Perhaps you’ve noticed the conflict within. In your mind, you hold a set of beliefs, probably with great conviction. You can argue them, defend them, maybe even prove them. But in your heart, you hold another set of beliefs with at least as much conviction. You may not spend time defending them—you may not even be aware of them—but you do live them out. What you believe in your head and what you believe in your heart are two different things. And what you actually do proves which one is stronger.
In many ways, discipleship is a matter of closing the gap between what we know intellectually and how our hearts respond to what we know. Sometimes it’s the other way around; God puts something in our hearts, and our minds have to catch up with it. Either way, there’s a gap, and closing it can be a lifelong process. Ultimately, we want our mental beliefs and heart beliefs to line up perfectly.
If you want to know what your strongest beliefs are, watch what you do. And if what you do doesn’t fit your goals for yourself, don’t simply try to change the behavior. Go after your own heart and mind. Ask God to transform them. Your actions will inevitably flow from your deep-down beliefs, and your deep-down beliefs inevitably come from God’s Spirit and your response to him. That’s the front line of your daily battle, and that’s where real change happens. And it’s where God wants to work in you every single day.
