Guard Your Hearts!

• What does it mean to guard something?

• How do you behave when you’re upset?

Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.
Proverbs 4:23

When this verse talks about the “heart,” it is referring to our thoughts, emotions and will. Basically, our “heart” is who we are on the inside.

God wants us to keep his truth in our hearts. The state of our hearts affects how we behave, the decisions we make and the words we say. It is so important that we “guard our hearts,” watching over and guarding them from dangers.

God cares about our hearts, about our feelings. He doesn’t promise that our feelings will never be hurt, but he does tell us to guard our own hearts. When we guard our hearts, we can protect ourselves from many situations that will bring us pain. We also prevent ourselves from making bad decisions based on our emotions, decisions that will often bring us even more pain.

We guard our hearts, in part, by spending time with God. Filling our hearts with God’s truth is one of the best ways to guard and protect our hearts. Another way to guard our hearts is to keep bad things out. If we know something isn’t good for us, we should stay away from it.

PRAYER
Dear God, please help us to guard our hearts, to carefully guard our emotions. Help everything that flows from our hearts to be honoring to you. Amen.