Deuteronomy 6:6 And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart.

Psalm 19:14 Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, my rock and my redeemer.

Jeremiah 11:8 Yet they did not obey or incline their ear, but everyone walked in the stubbornness of his evil heart. Therefore I brought upon them all the words of this covenant, which I commanded them to do, but they did not.”

Luke 8:12 The ones along the path are those who have heard; then the devil comes and takes away the word from their hearts, so that they may not believe and be saved.

Luke 8:15 As for that in the good soil, they are those who, hearing the word, hold it fast in an honest and good heart, and bear fruit with patience.

Romans 10:8 But what does it say? “The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart” (that is, the word of faith that we proclaim);

Colossians 3:16 Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God.

Hebrews 4:12 For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.

Colossians 3:15 And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful.

After my father died I repented in my heart for not reading the bible in years. At that moment God said “What is stopping you from starting over again today?” I knew it was God and I knew the answer, “Nothing”.So I went home that night and began diligently reading nothing but the bible.

Some weeks later I was at the food court in the mall with my bible and a yellow tablet writing down meaningful passages. A man came along and was looking over my shoulder and commented, “I see you are writing a sermon.”

When he left I looked at the passages I had copied and he was right.

I was writing a sermon to myself.

That was when I took it to mean that God wanted me to return to church. So I did.

But which church? My boss at the time was an elder in a local church. I had heard him ministering to family and church members on the phone since his office was the cubicle next to mine. It was like grace came over the wall and landed on me. This sounded like a good place to start.

My church journey returned that next Sunday.

Luke 18:13-14 English Standard Version

13 “But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’ 14 I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”

Yesterday we quoted text that indicated “This is the Way, walk in it.” Every path has an entry point, a place to make that first step on our journey towards our final destination. In this passage there are hints for each of us to identify that entry point.

The first is seen in shame, a feeling that things are not going right because of things that we have done to cause us to feel guilt. Beating of the chest indicates that those emotions of shame are deeply felt.

The tricky part of the second issue is that when we speak from our heart, the words do not have to match the words used by the tax collector. ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’ My prayer, that moment when the Way was exposed to me, was simple. “I don’t want to be like this.” My comment was heartfelt, honest and accepted by the God that knows the heart of man, even when his words are not perfect.

I left out the part of the story in which the Pharisee pleaded his proud prayer. This cannot be about what others do wrong but rather what we need to do to recognize God is trying to call us out from under the curse of our enemy. The enemy is sin, and the curse is spiritual death. This is validated by the tax collector by admitting he is a sinner.

Do we have to call ourselves sinners to be saved? Apparently if we feel it in our heart, that is enough for God to respond in the affirmative.

Being shown the opening to the Way is just a first step. Entering the Way is a journey of faith and the next step determines if in fact you are still on the path or have wandered off at the very beginning of our journey.

Genesis 12:1 The Call of Abram

Now the Lord said to Abram, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you.”

Abram, the father of faith, was told to leave everything behind and go to a country that was unidentified. A promise was made that the path would be shown but nothing more. This is the issue of faith. Faith comes from God which allows us to hear God, believe God and obey God.

The interesting part of this tale is that Abram did not obey God until Abram’s father died in Haran. I did not enter the Way and begin my walk of faith until after my own father died.