Good Morning!
You are welcome to join me for a daily scripture break. Please read this very slowly. It’s long, very long. I divided the post into three sections so you can absorb the “meat” of the message and feel free to read the post over the next couple of days.
Proverbs 16:2:
“All a person’s ways seem pure to them, but motives are weighed by the Lord.”
Section 1.
A reliable ability to honestly assess ourselves eludes most of us. Let’s take the time and seriously consider if we are actually capable of honestly assessing ourselves. In this passage it accurately describes our tendency to be very compassionate towards ourselves - letting ourselves off the hook when we deserve judgment. However, here's the jaw dropping reality - in the end, we can almost convince ourselves of just about anything but the Lord will weigh (examine and judge) our motives. Interestingly, this verse didn’t highlight our evil deeds, our vast knowledge of Him, how long we've practiced our faith, what a good person we are, etc. No, it is the motive (whether good or evil) found in our hearts that the Lord that will assess to decide our fate - our consequences. Well that’s sobering. Our secret motives (when we are jealous or envious of a brother or sister in Christ) are completely obscured from every other human being if we choose to hide them. No one can read your mind or heart and the false outward appearance we project to others often conceals the treachery in our hearts. I know I have often quoted “...you will know them by their fruits." (Matthew 7:16-20) However, we are all capable of concealing our motives even if only but for a time.
Merriam-Webster dictionary defines motive as “ something (such as a need or desire) that causes a person to act.” The Cambridge Dictionary defines motive as “a reason for doing something.” I think if these definitions are combined then we can fully comprehend how motives function in our lives. In Lamentations 3:40, it says, “Let us examine our ways and test them, and let us return to the Lord.” That’s great advice. Only God can help us render our heart with pure intentions.
In Psalms 139:23-24, “Search me, God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.” Fervently asking the Lord to examine us takes a great confidence and love for God - “Search me, God, and know my heart; test me….” Wow! Pause for a moment - are you really prepared at this very moment to ask God to answer this prayer?
Here are few scriptures that decipher for us the importance of pruning our hearts:
1. I Chronicles 28:9, “And you, my son Solomon, acknowledge the God of your father and serve him with wholehearted devotion and with a willing mind, for the Lord searches every heart and understands every desire and thought.”
2. Matthew 15:18-19, “But the things that come out of a person’s mouth come from the heart, and these defile them. For out of the heart come evil thoughts - murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander."
Section 2.
Why does the Lord relegate the responsibility to judge our hearts only for Himself?
We find the answer in I Samuel 16:7, it says, “But the Lord said to Samuel, "Do not consider his appearance or his height, for I have rejected him. The Lord does not look at the things people look at. People look at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart." To give you some context - God has rejected Saul as the King of Israel. God wanted David anointed as King by Samuel. This verse also reveals a limitation of our legal system. We can never ascertain a person’s true motives without their admission - we can infer from circumstances or physical actions but not with absolute certainty, and we can only judge with a reasonableness standard. Some may disagree but only God is capable of discerning the true condition of our hearts.
Here are a few scriptures elucidating God’s right to judge our hearts:
1. Isaiah 29:13, “The Lord says: 'These people come near to me with their mouth and honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. Their worship of me is based on merely human rules they have been taught.’” I've periodically ask myself, am I practicing a form of religion?
2. Luke 6:45 says, “A good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and an evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart. For the mouth speaks what the heart is full of."
3. Jeremiah 17:10, “I, the Lord search the heart and examine the mind, to reward each person according to their conduct, according to what their deeds deserve.” When the Lord performs His examination He rewards what He finds good or bad.
Section 3.
This is what is so important about keeping your heart pure before God. In Proverbs 4:23, it says, “Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.” THIS is the salient scripture with no ambiguity why a pure heart is so vital. The phrase, “above all else” gives you a red flag to slow down and pay attention closely.
Psalms 24:4-5, “The one who has clean hands and a pure heart, who does not trust in an idol or swear by a false god, they will receive blessing from the Lord and vindication from God their Savior.”
This passage hints at the condition by which you will receive “blessing from the Lord and vindication from God their Savior” and that is a believer must abandon any “idol” or “swear by a false god”. What is an idol? Merriam-Webster dictionary defines “idol” as “ an object of extreme devotion; a representation or symbol of an object of worship”. In the biblical sense - an idol is anything or anyone that usurps God’s primacy in your life. Remember the first three of the Ten Commandments?
So our job is to roll up our sleeves and shine a bright spotlight on our hearts. Our goal is to cleanse our hearts of any evil; thus aligning our hearts with God’s Word.
1. In Matthew 5:8, it says, “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.”
2. James 4:8 says, “Come near to God and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.”
3. I John 3:3, “All who have this hope in him purify themselves, just as he is pure.”
Do you ever wonder why people can be so utterly distasteful. Well, these passages above explain it. Sometimes, I’m truly bewildered by the abhorrent uncivil behavior of people - vehemently demeaning people they are engaging without remorse or pause on social media. It's fine to disagree - just be aware.
Recall Matthew 12:34, it says, “You brood of vipers, how can you who are evil say anything good? For the mouth speaks what the heart is full of.” To remind you of the context, in this chapter of Matthew, Jesus is speaking to the Pharisees regarding the demon-possessed man. They were testing Jesus and Jesus was extremely angry at the evil embedded in their hearts. In verse 34, Jesus reveals a priceless nugget of wisdom - “out of the mouth the heart speaks.” When someone berates your character and competence mercilessly on social media because you have challenged their narrative remember this passage. It isn’t just true for Pharisees.
Alas, this is a sobering message. Do you trust yourself to be completely honest with yourself? Don’t give Satan a foothold. Cultivating a pure heart takes honesty, determination, consistency, and commitment to the Lord. We can’t honestly to do this without the assistance of the Holy Spirit. Many Christians gloss over this one and give themselves a break. Don’t take the easy road. This is one of the reasons the path to heaven is through a narrow gate. I pray God helps all of us to be teachable, humble, and grateful.
Peace and be prepared.
If anyone thinks the DOGE mission is faltering, the answer is simple: it's not.
Everyone I've worked with in a DOGE context is grinding long hours, staying locked in on the mission.
I don't see Elon stepping back as abandonment. I see it as a vote of confidence in the wrecking ball he's left in place. The right people are finally in place.
I recently visited a federal office outfitted with brand-new hardware and a state-of-the-art security system including X-Ray and metal screening, likely costing hundreds of thousands of dollars. The office averaged maybe five visitors a day and was located inside a building with its own private security.
And yet, the machines that actually performed the work- laptops and scanners - were over 15 years old. Presumably, that was the only way to run the outdated software.
When my appointment time arrived, the backend database crashed. All appointments were cancelled. "Come back tomorrow," they said. "The system should restart overnight." Not kidding, that's what actually happened.
The federal government needs thousands of people and contractors to do the work of twenty. There's no elegant way to untangle that. We had decades to fix it. In the private sector, this would've been corrected with layoffs. Instead, we chose to deficit spend and keep the machine humming.
Now, there's no option left but a wrecking ball. This isn't a hypothetical. This isn't a time to clutch pearls over "but DOGE is causing too much thrash." This is the only way DOGE could ever operate, because the federal government is just that big of a mess and it's going to take our children's future if we let the status quo continue.
IRS modernization is 30 years behind schedule, $15 billion over budget, and is relying on outdated technology.
We are working hard to make it more efficient.
@musicwv presents: Rural Revival Project - Spruce Pine, NC
Saturday, April 5, 2025
Tickets available now: https://t.co/lyhFUlVBJR
Join us for an incredible event dedicated to raising critical funds and awareness for a community deeply affected by recent hurricanes. The destruction of homes, businesses, and livelihoods has left many residents struggling to rebuild, but the spirit of Spruce Pine remains unshaken. This project aims to bring people together, show unwavering support, and amplify efforts to provide financial assistance and relief. See you there!
@JustineBateman Yes , has a very demonstrative effect on how people (players) pick political careers. Grifting the current system. It needs to be addressed. Term limits, imo, would help keep this type of personality out of public office.
This is not simply negligence. This is criminal negligence. The DEI vermin responsible for this travesty must be indicted for a catastrophic failure of unimaginable magnitude.
New essay on my RACE TRACK site.
"The voters need to stop making excuses for federal, state, and city leadership, and also the failings of the media to expose it all. This has become like someone in an abusive marriage excusing the beatings with “It’s only when he drinks.”
The whole country needs an Alanon meeting.
Forget party alliance. These are not two rival football teams. Stop being a Superfan, eagerly excusing the team’s failings. Because when your football team doesn’t win the game, the defeat smarts for just an hour after, and ends with, “We’ll get ‘em next time.” But when your political leaders fail, your town will burn to the ground.
Forget the parties; vote for competent people you want in charge during worst case scenarios."
Read the rest of the essay below.
So it appears a native Texan was being radicalized by Islamic extremism, converted, and decided to murder innocent Americans. All while Joe Biden and his department of justice and FBI told us white supremacy was the biggest threat our nation faced.