“The purposes of a person’s heart are deep waters, but one who has insight draws them out.”

Proverbs 20:5

Who can decipher why they think, say, feel or why they do what they do? Our deeds, thoughts, speech and feeling are often a mystery to us. We just live and be and don’t think why. Why is a painful and heart- searching question, and so we avoid it. We find ourselves avoiding people, places and events that cause us this heart- searching. Heart- searching is very tiring and often we don’t know the answers to the questions we find ourselves asking ourselves.

It is also dangerous, as it can make us dissatisfied with ourselves and we can start not liking ourselves very much. We question or motives for doing the things we do. We examine our thoughts and wonder about them. This can bring us down, since we don’t really know what to do with what we find. Perhaps we seek help, but usually only when it starts to affect our lives significantly. We see prejudice in there, bad attitudes and lots of negativity. We search for good in us, but it is hard to find because our reasons for doing things is often suspect.

God tells us all about it in the Holy Scriptures. They explain us to ourselves, especially in books like Proverbs. Proverbs is full of challenge and instruction and gives us wisdom if we take it in. If we gain this insight, we can start to explain our fears and guilt about ourselves. As we see the negativity, we can do something about it. We can bring it to God, because He can help us to understand and give us the power to change. He does this when we want to change.

This is the key. We run from ourselves when we don’t want to face up. We don’t look for answers because we don’t really want to know. We look in the wrong places for answers, places where we think it won’t be too painful for us to face up to what is troubling us. We look in the right place and run away again, because we don’t like what we find, and are not prepared to do anything about it. And so the avoidance goes on…

What if I face up and do what God tells me to do? What if I finally solve my moral dilemmas and get a full and free forgiveness for everything, as God promises? I could have a new start, a new life, I could go places free from guilt and fear of all kinds.!

“Jesus answered them, “Most certainly I tell you, everyone who commits sin is the bondservant of sin. A bondservant doesn’t live in the house forever. A son remains forever. If therefore the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed.”

John 8:34-36

Only God’s Son, Jesus can make us free. If He sets us free, we really are free. He took the punishment due to me on Himself and paid the cost to set me free. I have nothing else to do. If the payment is made, there is no more guilt.

“God so loved the world, that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life. For God didn’t send his Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world should be saved through him. He who believes in him is not judged. He who doesn’t believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the one and only Son of God. This is the judgment, that the light has come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the light; for their works were evil. For everyone who does evil hates the light, and doesn’t come to the light, lest his works would be exposed. But he who does the truth comes to the light, that his works may be revealed, that they have been done in God.”

John 3:16-21

We are free people, with no judgment hanging over us and we have the light of Christ in our lives so that we can walk in the right way. We have finally found the truth, and the truth has set us free!

But if we do not find this truth, we are already condemned. We are condemned because we have our sin weighing us down and we have not believed. Only faith saves us, and not our own ideas.

We are now free to examine ourselves and deal with what is inside us. We can finally face up and get our problems sorted out. We have the joy of knowing that our Saviour Jesus, who we have trusted in, will never leave us, so we can face the worst of things and find forgiveness and power to change.

If we want more insight, God tells us to ask for it and He will give it.

“Count it all joy, my brothers, when you fall into various temptations, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. Let endurance have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. But if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach; and it will be given to him. But let him ask in faith, without any doubting….”

James 1:2-6