THE DECEITFUL HEART

Another one of those special nuggets of truth that we need to understand is found in Jeremiah 17.

Jeremiah 17:9-10 “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it? I the LORD search the heart, I try the reins, even to give every man according to his ways, and according to the fruit of his doings.”

The heart is a reference to man’s will and intellect, the place in our being from which decisions and choices are made.

It was interesting to note the Hebrew for the word deceitful—“fraudulent, crooked, polluted” and Webster adds, “serving to mislead or ensnare.” The Hebrew for “desperately wicked” makes reference to being sick and incurable. Webster defines wicked as “Evil in principle or practice; deviating from morality; contrary to the moral or divine law….”

In other words, because of the sin nature we inherited through Adam, man starts out with two strikes against him.

• The part of our being that guides us in making decisions and choices is naturally hardwired to mislead us and trap us through temptations.

• When following the leading of our heart, our natural proclivity is contrary to God’s law.

There is a verse from chapter 18 that is directly connected to this verse.

Jeremiah 18:12 “And they said, There is no hope: but we will walk after our own devices, and we will every one do the imagination of his evil heart.”

This verse declares that the people are knowingly acting with complete disregard for the power and authority of Almighty God. They are choosing to act according to the desires of their flesh, and they know their actions are evil. The Hebrew for the word “imagination” references obstinacy and lust from a root word that means to be hostile, an enemy. They are aware that they have positioned themselves as enemies of God.

Even more sobering is the answer to the closing question in verse 9 of chapter 17—God searches our hearts; He knows them inside out. The Psalmist was well aware of this truth.

Psalms 44:20–21 “If we have forgotten the name of our God, or stretched out our hands to a strange god; Shall not God search this out? for he knoweth the secrets of the heart.

The Hebrew for reins seems to be part and parcel of the heart; it makes reference to the “mind, the interior self.” When the LORD searches our heart, He is examining our thought processes, our motives. His judgments for or against each person are based on that examination.

Thankfully, each person of faith will emerge from that examination declared righteous in Christ Jesus. Heavenly rewards, however, will result from the LORD’s examination of our service before the LORD; and I believe that examination will be focused on the motivations of our heart.

2 Corinthians 5:17–18 & 21 “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new. And all things are of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ…. For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.”

1 Corinthians 3:13–15 “Every man’s work shall be made manifest: for the day shall
declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall try every man’s work of what sort it is. If any man’s work abide which he hath built thereupon, he shall receive a reward. If any man’s work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss: but he himself shall be saved; yet so as by fire.”