The Jeff Cavins Show (Your Catholic Bible Study Podcast) - Reversing Spiritual Heart Disease

Episode Date: May 26, 2023

What does it mean to have a “hardened heart”? This phrase is used a number of times in Scripture, and today, Jeff explains what it means. He also describes what can cause our own hearts to harden and what we can do to avoid those things. Snippet from the Show When we face trials in life, we have the choice to either turn to the Lord or turn away from him. Email us with comments or questions at [e-mail]. Text “jeffcavins” to 33-777 to subscribe and get Jeff’s shownotes delivered straight to your email! Or visit ascensionpress.com/thejeffcavinsshow for full shownotes!

Welcome to the Jeff Kavens show, where we talk about the Bible, discipleship, and evangelization, putting it all together in living as activated disciples. This is show 325, reversing heart disease. And welcome, I'm Jeff Kavans. Thank you for joining me again, 325 shows. Many of you have been. with me from the beginning and it has been a ride just sharing for years now about Jesus discipleship Bible study evangelization health everything that's really related to being a disciple of the Lord well maybe the title of today's show got your attention reversing heart disease maybe you're in one of those families where the doctor said well some of this is hereditary but there's things that you can do to avoid heart disease at least you know address it

head on. And so that's what we're going to talk about, but there's different kinds of heart disease. There's physical heart disease, which I think you know what we're talking about there. It is caused by diet, caused by a lack of exercise, and it's caused by stress, all of those things. But there's also a spiritual heart disease or a hardening of the heart. And that's mentioned in the scripture, which we're going to look at that whole story of fair. and how God hardened his heart. One of the, I think that's probably one of the five most asked questions in the great adventure is, one of them is harem warfare, and that's the complete utter destruction of Jericho.

But then people always will ask that question, how could God harden Pharaoh's heart? How could he harden Pharaoh's heart? That seems unfair. Did God just need a character in the Old Testament who he could harden their heart and sorry Pharaoh but you were the guy no not not at all so we're going to look at heart disease from a spiritual perspective but as I do that I would really encourage you to think about the physical as well I think the two go hand in hand I remember when I went to Mayo Clinic I've mentioned this before I had a wonderful doctor there he's retired now but I ended up meeting Dr. Emmett suit who was in

charge of alternative medicine at Mayo, which he started to establish that program years ago. And from what I understand now, that has actually spread throughout the country. And in that department, they're not interested in all the lab work necessarily. And they're not interested in all of the tests that have been run. There's another doctor that will look at all of that. But Dr. Seward was interested in other things when it came to overall health or, you know, what some doctors are calling now, not just a lifespan, but a health span in your life. So when you met with Dr. Seward, he would ask you questions like, do you have any

unforgiveness? Do you have a regular regimen of gratitude in your life? Is there bitterness, envy in your life? All of these things that you and I talk about all the time in the context of being a disciple. His thesis really is that those are the things that will contribute to heart disease. And I can't remember if he said more or less, and I'm not going to quote him on that, but it was very serious and it was competitive with the diet and the exercise and stress, you know, in your life. So there is definitely a correlation here, and you can listen for that as we move on here. So heart disease is responsible for a high percentage of deaths in America. It's related to what we eaten, stress, and so forth. But a common question that people have

that I mentioned is, why would God harden Pharaoh's heart? And did he just need a villain? Now, here's the scripture that we're going to look at. And that is Exodus chapter 4 and verse 21. At least this is the kickoff point, hey? It says, The Lord said to Moses, when you go back to Egypt, see that you perform before Pharaoh all the wonders which I have put in your power. But I will harden his heart so that he will not let the people go. Now, when you first look at that,

it's so easy to come to the conclusion that it's like that old song, God put a spell on him. You know, God just said, well, sorry. Pharaoh, I needed a villain in the story. You're the guy. It's just the way it is, and I'm really, really sorry about that. But here, I'm going to harden your heart. There's nothing you can do about it. It's just the way it is. It's going to play out in the narrative. Well, that isn't what God said at all, is it? I want to draw here for a few minutes, you know, off and on from something that Dr. Tim Gray and I wrote in the book, Walking with God, a journey through the Bible, which I'll put that in the show notes for you. You can get it at ascension press. I think it's one of the best books ever in terms of telling the narrative of salvation history. And in there, when we talk about the Egypt and Exodus period, I mentioned that there are 20 times in the opening chapters of Exodus that we are told of Pharaoh's hardening heart. Ten times, God hardens Pharaoh's heart. Ten times it is Pharaoh himself.

So you have these 20 times that that takes place. So 20 times it's quite a few. Now the Hebrew word translated harden is Chavad. Chavad, you can spell it K-A-V-E-D, and it means to make heavy. It's kind of similar to Chavod, which is the word for glory, and that is to be weighty. And so to have a heavy heart had a particular significance for ancient Egyptians. Among the tombs and temples in ancient Egypt, it was conval. to find inscriptions depicting the final judgment of the dead as carried out by the weighing

of a person's heart on a scale. Maybe you've heard this before that when the Egyptians would die, they would weigh the heart. And each heart was weighed against a feather, a feather representing truth and justice, two things. And if someone's heart was heavy, that person was condemned. And the Exodus narrative, Pharaoh's heart is being weighed against the scales of truth and justice. And each time he refuses to follow God's command, an acts against God and justice, his heart becomes heavier. God is making Pharaoh's heart heavy in as much as he gives a just command that Pharaoh refuses to follow. In the end, the heaviness of Pharaoh's heart will condemn him, not because God forced him to harden his heart, but because he was found wanting in his response to the demands

of justice and truth. Very concise explanation of what it means to have your heart hardened. Now, another example of this is in Deuteronomy 2 in verse 30. But Ceyon, king of Heshbon, was not willing for us to pass through his land. Now, that verse, to back up just a moment, that verse is dealing with Israel under the leadership of Moses going out of the wilderness after 40 years and finding themselves in the plains of Moab just ready to come in across the Jordan to take the land under Joshua. up. Now, Cian and Ogg were the two kings that they defeated over there. And one of the reasons was is that Cian, king of Hesbun, would not allow Israel to pass through his part of the land so that they

could take Canaan. So that's the context. And it says in Deuteronomy 2 in verse 30, but Cian, king of Hesbun, was not willing for us to pass through his land. For the Lord your God hardened his heart and made his heart obstinate in order to deliver him into your hand as he is today. Now again, you've got the same example there that God did not harden his heart. His heart was hardened in as much as Cion, like Pharaoh previously, was stubborn and did not respond to truth and justice. And so as a result of not responding, your heart becomes hardened. Jeremiah, the prophet said in chapter 16 and verse 20 i'll put it in the show notes you too have done evil even more than your forefathers for behold you are each one walking according to the stubbornness of his own evil

heart without listening to me and then he goes on in chapter 19 and says jeremiah that is but they will reply it's no use we will continue with our own plans each of us will follow the stubbornness of his evil heart isn't that something You know, and in the New Testament, Jesus talks about this in Matthew 15 when he says, For the heart of this people has become dull. With their ears, they scarcely hear, and they have closed their eyes. Otherwise, they would see with their eyes, hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and return. And I would heal them.

So, a hardened heart. Oh, here's one too. listen to this in Mark 8. I'll put it in the show notes. It talks about how a hardened heart weakens a person's ability to perceive, to hear, to understand, and even to remember. Jesus warns his own disciples about this in Mark chapter 8. Listen to what he says here and listen as a disciple, okay? Aware of their discussion. Jesus was aware of the discussion of some people and people are always trying to trip him up. Aware of their discussion, Jesus asked them, why are you talking about having no bread?

Now, he's talking in this particular situation about the disciples. Now, many times he addresses people who are trying to mess him up or trick him and so forth. I want to back up just a minute. This one, this particular one, is talking about the disciples. And that's why he asks them, are you talking about having no bread? Why are you talking about that? Do you still not see or understand? And then he says, are your hearts hardened?

Now he's saying that to the disciples. And that blew my mind, you know, in light of what we're talking about. It's one of those things where you read and sometimes you don't perceive. And for me, this particular reading out of Mark chapter 8 versus 17 through 19 just came alive to me in this preparation as I was thinking about a hardened heart. are your hearts hardened he said do you have eyes but fail to see and ears but fail to hear and don't you remember when i broke the five lows for the five thousand and how many basketfuls of pieces did you pick up so paul spells this out as well and i want to read this and as i'm reading it this is a romans chapter one i want you to listen real carefully to what paul says

surrounding this topic of a hardened heart because we as disciples of Jesus, we would fool ourselves if we thought that there was no way that we could have a hardened heart. It's a question that people ask sometimes, particularly when they go to spiritual direction or confession, they want to know, do I have a hardened heart? Just like that sin, you know, you can have a sin against the Holy Spirit is unforgivable. and people oftentimes worry and ask, is that me, Lord? Is that me? And, you know, the odds are that if you're concerned about this, it's probably not, but it's good for every man to check his own heart. So listen to what Paul said about the condition of your heart. In Romans chapter 1, 18 through 24, he said,

the wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness since what may be known about God is plain to them because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world, God's invisible qualities, his eternal power and divine nature have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse. Now listen to this, he says, for although they knew God, they neither glorified. glorified him as God, nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened.

Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles. Therefore, God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual. impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. Now, when you go back and you look at that, you know, Paul said that, he said, although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile. And their foolish hearts were darkened. Now, this can happen if we don't stay on top of it. We can actually have a hardened heart, which is something we certainly don't want to. We don't want to. We don't want to respond in a poor way to truth and justice, to the voice of the Lord and the commands

of the Lord. So when we come back from the break, I have for you a number of tips on how to deal with this topic going forward and some things to watch out for in our own hearts because we don't want a hardened heart. You're listening to the Jeff Kaven show. Hi, my name is Father Mike Schmitz, and we know, right, as disciples of Jesus, we need to be encountering God's word on a regular basis. We need God's word to transform our minds, to move our hearts, and yet if you're anything like me, sometimes you sit down to read the Bible and just fall asleep. Or you get caught up in the names and the events, it can be a confusing set of books.

We've created an answer. The answer, we think, is the Catholic Bible in a year podcast. It is produced by Ascension and hosted by me. For more information, you can go to Ascension Press. com slash Bible any year. Welcome back talking about having a hardened heart. We looked before the break at Pharaoh and, you know, we read the scripture where it says God hardened Pharaoh's heart and we kind of dealt with that misconception that people have that the Lord just sort of did that to him and said, there, your heart is hardened. And we looked at the fact that a hardened

heart comes as a result of resisting God, resisting truth, resisting justice, resisting the ways of God. When you do that, your heart can be affected. So there's a number of things that lead to this hardened heart as disciples these days. Let me give you four of them right off the bat here. Number one, sin, obviously, leads to a hardened heart. Sin leads to a hardened heart. Because sin is either thoughts, decisions, actions, it is our resistance to God's ways and our insistence on our own will to be done. It is living a life that is contrary to God's ways, and that my friend does have an impact, not only on your spiritual heart, but on your physical heart as well. You're not created for sin. I can give you a lie detector test this week, and

if you're lying, the odds are it's going to show. Why? You're not meant for lying. Your body just trembles. Your blood pressure rises. Your sweat glands begin to react. You blush every, you know, your heartbeat. You're not created for it. You're not created for sin. And it will eventually harden your heart. When we don't repent, our heart grows harder until we can't hear God at all. we don't see sin as sin any longer. In fact, we end up with spiritual arterial sclerosis. And that is that the life of God is not getting to us, to our heart. We've cut ourselves off from the life supply, from the grace of God. We cut ourselves off and we have a hardened heart. I don't know about you. I have an idea about you, but I don't know completely about you. And that is, wow,

that's dangerous. I don't want that happening in my life. I don't want to take a chance on a hardened heart. And so I have to stay on top of sin. I have to confess it as sin. I have to go to confession. I'm not going to risk this. And a lot of people will say, oh, I'm not going to risk heart disease and have a heart attack at, you know, 50 years old. And so they're either vegans or they eat fish or it's, you know, they've got all kinds of diets, a carnivore and, you know, vegetarian and seafood, whatever, and they're really on a very strict pattern of eating because they're taking it very, very seriously. My friend, we need to take this very, very seriously. The condition of our heart. Number two, the first one's sin. Number two, pride leads to a hardened

heart. Pride does. Moses tells us that it was Farrell's problem. Pride. Pride. And pride is when you have this exaggerated estimation of yourself in relationship to God in relationship to one another. Where on the other side of that, humility is a proper understanding of who you are in relationship to God and who you are in relationship to your brothers and sisters in the body of Christ. But pride is, it's really a problem because pride is what keeps us from praying. the catechism tells us that humility is the foundation of prayer and if you have pride prayer is going to be very difficult primarily because you've got the idea and you bought it hook line and sinker that you don't need god you can do this yourself it's the american way pull yourself up by the bootstraps right so pride is very very detrimental to your heart condition both physically and and spiritually and of course we know that scripture says that pride goes before a fall. And this was the problem with Adam and Eve. You know, when they fell, it was due to pride, and they failed to trust God as their father. They lost that connection. So sin definitely

leads to a hardened heart, and pride does as well. And then we have another that can lead to a hardened heart, which is great disappointment. Great disappointment can lead to a hardened heart. you are hurt you are crushed but you don't turn to the lord in that pain instead you self-medicate or you blame god or you keep god at arm's length because after all that didn't work my child is dead and so when there is a great disappointment in our lives we can we can either go closer to the lord in that or we can run away from the lord and so points of disappointment trials in our lives can become a test for our heart. How will our heart respond to that difficult situation? Well, we know what Pharaoh's heart was. He gave all kinds of promises. You know,

okay, you can do it. You can go out there. And then after the children of Israel were on their way out of bondage and the sea, the Red Sea opened up. What did Pharaoh do? He changed his heart. He changed his mind. And he went after Israel. And that's when the waters came down upon him. So great disappointments. We need to watch the condition of our heart when great disappointments come. And if you're experiencing that in your life right now, wow, I would really encourage you to get spiritual direction, at least go to confession and say, I'm in a disappointing period of my life. Something has happened. And my heart's in the balance right now. I want to protect it. There's another one, number four, and that is,

is the cares of this world. The cares of this world. You remember that parable that Jesus taught about the sowers, planting the seeds, and there was different kinds of ground, and the seed fell on those different kinds of ground, and it was unfruitful. And one of the bits of ground that the seed fell on was the type of ground where the seed is choked. It's choked. It's snuffed out. Why? the desire for riches and the cares of this world. So preoccupied us that it literally snuffed the life right out of that seed. Apathy sometimes is a sister sin to this idea of paying too much attention to the cares of the world and not turning to the Lord. Apathy. So those are some things that really do contribute to a hardened heart. Now,

I love a couple scriptures here, and I want to share these with you because then I want to share with you three things to remember to fight spiritual heart disease. Three keys to fight spiritual heart disease. Now, listen to these two texts, both from Psalms. The first one is Psalm 139, 23 through 24, and it's going to be in the show notes in just a matter of a minute. It says, search me, oh God. Salma says, search me, O God, and know my heart. Test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me and lead me in the way everlasting. I love that scripture when we talk about the heart. Psalm 139, 23, and 24, search me, oh God, and know my heart. Test me and know my anxious

thoughts. That's a beautiful prayer. Lord, search my heart. come to know my heart tell me who i am show me the condition of my soul lord i don't want to go on automatic pilot lord i don't want to just wake up every day and and just do what's in front of me and act like you're not there like some kind of practical atheism lord i want you i want you to search me and then also in psalm 119 through 11 just a portion of it here the psalmist says how can a young man keep his way pure by living according to your word i seek you with all my heart do not let me stray from your commands i have hidden your word in my heart that i might not sin against you my dear friend one of the best ways to to maintain heart health spiritual heart health is to make sure that god's word

is hidden in your heart and that means you need to eat your spiritual vegetables every single day. You need to eat a proper diet. You need to exercise. You need to diminish the stress in your spiritual life, in your heart. I love that. I have hidden your word in my heart. A couple suggestions there. One is start memorizing favorite scriptures. Treat it as a balm of Gilead. Treat it as a medicine. Put it in your heart. Memorize it. Cherish it. It'll come up and speak to you at wonderful moments. It will strengthen your heart when you really need it, but you've got to put it in your heart. It's not going to happen by magic. You're not going to wake up tomorrow morning and say, how'd that get in my heart?

No, you've got to put the word of God in your heart. You've got to hide it there. That's so important when it comes to spiritual heart disease, is to make sure that his word is in your heart. And so if you have a hard heart, number one, admit it. admit it and turn to the Lord with all your might go to confession and here are three things to remember to fight spiritual heart disease okay it's very simple and it's very similar to physical heart disease number one eat well what do we have to eat that will that will reverse spiritual heart disease well the two biggies are the eucharist which is the body and blood

soul and divinity of Jesus, and number two, the Word of God, the bread from heaven. The bread from heaven is the Eucharist. The Word of God is like manate to our soul as well. God gives us His Word. At the heart of every Christian's diet should be the Eucharist as often as possible and the Word of God. That's very, very important. If you are struggling with a hardened heart right now and you are dull to his hearing because of of wandering away and sin in your life.

You need to turn it around by saying, you know what, I'm not going to eat that junk food anymore. I am not going to sit there and watch three hours of network news every night. Don't do that. Man, don't do that to yourself. When you're dead,

they're going to look in your spiritual arteries and they're going to see all kinds of things that didn't need to be there. Eat well, the Euchar. the Word of God. Number two, give your stress and cares to the Lord. I love what Peter said. He said, cast your cares upon the Lord for he cares for you. You need to minimize the stress in your life. And how do you do that? You learn to walk with the Lord and trust the Lord. You walk by faith. Faith is intellectually acknowledging God's truth, but it's also a personal and trusting of yourself.

with God's truth. And so the way that you, you lessen that stress is you take that off of yourself and you throw this on the Lord. You cast your cares upon the Lord. You forgive people. You don't carry on forgiveness. You walk in mercy. You are gentle with people. You are slow to speak, slow to anger, quick to hear. I could go on and on with this. But this is how we deal with stress. Stop worrying about what people think of you. Pride, go away. Seek the Lord. Number three, so number one, we've got eat well, number two, deal with the stress. Number three, get exercise. Well, how do we get exercise that will benefit our spiritual heart? Well, do the word of God. That's it. Don't be a hearer only, but be a doer. A hearer only, they're just deceiving themselves. They're not

really doing it listen do you have relatives in your family and maybe it's you i'm not i'm not here to judge but you have people i'll just say people in your life not relatives or anything but just you know people in your life that they go to the doctor because they want a solution to their problem and they go there and the doctor says all right here's what you need to do you need to eat well i want you to get some counseling for your stress and i want you to get some exercise at least 30 minutes of of walking vigorously three times a week, 90 minutes a week. And you look at, you know that person's looking at the doctor and saying, wait a minute, don't you got a pill for that?

Don't you got a pill for me? I thought you were going to give me a pill. Doctor says, there's no pill for what you have. You need to eat well. You need to get rid of the stress and you need to exercise. And so they go home and guess what they don't do. They don't eat well. They don't get rid of the stress.

and they don't exercise and things get worse and so they go to a oh they go to a specialist this time looking for a pill and the specialist says eat well deal with the stress and get exercise but there's something very i don't know sneaky about this and that is that we have a way of thinking that if we went to the doctor we dealt with the situation when we really didn't we just found out what we're supposed to do just like when you go to confession and then you are told what to do and you don't do it. Kind of deceive ourselves, don't we? So those are the three things that I would leave you with this week

and really encourage you to dive into it and just go to the Lord and say, Lord, I need to check up, I need to know the ways of my heart, search my heart, let me know who I am I, what area of my heart do you want to deal with, and then focus on the eating and the stress and the exercising or the doing. of the word of God, doing the will of God in your life. Amen? Good talking to you. Let's pray.

Name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Lord Jesus, we love you and we thank you for your word and we thank you for the Eucharist and the church and the blessed mother and the saints and all that you have given us to live a godly life. Lord Jesus, help us to pay attention to what you've said to do in our lives to protect our hearts. Lord, search our hearts, know our hearts, our ways. And Lord, communicate to us those areas that need to change and give us the courage and the strength to do it. We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen. Name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen. I love you. Can't wait to talk to you next week.