HEART

* It is not very large, in fact, and in reality, it is only a little larger than your closed fist.

* A real miracle, that stays quietly and constantly beating within our chests, by our Creator.

* Statistically impressive! For someone who lives to be 75 years old, the average heart's work will comprise more than 2,7 billion heartbeats! 100,000 beats in a single day! Over those 75 years, the heart will pump more than a million barrels of blood - enough to fill more than three-four large oil tankers!

* Just last year, at the University of Waterloo, scientists, announced that there seems to be some sort of correlation between individuals' heart rates and their wisdom.

* Proverbs 2:10-11:

"For wisdom will enter your heart, and knowledge will be pleasant to your soul. Discretion will protect you, and understanding will guard you."

We gain wisdom through a constant process of growing. First we must trust and honour God. Second, we must realise that the Bible reveals God's wisdom to us. Third, we must make a lifelong series of right choices and avoid moral pitfalls. Fourth, when we make sinful or mistaken choices, we must learn from our errors and recover. People don't develop all aspects of wisdom at once. For example, some people have more insight than discretion; others have more knowledge than common sense. The idea is for us to pray for all aspects of wisdom and take the steps to develop them in our lives. We must train ourselves in order to have more discretion which will give us the ability to tell right from wrong. It will enable us, as believers, to detect evil motives in men and women. With practice it help us to evaluate courses of action and consequences. While it is true that for some it is a gift it is also true that for most it is developed by using God's truth to make wise choices day by day.

* In Mark 12:30, Jesus commands man to love God with all his heart. Since we are to love God with all the heart, it is of utmost importance to the Christian life that the heart be understood.

* 'The word heart occurs over 600 times in the Old Testament and at least 210 times in the New Testament. The extensive use of the word heart in all its varied implications places it in a position of

extreme importance.'

* The term "heart" (kardia) is never used in the New Testament to refer to the physical organ of man as the term is used when reference is made to heart in the Old Testament. But the Hebrews also used the term in reference to the non-material nature of man. The use grew from the concept that the heart is essential to physical life. It was a natural transition to bring the term over to the spiritual world as was done by the time of the ministry of Jesus. The New Testament sees the heart figuratively as the centre of the real person, the centre of spiritual life.

* Oswald Chambers recognizes this centrality of the heart:

'According to the Bible the heart is the centre: The centre of physical life, the centre of mercy, the centre of damnation and salvation, the centre of God's working and the centre of the devil's working, the centre from which everything works which molds the human mechanism'.

* The heart physically is the centre from which life is dispersed to the body, so the heart figuratively is the centre from which spiritual vitality is spread to the personality.

Chambers explains:

'The heart is not merely the seat of affections, it is the centre of everything. The heart is the central altar and the body is the outer court. What we offer on the altar of the heart will tell ultimately through the extremities of the body'.

* Emotion, intellect, will and the power of morality are all aspects of the heart and are included in the make-up of a normal child when born into the world.

* First, the heart is said to be the centre of intellect.

* The second function within the heart is that of emotions.

* The third function of the heart is moral consciousness.

* Volition or the will is the last function of the heart.