”I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.“
Ezekiel 36:26 NIV
The heart in all of us is where we wrestle with faith or doubt. When Jacob wrestled with God in the Bible afterwords he was limping but had his name changed to Israel which means. One who wrestles with God.
What are we wrestling about? We are wrestling about faith. Faith in God, or as Jesus describes it seeking first the Kingdom of God.
When we do that, seek first His kingdom, we are choosing to live life by faith. When the circumstances of life come we have already decided we are going to frame reality based on a kingdom perspective.
Once we start to frame our circumstances that are outside of us with a Godly perspective, once they come inside of us into our heart and we process them through our heart they are already primed to go in as faith and not doubt.
Faith will ultimately result in power in the anticipation we have for life that Christ is living through us.
This is what it means to wrestle with God. We see the circumstances of life through a Godly perspective or frame which can seem like we are wrestling with God because doubt is easy to default to. It can be hard sometimes to surrender the reins of our life to God, other times it can be extremely easy.
This is what it means, that God is working in us through faith wrestling with the doubt inside of us that creates the possible conflict.
We remember that we have been given a new heart. The new heart is one of forgiveness and trust the fruit of the spirit and may seem vulnerable but there is power in knowing God has started something’s new in us.
Of course we have a tendency to resort back to the old heart of hatred, jealousy, and other negative emotions from the past, but this new heart God provides does not have to deal with all of that old story. It’s God new story of what he is doing. The past has no place anymore, we live Kingdom forward.
There is a new story based on the future of His kingdom and his righteousness. Not based on what we have done, but based on what he has done, in this way we can live each day fresh moving forward with a newness of life.
Verses thought about for this post:
”I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.“
- Ezekiel 36:26 NIV
”In the womb he grasped his brother’s heel; as a man he struggled with God. He struggled with the angel and overcame him; he wept and begged for his favor. He found him at Bethel and talked with him there— the Lord God Almighty, the Lord is his name! But you must return to your God; maintain love and justice, and wait for your God always.“
- Hosea 12:3-6 NIV
”But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.“
- Matthew 6:33 NIV
”For I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God that brings salvation to everyone who believes: first to the Jew, then to the Gentile.“
- Romans 1:16 NIV
”I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.“
Galatians 2:20 NIV
”But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.“
- Galatians 5:22-23 NIV
”for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose.“
Philippians 2:13 NIV
”See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland. - Isaiah 43:19 NIV
”I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.“
Galatians 2:20 NIV