Heart of God

“ See the goings out of God’s heart to man, and man’s way of communing with God. God’s heart is an infinite ocean of goodness, and it flows forth to us through Jesus Christ, not in streams and driblets, but in rivers of grace and mercy. ”

“ What god are you praying to, we ask in dismay, when you lift up your hands and your eyes, or turn to east or west, or kneel or lie? Is there any god in the wastes of infinity, in a sunstar, a swarm of worlds, who is not in that miraculous soul of yours? Is there aught anywhere greater than a son of God? Is a stone, a star, a heaven studded with infinite glories, a greater place than your eternal soul? Then look within you. Speak with yourself, commune with your own heart, summon up the irresistible energies of your nature and nothing shall be impossible to you. ”

“ Love and pity and wish well to every soul in the world; dwell in love, and then you dwell in God; hate nothing but the evil that stirs in your own heart.
*Teach your heart this prayer, till your heart continually saith, though not with outward words; “O holy Jesus: meek Lamb of God! Bread that came down from heaven! Light and life of all holy souls! help me to a true and living faith in thee. O do thou open thyself within me, with all thy holy nature, spirit, tempers, and inclinations, that I may be born again of thee, quickened and revived, led and governed by thy Holy Spirit.” ”

“ Matthew, 'find it.' What speech of men or angels will serve to shadow the dimly glorious hope! To lose ourselves in the salvation of God's heart! to be no longer any care to ourselves, but know God taking divinest care of us, his own! to be and feel just a resting-place for the divine love—a branch of the tree of life for the dove to alight upon and fold its wings! ”

“ For the hearthstone of every heart there are three divine qualities that should burn with all the intensity and fervor as in the hearts of ancient seer and prophet.
There is the quality of Faith that makes God real. ”

“ What, then, is the nature of our worship of the Sacred Heart? It is, of course, the same as that which we pay to our Lord himself—that is, the worship which is due to him as God the Son, the second Person of the Blessed Trinity. {290} His human nature, united to the divine nature in one Person, is truly worthy of divine worship and honor. God, having become man, his human heart is the heart of God, and must be adored as such. ”

“ Of all things therefore look to this prayer of the heart; consider it as your infallible guide to heaven; turn from every thing that is an hindrance of it, that quenches or abates its fervour; love and like nothing but that which is suitable to it; and let every day begin, go on, and end in the spirit of it. Consider yourself, as having gone aside and lost your right path, when any delight, desire, or trouble is suffered to live in you, that cannot be made a part of this prayer of the heart to God. ”

“ Heart of Jesus, hope of the dying,
Heart of Jesus, sweet support of thy adorers,
Heart of Jesus, our help in all our sorrows,
Heart of Jesus, joy of the blessed,
Heart of Jesus, delight of all the saints,
Lamb of God, who takest away the sins of the world:
Spare us, O Lord Jesus.
Lamb of God, who takest away the sins of the world:
Hear us, O Lord Jesus.
Lamb of God, who takest away the sins of the world:
Have mercy upon us, O Lord Jesus.
Christ, hear us. Christ, graciously hear us.
V. O most meek and humble Heart of Jesus, render our hearts like thine. ”

“ What trouble when God hides his face and seems us to forgo. Now judge again, when weights are lift Grief, anguish, torments gone: For Wrath, Death, Hell, Eternity, of Fear now there is none. But in their Place the Heart lift up, Life, Light and Rest is come: Felt love, peace, victory, hearts-health, and Christ's Sp'rit all in Sum. Judge when our much provoked Lord, himself shows reconcil'd, If with the joy that then is felt, a Heart may not be fill'd. Now what can others Love do here, to Souls in such a Case. ”

“ Here again, we are struck with wonder and admiration at her purity of conscience, and here again we breathe a prayer for light to see ourselves as God sees us; for grace to understand the malice of sin as the saints understand it. It is because their hearts are so pure, that the spiritual vision of the saints is so refined. "Blessed are the clean of heart, for they see God" and in the light of that eternal Sun of Justice, they discern minutest stains, invisible to souls obscured by the clouds of sin, or dimmed by the mists of self-love. ”

“ Then why, my heart, why thus torment thee?
Be tranquil, stay upon thy God;
And think, when hours of grief are sent thee,
Soon he’ll withdraw th’ afflicting rod;
And humbly bow to his decree,
Who proves thee when He chastens thee.
DES CHRISTEN GEBET.
Selig sind, die reines Herzens sind; denn sie werden Gott schauen.
Ein reines Herz, Herr, schaff in mir,
Schleuss zu der Sünden Thor und Thür,
Vertreibe sie, und lass nicht zu,
Dass sie in meinem Herzen ruh.
Dir öffn ich, Jesu, meine Thür,
Ach komm und wohne du bei mir,
Treib all Unreinigkeit hinaus
Aus deinem Tempel und Wohnhaus. ”

“ The heart that wandered from God must be reduced—that was defiled with sin and put into disorder must be cleansed and put in order again—that was wavering and unfixed must be settled and established; so the word here signifies. The heart is then prepared to seek God when it is determined and fully resolved to make a business of it and to go through with it. 2. He must look up, and stretch out his hands towards God, that is, must stir up himself to take hold on God, must pray to him with earnestness and importunity, striving in prayer, and with expectation to receive mercy and grace from him. ”

“ It is the giving God all our heart; it is one desire and design ruling all our tempers. It is the devoting, not a part, but all our soul, body, and substance to God. In another view, it is all the mind which was in Christ, enabling us to walk as Christ walked. It is the circumcision of the heart from all filthiness, all inward as well as outward pollution. It is a renewal of the heart in the whole image of God, the full likeness of Him that created it. In yet another, it is the loving God with all our heart, and our neighbour as ourselves. ”

“ O God, to whom every heart is open, every wish speaks, and from whom no secret is hid, purify the thoughts of our hearts by the infusion of the Holy Spirit, that we may merit to love thee perfectly and to praise thee worthily. ”

“ God is a refuge for us.”
Is it not a happy thing, when a heart is full and bursting—so full that it cannot contain—to know that there is One, whose name is Love, before whom that heart can be poured out? ”

“ And so God desires, as He tells us in the Bible, to take away, out of our flesh this heart of stone, and give us a heart of flesh, so that we may appreciate and love Him in return for all that He has done for us.
The heart is spoken of in the Bible as the seat of the affections, and therefore it is that God desires us to have a new heart, a changed heart, a heart that can love Him. The Bible says that each one is to keep his heart with all diligence, for out of it are the issues of life. We are told also that "the heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked." ”

“ Wherever a heart beats with love, wherever Faith and Reason utter their oracles, there is God, as formerly in the hearts of seers and prophets. No soil on earth is so holy as the good man's heart; nothing is so full of God. ”

“ What the man is determines largely what his intellect thinks about God. When the heart is narrow, harsh, and rigorous its theology is despotic and cruel. When the heart grows kindly, sympathetic and of autumnal richness, it emphasizes the sympathy and love of God. Each man paints his own picture of God. The heart lends the pigments. Souls full of sweetness and light fill the divine portrait with the lineaments of love. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness. ”

“ God makes His angels spirits—that is, winds— His ministers a flaming fire. So, heart! (Weak heart that fainted in thy loneliness) In the sweet breezes spirits are alive; God’s angels guide the thunder-clouds ”

“ The heart is that which the great God requires and calls for from every one of us; whatever we give, if we do not give him our hearts, it will not be accepted. We must set our love upon him. Our thoughts must converse much with him, and on him, as our highest end. The intents of our hearts must be fastened. We must make it our own act and deed to devote ourselves to the Lord, and we must be free and cheerful in it. We must not think to divide the heart between God and the world; he will have all or none. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart. ”

“ If then the love of God, shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us, makes many souls one soul, and many hearts one heart, how much rather are the Father and Son and Holy Spirit, one God, one light, and one beginning? ”

“ Since everywhere the Spirit walks The garden of the heart, and talks With man, as under Eden's trees, In all his varied languages. Why mourn above some hopeless flaw In the stone tables of the law, When scripture every day afresh Is traced on tablets of the flesh? By inward sense, by outward signs, God's presence still the heart divines; Through deepest joy of Him we learn, In sorest grief to Him we turn, And reason stoops its pride to share The child-like instinct of a prayer. ”

“ If my heart condemn me justly, and with truth, much more so does God who is greater than my heart. But, if my conscience is tenderly sensitive, scrupulous because full of love, God's knowledge of my heart tells in this case on the brighter side, as truly as in the other case it told on the darker side. We may lull our heart. "A tranquil God tranquillises all things, and to see His peacefulness is to be at peace." ”

“ The heart must be pure, in opposition to mixture—an honest heart that aims well; and pure, in opposition to pollution and defilement; as wine unmixed, as water unmuddied. The heart must be kept pure from fleshly lusts, all unchaste thoughts and desires; and from worldly lusts; covetousness is called filthy lucre; from all filthiness of flesh and spirit, all that which come out of the heart, and defiles the man. The heart must be purified by faith, and entire for God; must be presented and preserved a chaste virgin to Christ. Create in me such a clean heart, O God! ”

“ The nearer we are to the Sacred Heart, and to the influences of the sacred blood of Christ, the fountain of all grace, the more holy we become. Let us then love the virtues which shine so conspicuously in the Heart of Jesus. Let us be generous with God and gentle and indulgent with others, as a reflection of the charity of the Heart of Jesus. ”

“ But when a heart feels the living word of God, then it knows and understands that God is all, all-good, and the true, perfect, eternal Good, and better than all for which any heart can wish or desire. ”

“ Our hearts must go along with our prayers. We must lift up our hearts with our hands, as we must pour out our souls with our words. It is the heart that God looks at in that and every other service; for what will a sacrifice without a heart avail? If inward impressions be not in some measure answerable to outward expressions, we do but mock God and deceive ourselves. ”

“ But what means this preparation of our heart according to the expression of Holy Writ: “God is greater than our heart, and our heart is greater than the world?” When our heart, in the solitude of meditation, prepares the service which it must render God, it effects marvels. ”

“ Such thoughts haunt and weaken us; but every man whose heart is touched by the Spirit of God clings to this as his hopeful prayer: “Teach me to do Thy will, for Thou art my God: Thy Spirit is good; lead me into the land of uprightness.” ”

“ Further, if our hearts are in heaven, then heaven will be in our hearts, and here we shall know the joy and the peace that come from 'sitting in heavenly places in Christ Jesus,' even whilst on earth. There is no blessedness, no stable repose, no victorious independence of the buffets and blows of life, except this, that my heart is lifted above them all, and, I was going to say, is inhaled and sucked into the life of Jesus Christ. Then if my heart is where my treasure is, and He is my treasure,' my life is hid with Christ in God.' If my heart is in heaven, heaven is in my heart. ”

“ Because my heart is larger; it was full then; it is full now, and although outwardly and according to the flesh, and in the world I may be in tribulation and sorrow, and care, and labor, and anxiety, yet in Jesus Christ there is peace, in the fulness of the Gospel there is joy, in the Spirit of God there is gladness; and whether we look to the past we rejoice with thanksgiving, and whether we look to the present our hearts seem to grow larger, and whether we look to the future there is hope and a fulness of joy, and we increase in understanding—and why? ”

“ And from this state of heart also, it is, that the spirit of prayer is born, which is the desire of the soul turned to God. Stand, therefore, steadfastly in this will, let nothing else enter into your mind, have no other contrivance, but every where, and in every thing to nourish, and keep up this state of heart, and then the light of heaven, and the love of God, will begin their work in you, will bless and sanctify every power of your fallen soul, you will be in a readiness for every kind of virtue and good work, and will know what it is to be led by the Spirit of God. ”

“ When, amid the higher and holier states of life, the heart arises to the Lord with loving thanks, whether silent or expressed, when, amid its darker states of trial and temptation, in unbroken faith, it hopes and trusts in Him, when, in the momentary lull of either or of both, its knowledges of the true and good, of God and heaven, still assist in the dispersion of the gross darkness of merely natural life, then do the sun, moon and stars of the mind praise the Lord. ”