For months now, a certain verse has repeatedly come across my path:
Psalm 73 v 26, “My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.”
The original Hebrew for the word that has been translated into ‘strength’ is ‘rock’.
So the verse reads like this, “…but God is the ROCK of my heart and my portion forever.’
I think that this is beautiful imagery, God is the ROCK of my heart…but what exactly does this mean?
In order to try to answer this question I need to explain a bit of my story. I grew up going to church every Sunday and having my mom pray with me and read me bible stories. God was a part of my life from the beginning. God wasn’t a foreign concept to me.
When I reached my teenage years, long story short, I made more of a commitment in my heart to pursue this God, I started to read my bible more and I went to youth group. By the time I reached the end of high school and when my university years began, I felt like there was less and less place for God in my life, more often then not it felt like He was getting in the way of me having fun and doing what I want to do.
So I turned my back on God and walked 180 degrees in the opposite direction.
Still, there were times when I acknowledged His existence. Emergency times, mostly. Like exam time. Or the time a man was walking towards me to mug me and I cried out ‘Jesus’ and he turned and sprinted away from me. Or when I broke up with a boyfriend and felt broken inside. Or when I was drunk and fearing for my life. During times like these, I called out to Him, I asked for help.
And so it went for many years, when life went well I was happy to not think about God and when life was difficult I cried out to Him to make things go back to being good and easy.
You see, God had become a plaster that I used every now and then to bandage a wounded situation. When I felt better that plaster could not get into the bin fast enough.
In the last two years I have realised that I cannot deal with God on my own terms. I have had to learn that in order to know God, God has to become the ROCK of my heart, and not my occasional plaster. I have had to stop running after every whim and fancy of my heart; I have had to make some sacrifices and give up some things in order to ‘create the space’ for God to begin to form solidly in my heart.
Is it easy? Not always.
Is it worth it? Absolutely with absolutely no doubt at all.
Is it a journey? Yes.
Why should I desire for God to be the Rock (strength) of my heart? Because then the strongest and most solid thing about you is the partnership you have with the creator of the universe and the creator of YOU. If God is the Rock of your heart you are enabled to walk out your true purpose and destiny on earth in your full potential, fearless and unhindered.
If you feel without purpose or uninspired or like something keeps holding you back from what you want to do in life, I want to suggest that you take a look at your heart situation.
Have we made up our own ideas about who God is?
Is our relationship with Him on our own terms or on His?
What if there is more to knowing Him then we have allowed ourselves to believe?
Petach Tikvah 