THINK TOGETHER.
Do you remember the story of the Exodus? What parts do you remember?
READ TOGETHER
Proverbs 28:14. Blessed is the one who fears the Lord always, but whoever hardens his heart will fall into calamity.
One of the most important things you must learn to do as you grow up is to guard your heart. We have looked at many proverbs about our hearts already this year. Your heart is the inner part of you that loves, and cares, and desires, and trusts. As when your heart gets hardened, you stop loving, and caring, and trusting – you stop fearing the Lord.
In the Bible the story of Pharaoh is a sad story of a person who hardened their heart. Do you remember the story of the Exodus? The Israelites were slaves in Egypt and God sent Moses to tell Pharaoh, “Let my people go!” But Pharaoh would not listen to God. He hardened his heart. Moses did miracles. Pharaohs heart was hard. God sent plagues. Pharaoh’s heart was hard. Sadly, Pharaoh never listened to God. He never tuned from his sin. He never did what was right. As a result, just like our proverb says, he fell into calamity (trouble or destruction).
Pharaoh might seem like a very extreme case of hard heartedness, but the truth is that any of us can let our hearts become hard just like he did. In fact, if we don’t keep hearing the good news of Jesus and trusting in his love for us, then little by little, our hearts will also get more and more hardened. We will stop trusting God and begin to try to do what WE want to do, instead of what God wants us to do. We will become selfish, like Pharaoh, instead of loving like Jesus.
The good news is that when we have Jesus living in our hearts, the Holy Spirit gives us a new heart that is “soft” like Jesus’ heart, and not hard like Pharaoh’s. When we have Jesus’ heart we love what he loves, we care about others like he does, and we listen to God like him too. And that means that in the end we get to live with Jesus where there will never, ever be calamity, only joy and peace.
Because of Jesus we have a new heart.
With Jesus our hearts never have to get hard or selfish.
DO SOMETHING TOGETHER
Do you have any hard, dried out playdough or clay? Talk about the difference between hard and soft clay while trying to make something out of both. God’s love in Jesus keeps our hearts soft and changeable like soft clay.
PRAY TOGETHER
Jesus, keep my heart soft like yours. Loving others as you love me. Amen.
TLICfamily 