After God's Own HeartSample

AFTER GOD’S OWN HEART

When you were a kid, you probably joined your parents on trips to the grocery store and watched them pick through the fruit, selecting those with the highest quality. I remember my dad grabbing a watermelon and testing it by giving it a couple slaps. When he heard the perfect hollow thud, he would say, “That’s a good one!” As I got older I began to buy my own groceries, and I began to continue this practice of slapping watermelons. However, I realized that these external observations weren’t able to fully reveal the internal quality of the watermelon. In the same way, making external observations about another person shows you little of their character. It is their heart that reveals the deep truth of their inner qualities.

God knows and understands the depths of our hearts and this is made evident in the life of David, a man who was “after the Lord’s own heart.” In today’s culture, we are often valued by where we live, how we look, and what we are able to provide. At times it can feel easier to make a judgment about a person rather than go through the process of getting to know them. As we read 1 Samuel 16, we see David’s father Jesse bring all of his strong grown sons before Samuel in order to be anointed as the future king of Israel. Even Samuel, the priest of the Lord, first chooses based on appearance, guessing that God wanted to anoint a strong, handsome man. But the Lord corrects Samuel, reminding him that he chooses based on the heart not appearance. He picks David as the future ruler.

We are reminded that the Lord chooses his sons and daughters not based on how they look, how strong they are, how many people they know, or even how much money they make. The Lord chooses us because he loves us and longs for us to understand his heart. His love gives us a salvation that is not earned but given freely having been paid for by the blood of Christ. But often we seek to earn either the Lord’s love or the World’s love through how we live our lives. Our hearts, time, and energy show what we truly love and pursue.

So as we read the story of David and learn of how Christ loves us, we begin to understand how we should live our lives in a way that shows the love of Christ to others not because of what they look like, but because they are made in the Lord’s image.

ASK YOURSELF: Do you recognize that you are loved by God no matter what? What steps will you take to model your heart more after God’s heart?