It's A Heart Thing
The word of the Lord says:
These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. They worship me in vain, their teachings are but rules taught by men ." —Matthew 15:8-9
True worship starts from a PURE heart and a RENEWED mind. We must understand and focus on what we are feeding our “Spiritual Man”. The type of MUSIC we listen to, TV shows or MOVIES we watch, PEOPLE we associate our selves with. All these are just some of the areas in which we can either fill our hearts POSITIVELY or NEGATIVELY.
The more we fill our hearts with things that are not of God we are moving further and further away from our Father and He is not accepting our Praise and Worship unto Him. Let us be prayerful on what we listen to, what we watch and who we associate ourselves with. The Holy Spirit will (depending on our relationship with God) be our “ALARM” as to what things are of God and things that are not.
— Minister Rodney L. Norton
PURE HEART -
“But the LORD said to Samuel, do not consider his appearance or his height, for I have rejected him. The LORD does not look at the things man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart." —1 Samuel 16:7.
Purity of heart is an examination of our lives at the heart level. Pure or purity can also be defined as "Free from that which harms, weakens or pollutes." The word of God is the cleansing agent that we need to make our hearts pure.
RENEWED Mind -
"For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds. Casting down imaginations and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ." 2 Corinthians 10:4,5
Wrong thoughts and imaginations become a stronghold over our minds. However God’s weapons of warfare, the power of the spirit, faith, name of Jesus, blood of Christ and the Word of God will break these strongholds enabling a believer to begin to bring back all of his thoughts in line with God’s thoughts. This type of thinking will then become a stronghold for the Christian to defeat the enemy
MUSIC - A very powerful area in which the enemy will use to fill our hearts, minds and souls in a negative way. We are to be careful of the types of songs, sounds and lyrics that we listen to. If it has degrading lyrics and profanity then we should know it is not of God. We should always ask ourselves am I pleasing God by listening to this song?
TV Shows/ Movies – A very powerful area in which the enemy will use to fill our hearts, minds and souls in a negative way. Society is overwhelmed with violence, nudity, gossip, sex, selfishness etc... We cannot allow the enemy to say to us “it’s just a movie or TV show.”
PEOPLE – The enemy can and will use people to keep us from fulfilling our God given purpose/destiny in life. Let us seek God in all areas, especially in who are our friends.
Minister Norton is a yielded vessel used by the Holy Spirit as an usher in worship. Positioning the Body of Christ in their right place in worship. Once in position you will have intimate dialogue with the Father. For the Father seeketh such to worship him. —John 4:23,24.