbs, in chapter 4 and verse 11, admonishes us, "Keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life." The literal meaning of the word issues is geographical boundaries. In the book of I John we are called to "walk in the light, as He is in the light." The only way to walk within the spiritual boundaries that we are called to walk, lies within the LIFE we have received from Him and the LIGHT that He is able to put in us. Then, whatever comes our way, inevitably will have to face the vibrant, faith-full, action -packed LIFE that we have received from Him. That LIFE will always answer for us- Prov. 16:1-3; Prov. 16:23.

Victor