A couple years ago my daughter walked into her
bedroom to find balloons & confetti everywhere – all over her bed, all over
the floor, all over the dresser. And
there on her bed was a sign asking her to prom.
She looked around, then read the sign, and then quietly sat on her
bed.
Taking it all in, she smiled and treasured the scene
up in her heart and thought about her response.
Hours earlier, before she had come home, her sister
had peeked into that same room, and seeing what had been done, she screamed in
excitement for her sister.
A couple months later the kids and I flew back from visiting my brother. We
arrived at the airport around 2 in the morning on a school night. My daughters’ boyfriends had decided to
surprise them by meeting them at the airport.
One daughter, as soon as she saw her boyfriend, screamed and ran to him
to give him a big hug, nearly knocking him down. The other daughter calmly smiled, walked to
her boyfriend, said “hi,” and hugged him.
Two people. .. two very different responses in both scenes.
I was reminded of these two scenes this week, and while
talking about them with my girls, it brought to mind another scene – in Luke.
You know the story well. An angel came to some
shepherds to announce Jesus’ birth. Then
the shepherds decide to go find the baby Jesus.
“So they
hurried off and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby, who was lying in the
manger. When they had seen him, they spread the word concerning
what had been told them about this child, and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds said
to them. But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in
her heart.” (Luke 2:16-19)
What
the shepherds did was great! They
hurried off to find baby Jesus, they spread the word concerning Him, they
glorified and praised God.
But
Mary treasured up these things in her heart.
I
LOVE THAT!! She didn't FEEL any less than the shepherds just
because she quietly took in what she saw and heard, storing it up in her heart –
all the amazing acts of God, the words spoken to her by angels and prophets,
the reactions of those who heard and those who came to see & worship
Jesus.
And
we can learn from that.
Yes,
there are times for praising & glorifying God and telling others of His great works, and ideally that would be often. But we also need to take time to just quietly fill up our
hearts with the Words and acts of God.
Because
what’s in our hearts matters! Proverbs
tells us that EVERYTHING we do flows from it.
And
Luke 6:45 says: “The
good person out of the good treasure of his heart produces good, and the evil
person out of his evil treasure produces evil, for out of the abundance of the
heart his mouth speaks.”
We
all store things in our hearts – memories, feelings, words read or spoken. We store negative things in our hearts as well
as positive things.
It’s
important to be careful what we store in our hearts.
Proverbs
instructs us to overlook an offense or insult; that is, refuse to store it up
in our hearts. Care in what we read or listen to also protect the storage rooms of our hearts. We can choose not to
store up negative things in our hearts, but it has to be a deliberate choice.
We
should also make a deliberate choice to store up God’s Word in our hearts.
Psalm
119:11 says: “I have hidden your word in my
heart that I might not sin against you.”
If our hearts are so full of God’s Words, there will be less room for
anything negative. Then good things will flow from us to others.
But
Mary also pondered what she
had stored in her heart.
To
ponder means to
weigh in the mind; to view with deliberation; to examine carefully; to consider
attentively, to meditate on.
It’s not enough just to have the Word in our hearts.
We need to meditate on it,
Examine it carefully to understand it,
Consider it attentively to apply it to our lives.
A couple scriptures to remember:
2 Timothy 3:16 “Every scripture is inspired by God and useful for teaching,
for reproof, for correction, and for training in
righteousness.”
Philippians 4:8 "Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is
noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is
admirable-if anything is excellent or praiseworthy-think about such things."
“I think it matters what we choose to
treasure up and ponder in our hearts: treasuring problems leads to anxiety,
treasuring hope yields joy.” –John Richmond