The hymn writer, R. Robinson, penned the words to that beautiful hymn, “Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing.” The words to the last verse are the testimony of every Believer at some stage of their walk with the Lord:

“O to grace how great a debtor
Daily I’m constrained to be!
Let that grace, Lord, like a fetter,
Bind my wandering heart to Thee:
Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it,
Prone to leave the God I love;
Take my heart, O take and seal it,
Seal it from Thy courts above. ”

The love of God constrains me to be a debtor to His grace. He is that indescribable force, outside of myself, that either prevents my wandering feet from leaving the path of life, or pulls me back to Him when my heart has wandered. Much has been written about spiritual warfare, but there is a spiritual warfare that can take place in my heart where I can either acknowledge God, or the devil. As we have mentioned before, my heart is the same fertile ground to receive either the word of God, or the devil! As a Believer I do not have to fight the devil…..Jesus did that for me at Calvary and won! Calvary is a finished work that I have to learn to walk in. The only fight a Believer has is the fight of faith, 1 Timothy 6:11-12, “But you, O man of God,……fight the good fight of faith.” How do I do that? I resist the devil, not fight him. James 4:6-8 instructs us how:
“….God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.
Submit yourselves, therefore, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.
Draw near to God, and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts you double-minded.”

As I humble to the Lord and submit to the truths of His word He has taught me, the devil will flee because he hates the light and cannot abide in it. God’s word is truth and light, the devil abides in deception and darkness. I must choose to let God be true in my heart. Proverbs 4:23 instructs, “Keep thy heart, with all diligence, for out of it are the issues of life.” That is my place of responsibility, to keep my heart right before the Lord. If I have not learnt how to “keep” my heart it is often in a state of fluctuating confusion. Because I am born again, it does not mean that my heart is not prone to wander, but at my salvation, God put a seal on my life and constrains me by His grace, as He teaches me His ways. Only when my heart is ruled by Jesus Christ is it a safe habitation as I respond to my divine Guide in life, the Holy Spirit of God. Thus the process continues in my life as I take my place of responsibility in humility.

The words of Jesus search our hearts, Matthew 18:1-6:
“…the disciples came to Jesus saying,”Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?”
Jesus called a little child to Him, and set him in the midst of Him.
And said, “Except you be converted, and become as little children, you shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven.
Whosoever shall humble himself as this little child, the same is greatest in the kingdom of heaven.
And whoso receives one such little child in My name, receives Me.”

A little child is not in control of his own life. He has to accept that his mother and father know best. Our Heavenly Father requires us to be child-like, but not childish. A child raised in a stable, loving home established on godly principles should be able to love, trust and honour his parents. This is the “child-likeness” that Jesus refers to us becoming. It is an on-going process for us in life, totally opposite to what the world values and believes. The world wants independence, fame, fortune, recognition, glory, instant answers and materialism, but these are not values in the kingdom of God.

When I learn to live in child-like trust in my Heavenly Father, clothed in humility then I can live and dwell in “the secret place of the Most High,” Psalm 91, and all the benefits of the “secret place” become my inheritance.

In recent weeks we have referred many times to our position of walking in the fullness of our inheritance of the Promised Land. In Deuteronomy 1:39, scripture declares that the generation of children that would enter the Promised Land “….had no knowledge between good and evil,” and they would go in and possess their inheritance. Let us remember, as this teaches, not to eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, (Genesis 3), but only from the Tree of Life, the Word of God, in child-like trust. Thus the Son of God, our Lord Jesus, will comfortably reside and abide in our hearts, seated on His rightful throne there.