As we walk in this world we can witness that there is a vast chasm between those who know Him and those who only think they know. While huge swaths of people proclaim understanding and wisdom, it’s actually revealed that many only repeat data in order to appear to have understanding, while having none. There is one factor that separates the knowing and unknowing—living open hearted.
For everyone who listens with an open heart will receive progressively more revelation until he has more than enough.
Matthew 13:12 TPT
Open Heart – Teachable Heart
The Word of God clearly speaks that you have to have an open heart to have a teachable heart. And without a teachable heart you will never understand what Jesus says or receive His amazing revelations. Our Heavenly Father puts a high premium on living open hearted because otherwise we’re guarded and self-protecting from HIM. He has opened wide His beautiful heart to us, and as His beloved, He expects the same in return.
But while God doesn’t rely on our performance, He does require our open-heartedness. And living open hearted gives us access to ALL of Christ. His living impartation and indwelt Life flood into the open heart. The deepest things of the Kingdom are bestowed on the openhearted, while the cerebrally fortressed never get it at all.
Open Hearted Exchanged Life
I recently did a video and in it I speak about open hearted living as it relates to the exchanged life. Matthew 13 shows clearly why someone may mentally grasp the exchanged life, while be unable to experience it in their lives. And I don’t say this with any judgment because receiving the revelation and experiencing it takes a work of the Spirit. I know many who yearn and long to experience Christ’s Life as their life but feel they don’t. Take heart, despair of the self is part of the process.
In reading the below scripture this morning, I am wondering how much of what stands in the way of our experience of Jesus is simply not living open hearted. And while this too is a work of the Spirit, it is also a personal choice. What is that choice? To abandon our heart to the hands of our Lord. An open heart is an abandoned heart. And the abandoned heart yields to the Spirit by opening wherever He leads.
This is uncomfortable, because I have witnessed that His choices are usually not mine. His Will leads to my vulnerability which opens me up to possible hurt. Yet the good news is, He often leads us to potential pain, but our Reward is always Himself. The choice to live with an open abandoned heart is the difference between struggling to make it and experience of His sustaining LIFE regardless of circumstance.
The Haves and Have Nots
Then His disciples approached Jesus and asked, “Why do You always speak to people in these hard-to-understand parables?” He explained, “You’ve been given the intimate experience of insight into the hidden mysteries of the realm of heaven’s kingdom, but they have not. For everyone who listens with an open heart will receive progressively more revelation until he has more than enough. But those who don’t listen with an open, teachable heart, even the understanding that they think they have will be taken from them. That’s why I teach the people using parables, because they think they’re looking for truth, yet because their hearts are unteachable, they never discover it. Although they will listen to Me, they never fully perceive the message I speak.
The prophecy of Isaiah describes them perfectly:
Although they listen carefully to everything I speak, they don’t understand a thing I say. They look and pretend to see, but the eyes of their hearts are closed. Their minds are dull and slow to perceive, their ears are plugged and are hard of hearing, and they have deliberately shut their eyes to the truth. Otherwise they would open their eyes to see, and open their ears to hear, and open their minds to understand. Then they would turn to Me and I would instantly heal them.
Matthew 13:11-15 TPT
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Open hearted abandon to Him!
John, have you been listening in on God’s talks with me! Hee he hee.
Seriously, this is soooo important!
Life and death… living Spirit-reality, intimate communion, or religious garb important! The heart matters and matters of the heart matter, according to Him matters!
Thank you… I am going to read this post again and again-Receiving—— praying——Receiving——praying………❤️
While I haven’t been a fly on the wall of your time with God, I have been listening attentive to mine. He must be speaking this to many. It is a life or death matter. I am going to do a number of posts on the heart. It is always a good reminder! Thank you for drinking so deeply! Love you!