Monday, December 26, 2011
So this week is the last week of 2011. It went by pretty quickly didn’t it? For many of us this year was a year of incredible growth. We grew in our relationships with God and with each other. Maybe you read that and you wouldn’t include yourself in that statement because you haven’t grown spiritually in a long time. That’s okay because of what we are going to talk about over the next couple of weeks.
Here’s the point- You are either moving forward and moving backward spiritually. There is no neutral. The thing that God is most interested in having that you control is your heart. If we are going to grow spiritually we have to deal with our hearts.
Over the next 2 weeks we are going to start out the new year focusing on making sure our hearts are right with God. Here are my two requests for you before we dive into God’s Word.
- Pray that God will begin to do a work in your heart today. Ask God if your heart is right with Him.
- Tweet, Facebook, or email this to someone to invite them to end/start this year out right!
In the comments below discuss this question. What does the Bible say about our hearts?
Study the Scriptures with Ben Jennings 
Matthew 22:37 says: Jesus said unto him,Thou shalt love thy Lord with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. The heart reveals what we really feel. It doesn’t matter to God what we do on the outside if our hearts are not purely motivated. We may be able to fool people around us, but we can never hide our true motives from God because He sees our hearts and is only interested in what our hearts say about the “real us”.
I will be praying for H2o ministries for 2012 and each and every one of you in our awesome youth group. I am praying that the Lord will help me to keep my heart pure and help me to keep focused on what is really important—leading others to Christ. I want to see all of us continue to grow and be on fire for the Lord in 2012. I am committed to increasing my prayer time and my devotional time. Please help me stay accountable. It is a daily battle fighting our true nature, but if we just stay in communication with the Lord, and lean on Him to give us strength and guidance He will never fail us.
Great post Laura! So cool!
2011 has definitely been a crazy year, it’s unbelievable thinking about how much has happened in only 365 days! (including what will happen this week) I agree with Ben that we all have grown SO much this past year, individually and together as a youth group! A verse that I like it Psalm 119:11 “Thy word have I hid in mine heart, that I might not sin against thee.” We’ve talked about memorizing scripture before, and I think it’s a really good idea! Especially a great thing to start out the new year with! 🙂
That picture of a heart made me think, there’s kind of two different hearts that we have.. Our physically heart, which we need to live. And our spiritual heart, which we need Jesus in (First of all!) to live eternally! Most of us have already accepted Jesus and what He did on the cross for us. But sometimes our spiritual growth stops there. I know at the beginning of 2011 I was definitely not moving forward spiritually, so that means I was moving backward. NOT GOOD! I actually feel like now I’m growing and learning more and more about God and what He wants for my life!
I’m kinda sad to see 2011 end, but I’m even more excited to start 2012! It’s going to be a great year and I hope everyone can continue to grow spiritually and that God will work in all of our hearts 🙂
“And he did evil, because he prepared not his heart to seek the Lord. 2 Chronicles 12:14”
I know from experience, that no matter how much you want to do what God wants, it’s almost impossible to do if your heart isn’t in the right place. So many times have I made mistakes because I thought I was doing right, yet in fact my heart was way off from where it should’ve been.. This verse is saying that we need to have our hearts in the right place with God. I find myself far of sometimes, and I hate it. God needs to be number one always, not just when it’s convenient. Laura made a great point when she was talking about how she needs to spend more time in prayer and her devotions. I’m making a commitment to God and myself that I’m going to work on that as well. Sometimes I find myself only praying when reality hits, and that’s not right. I need to be praying all the time, and in constant communication with God. 2011 was both a rough and an amazing year for me. I’ve personally grown a lot, and I don’t want it to end with the year, I want to make 2012 a bang, and I’m going to start it off right!
i agree also that we ALL have grown this past year.when i joined this group in may (its been that long!) i believe i have deff grown so much spiritually! 2011 has been tough but great to me.can’t wait to start a new year and to deff start it right.im gonna have to go with the verse alexis mentioned Psalm 119:11 “thy word have i hid in my heart,that i might not sin against thee.” hiding his word in your heart is basically memorizing scripture which is very important to do because you may need a verse or quote from the bible in a situation.the pic of the heart just amazes me.#1 that God gave us a heart with so many different parts that keep our body going.#2 (like alexis said) we have basically two hearts spiritual and physical. we deff need our physical heart to live,but our spiritual we need to have jesus in.i know alot us have accepted him this year or the past year(s) and i want to have more and more people accept him this coming year! im kinda like alexis because at the beginning of this year,i kinda wasn’t like i am now.i wasn’t moving forward spiritually.now i”ve grown so much spiritually.actually,i’ve been praying since wednesday about the plans and future God has for me like pastor ben encouraged us to do.i think God is really gonna work in my life in that area and everywhere else.well,i hope you guys had a very merry christmas and have a happy new year!!!! 🙂 <3333333333333