Proverbs 4:23

 "Watch over your heart with all diligence, for from it flow the springs of life."     --  Proverbs 4:23 

Proverbs 23:7 puts it another way: in our usual slight misquotation, "As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he."

I remember a quote from a pastor, who credited it to Harry Truman: "What's down in the well comes up in the bucket."  (Trying to track down that saying's origin, I find it's been ascribed to numerous people besides Truman, including a slightly different form by evangelist Vance Havner.)  That puts Proverb's wisdom pretty well.

But I didn't realize until I started pondering and studying Proverbs 4:23 how often Jesus alludes to its wisdom:

 "...how can you, being evil, speak what is good?  For the mouth speaks out of that which fills the heart."

                                                                                                                                       --  Matthew 12:34

"But the things that proceed out of the mouth come from the heart, and those defile the man." -- Matt. 15:18

"For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed the evil thoughts."  --  Mark 7:21

^"The good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth what is good; and the evil man out of the evil treasure brings forth what is evil; for his mouth speaks from that which fills his heart."  --  Luke 6:45 

Proverbs' take on man's spiritual identity is exactly that of Jesus: man's identity is always in God's moral terms...and shows in all that a man does, as either righteous or evil.

John puts that wisdom even more succinctly: "By this the children of God and the children of the devil are obvious (my emphasis: other translations say "manifest"): anyone who does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor the one who does not love his brother." (I John 3:10).

The set-up of the old joke is profoundly right: "There are only two kinds of people..."

Test Your Spiritual Discernment Here !!

                                                                                                                                                              
                                                                                                                                                              
                                                                                                                                                              

Reading I John, this series of verses caught my attention:

I John 2:18 says there are already "many anti-Christs" around us.

I John 3:10 says the children of God and the children of the devil "are obvious."

I John 4:1 says we should "test the spirits to see whether they are from God."

That set of scriptures sounds like a challenge: or rather, when God says it, a command.

Since I John is where God gives His main teaching about anti-Christ, maybe He wants us
to check and see if our spiritual discernment is functioning well enough to spot him.

Jesus told us in John 8:44 what's obvious about "sons of the devil:" like their father, they
love lies, and they love murder (and Jesus says in Matthew 5:21-2 that "murder" is angry
contempt for other people).

There's our spiritual check-list.

Of course, we should first run the test on ourselves:  do we love lies and murder ?  If so,
we have to repent before we presume to run that check on anyone elses' spirit.

O.K., done.

Now...looking around ourselves, testing in today's world to see if our spiritual discernment
is in working order...can we spot any of the "many anti-Christs" out there ?

It shouldn't be hard: as John rightly says, they are obvious.