“The purposes of a person’s heart are deep waters, but one who has insight draws them out” (20:5). Here is a profound word of truth. How deep and hidden are the motives of the heart! Our motivations, in our fallen state, are inevitably driven by a complex tangle of beliefs, desires, fears and hopes. Inasmuch as we are all still imperfect, none of us have completely pure motives. The key to living the Christian life is knowing what your motives are so that you can, with God’s help, gain some control over them. God, by his Holy Spirit, empowers us inwardly with his desires. And Christian growth is a process of merging our desires into his. But this must happen consciously and therefore it begins with us bringing hidden motives into the light. Here they can be examined and transformed. But if our motives stay hidden then they will continue to hold power over us. It is what you don’t know about yourself that controls you most detrimentally. The first things that the Holy Spirit wants to do therefore is to bring your corrupted, twisted and selfish motives to the surface. We all have them. And to overcome them we must face them and interrogate them. To have wisdom you must first understand yourself, however bad a state you may be in. This will be the beginning of your liberation. Freedom begins in the heart with liberation from desires that tyrannise us from within. You won’t know how wonderful a difference it will make until you allow God to do this for you.
Ask God to bring the motives of your heart into his light.
Read Proverbs 20:1-8
