Do not let mercy and kindness and truth leave you [instead let these qualities define you]Bind them [securely] around your neck, write them on the tablet of your heart.
Proverbs 3:3 (AMP)
The things we write on our hearts are the things we don’t want to lose. But we usually write the wrong things there. We listen to the voices of the world and write on our hearts whatever they tell us to value and whatever they tell us to believe. We listen to our fears and constantly add to the ever-growing list that influences our daily decisions and keeps our faith and our lives very much stuck. And we listen to our doubts, our insecurities, and all the lies we believe about ourselves—some dreamed up on our own, some uninvited and written there by others, or whispered into our thoughts and scratched onto our hearts by the enemy of all that is good. Perhaps our hearts look a bit like an old, abandoned building where graffiti, sketched by any number of voices, covers what was once valuable and lovely and treasured.
Our hearts have an endless capacity to love, to be kind, and to hold truth. But they don’t have room to hold lies, fear, guilt, insecurity, resentment, shame, sin, or anything else that doesn’t come from God, at the same time. When we write all the wrong things all over our hearts, they eventually become the truth that we live by. They will negatively impact our decisions, our lives, and others. Thankfully our God can transform our hearts and erase all the ugliness carelessly carved there. Only the light of Jesus can remove what doesn’t belong, what holds us back, and what keeps us in darkness. Only He can take our scratched up, graffiti-covered hearts and restore them to the lovely, valuable, and treasured condition He intended. Only love, kindness, and absolute truth can define us, because only Jesus holds the pen that inscribes and fills our hearts with the truth they so desperately need.
The truth of God is found in the pages of your Bible, but it can only replace the lies you believe when it gets into your heart. If you are going to write anything on your heart, make sure it is God’s Word, His breath, His truth! He will deeply etch into your heart how much He loves you. He will beautifully engrave the grace He has given, the hope that never disappoints, and the peace and joy of surrender. When you let Jesus define you, truth will guide your decisions, influence others, and make your faith soar! Because the things Jesus writes on your heart are the only things that can never be lost!! You are loved!