On Guard

Last updated on January 20, 2023

Guard your heart above all else, for it determines the course of your life.

Proverbs 4:23 NLT

During these months of “safer at home” throughout the COVID-19 Pandemic in the United States, I’ve had a lot of time to examine what’s been going on in my heart. It hasn’t all been pretty. Wise King Solomon tells us in the verse above to guard our hearts. In today’s post, I want to examine a bit more of what that means and give us some application we can take and apply to living our lives with high integrity.

First, let’s take a look at what “to guard” means.

guard /ɡärd/ verb

1. watch over in order to protect or control.
“the gates were guarded by uniformed soldiers”

2. protect against damage or harm.
“the company fiercely guarded its independence”

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So, by this definition, the purpose of guarding something is protection: keeping in what needs to be kept in, and keeping out what needs to be kept out, and management: letting in what needs to be let in and letting out what needs to be let out.

Let’s look at some examples of other things we guard in life that are less nebulous than our hearts to better wrap our mind around the practicals of the concept.

• Money
  • Keeping in: Saving, investing
  • Keeping out: Unnecessary expenses by budgeting
  • Letting in: Looking for opportunities to earn more money
  • Letting out: Giving to others and to organizations we care about.
• Marriage and Friendships
  • Keeping in: Sharing our dreams and hurts just between us, inside jokes, memories
  • Keeping out: Gossip, lies, division, relational substitutes
  • Letting in: Wisdom and insight of others who are trustworthy; vulnerability, love, changes in the partnership
  • Letting out: Fear, pain, care for others, unmet expectations
• Children
  • Keeping in: innocence, correction, safety rules
  • Keeping out: Unnecessary danger, bad influences, foul speech, exposure to violence
  • Letting in: Opportunities for growth, education, playtime, good friends, challenging activities, hard conversations
  • Letting out: Child’s independence, resilience, genuine character, fear, worry, division

I could go on with ways we guard our careers, property, and even our bodies, but I think you get the point.

If we follow the wisdom of Solomon, our heart is to be guarded above all those things. Why? Why is the heart so important?

In the Bible, the idea of the “heart” is not just about that muscle in the center of our chest cavity that pumps blood through our physical bodies. Strong’s Hebrew Lexicon defines it as “the feelings, the will and even the intellect; likewise for the centre of anything”

We are to guard our feelings, our will, our intellect, and the center of ourselves. Okay, Solomon, I can see what you’re getting at. Guarding our heart is a big deal. The direction of our feelings, will, and intellect–the center of ourselves–does determine which way we will go in life.

Guarding our feelings

Modern psychology calls this emotion regulation. And there are healthy ways to do this and harmful ways to do this. It takes awareness and practice, and even help from outside sources in many cases.

When emotional control fails, people often say or do things they later regret and wish they had been able to keep their emotions in check. Emotion dysregulation is a component of certain forms of mental illness. Over time, it could have a negative impact on one’s personal well-being and social relationships.

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Guarding our will

Our will equates to our intentions. Not just our desires which stay inside of us, but those actions and determinations that make our desires a reality. Our will can be set on that which is unhealthy for us and for those around us.

When we appreciate that the results and circumstances of our lives are a product of our intentions, and that the more able we are to see our intentions, the more able we are to consciously focus them and to use them to our own advantage.

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Guarding our intellect

Intellect is a term used in studies of the human mind, and refers to the ability of the mind to come to correct conclusions about what is true or false, and about how to solve problems. 

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We must accept the fact that intellect is subjective to our own experiences of life. Which means, we can know something to be true or false and be quite incorrect in our knowing. Guarding our intellect means to have a standard of knowing that is beyond ourselves against which to check our perceived understanding of truth and falsehood. Otherwise, we will move with the “truth” of the times and history tells of the disasters that can cause.

Deceitful hearts

What’s in your heart determines the way you will go. In each of these areas, the feelings, will, and intellect, we find a propensity for deceitful direction. The prophet Jeremiah says this about the heart:

The heart is more deceitful than anything else, and incurable — who can understand it?

Jeremiah 17:9 CSB

To the prophet Samuel, God said,

Humans do not see what the Lord sees, for humans see what is visible, but the Lord sees the heart.

1 Samuel 16:7b CSB

Praise God that we are not solely responsible for its health, however. God does the work we are unable to do.

We are accountable for the health of our hearts.

Don’t worry about anything, but in everything, through prayer and petition with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.

Philippians 4:6-7 CSB

Guarding our hearts

With the pressure to be perfect off of us, because God’s perfect peace is guarding our hearts, what can we be doing to take ownership of what we can do to guard our own heart health?

Take in scripture

These are the words from God about himself, the world, and ourselves. We need to know these things as a barometer of truth. We can take in scripture by reading it directly from our Bibles or from online apps. We can listen to it being read to us. I highly recommend this by the way, as much of what is written in the Bible was originally intended to be read aloud to the people. Our brains process information differently when we hear.

We can write down scripture that is meaningful to us and place it around us on notes or artwork. This is an effective way of memorizing scripture as well. All of these train us to hide the word of God in our hearts. When we need it to correct course and to evaluate our heart health, it will be there and available because we have been feasting on it.

Pursue wise counsel

The life of the Christ-follower is not a solitary life. We are designed for community and indeed the church requires community to function as intended. One of the ways to engage with community is to pursue the counsel of those who love Jesus and are wise and able to give feedback. These are those who are not prone to the “wise counsel” of the modern age but the counsel of those in the faith that have gone before us. This could be the wise counsel of books and writings of believers of the past, conversations over coffee with those who have been through what we are going through, or those trained to shepherd others in the faith.

I should make a point to note that not all counsel of the modern age is bad. But counsel that conflicts with the truth of scripture should not be listened to. It will seem right to man, but it’s way may lead to death.

Seek Understanding

Taking in the scriptures and taking in counsel give us the fodder with which to guard our hearts, but they are not useful until we take them into ourselves. This takes time and intention. Some of the ways we can do this are contemplation, meditation on scriptures and counsel, time in prayer, both speaking and listening.

Personally, I like to use a journal to write out my thoughts on what I am taking in and to wrestle, prayerfully, with my reality in relation to that. I find it helpful to also record the conclusions I reach and what God brings to mind in this communion process.

Seeking understanding will often include further research into what scripture says, and what others in the faith have said. There is also mystery here that we can contemplate for the duration of many lifetimes and never understand the whole of God’s ways. But it is quite the adventure to spend time trying.

Walk in the Spirit’s friendship

Knowledge, wisdom, and understanding are all essential to guarding our hearts, but without a companionship with the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of the Living God which dwells within those that follow Jesus, our hearts remain unprotected.

Fostering a Holy Spirit friendship is where the mind gets at the heart and the spirit of a person. It takes time, and it takes a training of the ear to hear. It takes a willingness to hear. A willingness to embrace the mystery of it. Of those things that are spiritually discerned and no book can fully communicate. Walking by the Spirit, being led by the desires of the Spirit, is guarding our hearts.

By way of benediction, let us end today’s conversation with a trip to Galatia where we read a portion of a letter written by the apostle Paul in regard to walking by the Spirit, identifying the works of an unguarded heart, and encouragement to live the fruit of a well-guarded Spirit-led heart.

I say then, walk by the Spirit and you will certainly not carry out the desire of the flesh. For the flesh desires what is against the Spirit, and the Spirit desires what is against the flesh; these are opposed to each other, so that you don’t do what you want. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law.

Now the works of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, moral impurity, promiscuity, idolatry, sorcery, hatreds, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambitions, dissensions, factions, envy, drunkenness, carousing, and anything similar. I am warning you about these things ​– ​as I warned you before ​– ​that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. The law is not against such things. Now those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live by the Spirit, let us also keep in step with the Spirit.

Galatians 5:16-25 CSB