I’ve chosen the verse of Scripture that very obviously speaks to us on the special day in the year and it’s in the passage that’s just been read to us Proverbs chapter 23 and the last verse read verse 26. My son give me your heart and Let your eyes observe my ways As I’ve reflected on these words and also the verses that were read that come before them I have found them to be so rich that I want us to stay here in the same passage of Scripture for two weeks this week and Also next Sunday. So there’s a changed title today. We’re going to look at how the heart goes wrong and Next week we’re going to look at how the heart is set Right both from these versus that are before us today in Proverbs and chapter 23 Now what we have in this verse, that’s before us today then is obviously a father Speaking to his son my son give me your heart It could of course equally well be a father speaking to his daughter Or it could be a mother speaking to a daughter or a mother speaking to a son So we can hear these words in all of these ways in their different applications to each of us but in this case That is before us today in Proverbs chapter 23 it is a father who is speaking to his son and he says, my son give me your heart and I want over these two weeks then for us to hear these words first in the voice of a father speaking to his son or to his daughter and Then I want us to hear these words in the voice of God our Heavenly Father speaking to us Now let’s begin here with the question. Who then is the father? Most of the Proverbs as many of you know are credited to Solomon the son of King David who was given a very special gift of wisdom from the Lord there are a few Proverbs towards the end of the book that are by other authors a king Lemuel and a man by the name of Agora, but most of the Proverbs were either written by or collected by King Solomon And how appropriate that he should be the one to do this because he was given particular Wisdom and this book of Proverbs is a collection of wisdom for our lives So Solomon was the father who is the son now? Now Solomon of course was infamous for having had many wives and So we must assume that over the course of his life. He had many sons and daughters as well But here’s a kind of Bible trivia question How many children of Solomon are named in the Bible? The sons of David many sons of David are mentioned and in the genealogies You know how often multiple offspring are mentioned, but in the case of Solomon Only one son is mentioned no daughter is mentioned only one offspring and His name was Rehab ohm. You can read about him in first Kings chapter 11 through chapter 14 he was the successor to Solomon of course and reigned for 17 years after his father’s death and So I think it is very reasonable therefore for us to hear these verses that are before us today first as the passionate plea of King Solomon To his own son Rehoboam the only one to be named in the Bible Rehoboam was 41 years old when he became King when his father died, so We are to picture then that the father was speaking to the Sun at an earlier stage maybe in his teenage years maybe in his 20s or maybe in his 30s And he sits down with his son and bringing collected wisdom to bear that we have preserved for us by the Holy Spirit and the verses that have been read He says proverbs 23 in verse 26 my son. Give me your heart So these are the words of a wise father that’s the first thing to know a good father who loves his son These are not the words of an emotionally needy dad who’s sort of saying oh love me love me Please I need you to love me. It isn’t nothing like that at all these are the words of a good father and And he is seeking the good of his son. And what he says is My son give me your heart That’s the focus of his concern Now I want to focus on three things today, we’ll spend most of our time on the first two Let’s begin here why the heart matters. Why does he say give me your heart? Why is the heart so important in the Bible as indeed it is? Well, the heart pretty simply is the command and control center of your life Your heart is the deepest thing about you where your heart is is always the central question where your heart is today will be a predictor of where your life will be tomorrow Let me give you just very briefly six scriptures that point in different ways to the importance of the heart First the Bible makes clear that your heart directs your life Proverbs 4 and verse 23 keep your heart with all vigilance for from it flow the springs of life Notice keep your heart you have brother sister a responsibility for your own heart God says to you you’ve got to guard your heart You’ve got to keep your heart if your heart is cold. There’s a reason why your heart is cold If your heart is all over the place today There’s a reason why it’s become distracted and why it’s all over the place Why is your heart like that and someone else’s is in a different place? You have a responsibility for your own heart And here’s why it matters because from your heart flow the springs of your life the whole trajectory of your life Where you will be tomorrow springs from where your heart is today Second the heart is a mystery Jeremiah chapter 17 in verse 9 The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately sick We’ll come back to that in a moment. But notice the last part of the verse who can understand it Who can understand it? Can you explain your own heart Can you explain why you are as you are Why you feel what you feel why you’re drawn to what you are drawn to Well someone may say well pastor if you if you knew what had happened to me in my life That would explain why I am but here’s the thing other people have experienced something very similar to what you have experienced in your life and They may be in a very different place So how are you going to explain that The heart is a mystery That’s why Paul speaks in Romans in chapter seven about his own heart he says I don’t understand it What I want to do I end up not doing and what I don’t want to do I end up going there Why is that? It’s a mystery to me I seem to be a mass of contradictions Third the heart is sinful We already saw that from Jeremiah, but look at it in the words of Jesus in Matthew chapter 15 in verse 19 He says this from out of the heart Come evil thoughts and murder and adultery and sexual immorality and theft and false witness and slander Now of course We like to think that bad things are all out there and come to us from outside But the Bible won’t let us get away with that No, the Lord Jesus says very clearly that It comes from inside it’s out of the heart That these sins and these evils flow Now of course as parents we rightly feel a responsibility to do whatever we can To protect our children from the many many evils that are indeed in the world out there But of course when we take to heart what we learn in the Bible We understand that the greatest danger not only to our children But indeed to all of us is not in fact the evil that is out there. But the evil there is in here In our own hearts Now this actually is very important for parents to grasp ticularly parents who grieve over a Rebel son or a rebel daughter let me quote to you from John White a Christian Psychologist and counselor and speaker who wrote a very helpful book called parents in pain and he talks in that book about the theories of raising children that are widespread in our culture that simply assume that children are the product of their upbringing period and he says this that these theories assume that children come into the world and I quote as clean slates For their parents to write on if the parents write properly says John white describing these theories if the parents write Properly what they ought to right that is if they rear their children properly they will then produce well adjusted outgoing morally upright and self-reliant children and Therefore any defects in the final product must reflect parental Parental mismanagement now, that’s his description of widespread child-raising theory in our world that we are simply the product of our Environment and so forth and so on and therefore that anything that is produced That is amiss in a child is to be blamed at the mismanagement of the parents Now here’s what John White is saying He’s making this point Child rearing theories may say That children come into the world as a clean slate for parents to write on But the Bible if we understand it is saying to us something very different the Bible is saying children do not come into the world as a clean slate for parents to write on children come into the world with sin written on their hearts already the slate is already graffitied and that is how it is been done through the generations since Adam and Eve were rejected from the Garden of Eden sin is already Scrawled on the slate the heart is sinful And that is something very fundamental. We need to understand about that’s why it’s a mystery to us That’s why we don’t even understand ourselves 4 God looks at the heart for Samuel chapter 16 in verse 7 the Lord sees not as man sees because man looks on the outward appearance, but God the Lord looks on the heart is what this means That God looks into your life more deeply Then anyone else ever can or ever will God looks into your life more deeply Other people just see you on the outside. They hear your words and they see your expressions They look on the outward appearance, but God alone is able to look on the heart He sees into you and what is going on inside you right now more deeply than any other person ever can or ever will And You may not understand Your own heart, why do you love what you love? Why do you think and feel as you do but you can be sure of this that? While you may not understand your own heart God surely and certainly does Fifth the heart is very important for this reason that the heart actually often contradicts the mouth Jesus says in Matthew 15 this people honors me with their lips But their heart is far from me Now of course it is true that what we say is often the overflow off our heart That’s why what we say is often very revealing about us Our Lord Jesus makes this clear doesn’t he says out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks? That’s Luke 6 in verse 45 But here Jesus is making clear, that that is not always the case and it is possible For the heart to become disconnected from the mouth In other words it is possible to be in church and to say the right things and so forth but actually for your heart to be in another place and Very far from God indeed Which is why Jesus says why do you call me Lord Lord and you don’t do what I command you Remember Jesus told a story about two sons not the prodigal son. This is another story. That was making this point Certain man had two sons and he said to both of these sons go work in my vineyard And the first one said yes, I will But he didn’t go and the second one said no, I’m not gonna do that, but then he changed his mind and he did go Now think about this in both cases The heart was in a different place from the mouth in both cases Sixth the roots of unbelief actually lie not in the head but in the heart Psalm 14 in verse 1 where God says what only God can say The fool says in his heart There is no God Now the person who does not believe may also say in their head there is no God But you see the point that is being made here unbelief has a deeper route Than in the intellect The fool says in his heart There is no God Now it is a very simple fact is it not that there are people who are of great intellect Who are Christians and there are people of great intellect who are not Christians Because faith and unbelief both have a deeper root Than the intellect it does not depend upon knowledge or upon intelligence Here we’re being told in fact that unbelief is visceral At its root rather than intellectual That it arises at its root from a hidden resistance towards God That lies deep in the human heart. That the person who does not believe may not even recognize or fully understand Themselves. It’s in the heart that comes out of this there is no God Why is it that two people Can go through exactly the same experience And One comes out praising God and the other comes out blaming God Two people experience a terrible loss And one comes out with a testimony to God’s help in the trouble and Another comes out with another reason not to believe It Was the same experience Why the difference Or the differences he lies in the heart that’s taking a person in a different direction Why the heart matters once you ponder The command and control center of your own life, and the mystery that it is You will see why the Bible again and again and again comes back to speak about your heart And why God says to you today my son my daughter. Give me your heart Now let’s turn to a second thing because I want us to see in these verses here where the heart Goes wrong When Solomon says to rehoboam my son. Give me your heart It seems very clear just from that statement that this is a father Who has some anxiety Over where his son’s heart is Now remember as we think about this that Solomon was famed for his wisdom and so here is a wise father who is discerning his son’s heart Now remember especially in the early years when Solomon would have collected and spoken these words of wisdom That Solomon followed the best of his father David’s example But remember also that Solomon say this is a real-life stories Solomon had a brother whose path went in a very different direction the brother’s name was Absalom and Absalom raised a rebellion against his father David and That rebellion led his life on a sorry path that had a very miserable end indeed And so here’s Solomon who at this point in his life is Following in the path of the best example of his own father David And he’s looking at his son and saying I wonder where your heart is Will My son be like my rebel brother That’s the question here And Solomon is anxious There are certain things it seems from these verses that he is seeing in the heart of his son And so like a wise father he addresses them Let me point out three here Suggest to you three places where the heart most often goes wrong, I suspect these were the things Because Solomon says them here that he was seeing Emerging in the heart of his own son The first is that the heart goes wrong with regards to who you admire for 17 Let’s not your heart and the sinners But continue in the fear of the Lord all the day Now we’ve every reason to believe that Rehoboam in his early years Conformed to the faith of his grandfather David and of his father Solomon The faith that had been passed on the faith with which he was raised But it seems from this that when Rehoboam looked at Godless people people who live without God in their lives It seems he found their life their model their example to be attractive That’s the significance surely of let not your heart envy the wicked And so here’s Solomon’s fear He has a son who professes faith He professes to believe the faith that was handed down from his grandfather David and now his father Solomon But there seems to be in this son a secret longing an Attraction of his heart a drawing of his heart to move in a different direction Solomon says verse 24 he who fathers a wise son will be glad in him But at this point you see Solomon’s not sure if he’s got a wise son or not He fears that his son’s heart may be somewhere else He admires the wrong people he envies sinners He looks up to the example of people who live without God. They’re the role models for him And they’re the ones he wants to be like He admiresIDON’T Now, I want to speak from the heart to every son and daughter of whatever age who has been raised in a Christian home, you have Christian parents or Christian grandparents And here’s the burden of my heart today I Can think of no greater tragedy than that while people Who had no knowledge of the truth in their early years and were exposed to all kinds of evils While so many of them are Pressing their way into finding peace and joy in Jesus Christ you who have had more blessings than you may ever realize Some of you seem ready to throw it all up That’s a tragedy That others who had none of the blessings you have enjoyed should end up pressing into the knowledge of Christ and all the good that comes from that forever and forever and that you who had all the opportunity should sit with your heart envying the wicked And end up throwing it all away And you know what the first sign of being ready to throw it all away is You start envying sinners You start looking at people who live without God, and you say that’s what I want to be like. I want to be like her I want to be like him I see how they live and that’s how I want to live And when I get the chance, that’s what I’m going to do And here you are in church, and that’s where some of you are right now And here you are in church, and that’s where some of you are right now Second place the heart goes wrong is not simply in who you admire, but it’s in how you decide Look at verse 18. Here’s something else that surely Solomon discerned in his son. He says to him Surely there is a future and Your hope will not be cut off Now, I think that this shows to us that Solomon saw in his son a growing tendency to live only in the present and to lose sight of the future In other words Solomon is seeing that his son is going more and more with what he thinks and feels at any given point in time and So what Solomon says to him in this verses is look son surely there is a future in other words Don’t make your decisions in life on the basis of short-term comfort Son, there’s a future you make your decisions in life on the basis of long-term outcomes Surely there is a future Now friends this is obviously of huge importance for us today because our culture is Bombarding us with a philosophy that says live in the moment It seems to me to be a new phrase but it’s around us everywhere If it means that we are to be fully present and fully Engaged in whatever we are doing at any given time rather than have our mind Distracted off and a dozen other places trying to do multiple things at the same time, then that would be a very good thing live in the moment, but Have noticed often enough to want to comment on this today. I Have noticed the phrase Live in the moment being used too often By people who are very clearly moving away from Christian faith I’m trying to live in the moment pastor and If I understand that correctly, I think what is being said here is this I’m going with what I feel and Sometimes I feel I want to know God and sometimes I don’t and I live in the moment Now in a world that is constantly saying to you live in the moment I Want you to hear the word of our Father in Heaven who says to you surely there is a future I Want you to hear that Always remember this friend Your life the life that God gives to you comes in two very unequal parts you have a very very short life in time and you have a very very long life in Eternity, that’s the life that God has given to you How short is? Your life in this world Listen to her God describes it. He uses pictures so that we’ll get it all flesh is grass The grass withers when the breath of the Lord blows on It how long? Does grass live? About a week Then you cut it And it’s blown and it is gone If you’re not cut your grass for three weeks, hey there you are, you know time to do it, right? About a week That’s the image That God our Father gives to us if you want to think rightly about your life You have to think of the proportion of what you have in this world in relation to what you have in eternity And let me put it in a picture for you. It’s like grass That’s your whole life. If you live to a hundred years and more, that’s what your life in this world is like in relation to eternity You haven’t got much time And then in case we didn’t get the point in the New Testament god uses another analogy as the analogy of Mist what is your life James? Chapter 4 in verse 14. You are a mist it appears for a little time and then vanishes like a Mist and a hays in the morning and it’s all blown away by noon That’s your entire life in this world We’re all here today and gone tomorrow and then we will all stand before the judgment seat of Christ and the person in the congregation who’s lived the longest life and The person in the congregation has lived the shortest life in Eternity will seem like one was two clicks and the other was one but the difference between them will be very very small in the light of Eternity Now since Solomon to son you’re not thinking rightly you’re jude you’re living in the moment You’re going all the time with what you feel now Sun don’t make your decisions On the basis of what makes you feel good? Now make your decisions on what will make you feel good then Because your entire life in this world is this long your entire life and eternity is Surely there’s a future And son If you walk the path of wisdom, your hope will not be cut off You See here’s one of the pressures especially on younger people today We hear all the time that’s phrase don’t we we want to be on the right side of history Here’s our answer to that friends. We need to be on the right side of eternity We need to be on the right side of eternity Where the heart goes wrong Who you Admire how you choose and thirdly where you invest Look at verse 23 Where Solomon says to his son this by truth And do not sell it By wisdom instruction and understanding by truth Invest Truth I Wonder since Solomon says that as he speaks with this candor to his son, I Wonder if that indicates that Solomon’s son was losing interest in the truth They would have had the five books of Moses the pentateuch and They would have read from that part of the scripture that they had I wonder if when the Old-testament books of Moses were brought out when they were read I wonder if Solomon saw his son’s eyes rolling in the corner of the room I Wonder if when they went to worship in Solomon’s Great Temple whether Solomon noticed that his son looked as if he had Absolutely, not the faintest bit of interest in what was going on in all of the world And he thinks to himself my son’s hearts in another place And he’s anxious The son once was learning the truth and showed some interest in truth But now there seems to be no interest in it at all, and he says this by the truth Notice that there is such a thing as the truth and that It is worth whatever it costs you to get it Solomon doesn’t tell his son what it will cost him to stand for the truth He he doesn’t know there isn’t one of us here who knows what it will cost our children to stand for the truth or our grandchildren to stand for the truth Not a single one of us None of us knows it might cost friends for you to Embrace by the truth that might cost Opportunities in your life. It might cost your life But you see what Solomon is saying to his son here he’s saying by the truth at any price Now those of you who are investors know you wouldn’t do that with anything else With any other investment, you’d look at the price and then you’d look at the options But What Solomon says to his son is look son when it comes to the truth. It’s in a whole different category because the price is never too high for the truth because the truth has a Value that is supreme because it has a value that is eternal And your life in this world is very short and Your life in eternity is very very long indeed. So by the truth, whatever it costs you You bind the truth like a belt around your waist and do not sell it Judas sold the truth But he’s not an example for you No, says this wise father. The truth is worth more than anything you could ever ever gain by giving it up Whatever you think you will gain in life by giving up the truth. The truth is worth more than Anything you will ever gain by giving up The truth so by the truth and do not sell it So Here are three Places there for a wise father is telling his son that the heart most often goes wrong He’s concerned about his son Because it seems that he sees some evidence of these things in his son’s heart and in his life, son It’s about who you admire and it’s about how you decide and it’s about where you invest Solomon seemed who son I don’t know right now where your heart is but I’m seeing to you my son. Give me your heart Well, very obviously this raises the question for all of us men women fathers sons mothers daughters Where is your heart today? When Jesus was asked what is the very first commandment what is the very first thing that God requires of every one of us He Said love the Lord your God with all your heart Where do you stand in relation to that first calling of God upon your life today to love? the Lord with all your heart and you better guard your heart because from it flow the springs of your life, I I Pondered do we go to the outcome of this story today, or do we hold it for next week? big big preachers decision So I did the only wise thing to do I asked my wife and She said you better tell them the end of the story today and Here’s why I hesitated because The outcome of the story isn’t good But I’ve taken her advice and I Think it’s right to follow the story to its conclusion because today we’re looking at the heart gone wrong next week We’re gonna look at the heart getting right If you want the conclusion of the story you’ll find it in second Chronicles chapter 12 and verses 13 and 14 and the words that are used there are very very striking indeed so King Rehoboam grew strong in Jerusalem and he reigned so this is the Sun Solomon has now died. He’s Rehoboam is 41 years old when he began to reign and he reigned for 17 years in Jerusalem and then notice what the scripture says and He did evil Why did he do evil notice what it says for or he did not set his heart to seek the Lord He did not listen to his father’s wisdom You know think about this and I see this for the father and for the mother who wrestles with a Rebel son nor a daughter and so often you go over and over what might we have done different and all of that The wisest father who ever lived had a rebel son In fact, if you have a rebel son or a rebel daughter or if you are anxious about a grandchild You will want to have made a very clear note of Isaiah chapter 1 in verse 2 where God says this I Raised children and They rebelled against me. Can you take that in God says I Raised children. He’s referring to Israel, of course And they rebelled against me Well, you cannot have a better or a wiser father than God Rehoboam I think is one of the saddest characters in all of the Bible because he was so privileged and Gave it all away Think of this the scripture is very precise in its language and it tells us about David who was Rehoboam’s grandfather That his heart was wholly true to the Lord We then read later in the story that Rehoboam had a grandson and And The same words precisely the same words are used of him His name was Asa and it is said of Asa that his heart was Wholly true to the Lord. So here’s Rehoboam standing in the middle He’s got a grandfather wholly true to the Lord He’s got a grandson wholly true to the Lord and he’s in the middle and he’s given it all away Because he did not set his heart To seek the Lord Are we gonna look throughout the message next week at what it means to Get the heart right, but let me just leave you with this in just two minutes. I Think there are two prayers that Rehoboam’s granddad Prayed that would have greatly helped him and would be of great help to any who find ourselves with a is astray One of the reasons that David had a heart that was wholly true to the Lord was that he learned to pray like this He asked God to search his heart search me Oh God and know my heart try me and know my thoughts and See if there is any grievous way in me and lead me in the way everlasting. Oh make that your prayer today It’s a great, Lord show me where my heart is I understand my own heart But you do you’re able to look into it as no one else ever can and no one else ever will now Will you reveal to me what you see in my heart today? Show me what I’m grieving you right now Show me where I’m admiring the wrong people show me what I’m making the wrong decisions and show me where I’m investing myself in the wrong ways And then as you ask God to search your heart ask God to change your heart Oh Rehoboam’s grandfather knew what it was to pray like this create in me a clean heart Oh God and renew a right spirit within me Friends the message today the message of the gospel is not Get your heart right so that you can come to God The message of the gospel is come to God in order that you may get your heart, right? You do not come to Jesus Christ because you have a right heart You come to Jesus Christ because you need a right heart and you know today that you don’t have it So you come to the Lord Jesus Christ in whom this great promise is ours I will give you a new heart and I will put a new Spirit within you and you say Oh God. Give me a clean heart through Jesus Christ change me and Then God will indeed do that and he will say son daughter give me your heart father May there be real heart change In all of us according to your great purpose today and these things we ask in Jesus’ name Amen