DANGER, DANGER

A Divided Heart (Hosea 10:2, James 1:8, Matthew 6:24, 1 Kings 18:21, James 4:8) Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters,a whenever you face trials of many kinds,because you know that the testing of your faithg produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be maturei and complete, not lacking anything. If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to you. But when you ask, you must believe and not doubt,l because the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. That person should not expect to receive anything from the Lord. Such a person is double-minded and unstablen in all they do.(James 1:2-8) “No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money. (Matthew 6:24) A spiritually divided heart, another way of saying it, is called riding the fence, one foot in the world and one foot with God Anothing thing I have heard it called is the royal splits. none of these sound good and I know they do not feel good. When one is conflicted, and disturbed all the time because you do not know which way to turn, you have allowed the stronger one at the time to pull you one way and then when the other part seems stronger it pulls you back the other way. And those barbs on the fence just do not feel very good. It is a process where you try and serve both God and the devil, which is personal interests and worldly desires. Not being completly dedicated to either one, which makes you "lukewarm" and being like-warm leads to instability, anxiety, and a spiritual life that feels like it has no meaning what so ever. Be cause your like your riding the waves, and you cannot stay fully committed to a divine purpose that could be fulfilling if you were able to do so. Double-Mindedness keeps you on a tight rope, and you are not sure on which side you will fall, when temptations come. You are between faith in God, and only believing that you are it, yet trying to please God while indulging in worldly pleasures, friends, serving two masters is totally impossible.. While in the attempts to do so, you loose your inner peace, you become anxtious and eritated, unstable and emotional. Anger sets in and you are at odds with everyone, especially those who are trying to help you. Caused by a state of neither fully servung God nor fully resisting Him, which causes you to feel stale and unwanted. You have become unstable in all your ways,which can lead you to make hasty and dangerous decisions. This is a process that brings you to a place where you will feel unsecure and full of fear.. Where you doubt God and do not trust Him anymore. Because of the divided heart, you only trust yourself sometimes. A place where it feels like money is power and you think it will give you security, but instead it leads to more lostness and you begin to feel more and more insecure and a desire to make more and more money, following the lie that money makes you happy. SSo, by now, I am sure you are asking, how does one over come a divided heart? Number one, you have to hate where you are at I found that I got to the place where I hatted the sin I was in, while trying to follow God. It just wasn't working and satan we happy to keep me right there. I finnally got to the place where I began to seek actively seek a heart that was after God alone. A heart that was "undivided. (Psalm 86:11), a heart that was fully dedicated to God’s will. Jesus had to become number one, I had to take second place. Jesus became my pilot aand I became the Co-pilot. The first step I had to take was to repent of my sin, then refocusing my priorities, as I did that I came to the place where I could trust in God's grace angain and unified my mind on the ways and things of God. Friends, God has taken me to a place where God and His word is the most important thing in my life At the beginning of the day, it is my desire to be in the word of God and learning from Him, so that through out the day, my mind will be stayed on Him. This is not an easy task, it is so easy to be detired to things that are my desires. To stay focused I need torepent and confess often through out the day. To stay between the ditches. God has His hands on the steering wheel and He is a fantastic driver, just change seats and let Him have the wheel, and you will see. Father God, thank you for giving me the gift of a single mind, it is so nice to let you have control, and I come along for the rigde of a life time. It has been a wonderful live living with and seving you. In you name I pray Amen.