“At the end of the day
I wanna hear people say
That my heart looks like Your heart
My heart looks like Your heart.
When the world looks at me
I pray all they see
Is my heart looks like Your heart
My Heart looks like Your heart.”
Your Heart by Chris Tomlin
This song is from The Story CD and is actually sung from the perspective of David (you can listen to it here). I’ve been thinking a lot about him the past few days (no idea why). He is known as a “man after God’s own heart,” but what does that mean? 1 Samuel 13:14 says (speaking to King Saul), “But now your kingdom will not endure; the Lord has sought out a man after his own heart and appointed him leader of his people, because you have not kept the Lord’s command.” From this verse, it sounds as though it means someone who follows God’s leading, but when we think of David, that isn’t generally the first thing that comes to mind. We see his failures first and David messed up pretty badly from our perspective. He committed adultery and then killed a man to cover it up. That doesn’t sound like someone after God’s heart. But yet, God still called him that - why? Hadn’t David hit rock bottom there? Most would think he would be the last person God would say that of, after all, look at where he fell to. But God didn’t see that. God saw his almost immediate remorse when Nathan called him on it. He saw David’s sorrow, his mourning. Psalm 51 illustrates pretty eloquently where David was spiritually after that. He didn’t run from God, but rather chased after Him, repenting, asking forgiveness, then praising Him. I think that is what made him a “man after God’s own heart.” Because when he fell, when he failed, he didn’t run from God, but rather to Him.
God, please make us people after Your heart. Guide us, teach us Your ways. Help us to follow the path You have for us without straying. And when we do fail, I pray that we would learn from Your servant David and would run to You and not away. Amen.
Very nice :) Thank you for this!
ReplyDeleteThe phrase rendered "after his own heart" often is taken to mean that David's heart was patterned like God's heart, or that David's heart was seeking God's heart...though those things came to be, that's not what it means.
It means that according to the desires of God's heart, He chose David. Why? Because of what you said: David honored God for who He is, and recognized himself in that light. That's what God wants of all of us.
Too often we look at sin in a legal sense, rather than what it says personally about God. Relationship is the most important thing with God, but we make sin be about us. David didn't; he made it be about God, and that's what made his repentance true -- love for who God is. And that pleases God's heart :)