Ezekiel 36:26-27 And I will give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit within you; and I will take the stony heart out of their flesh, and will give them an heart of flesh: And I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shall keep my judgments, and do them.

Real change is what God does to you and in you. That is something that you cannot do for yourself. You cannot decide this sounds right and claim it by force of will. No amount of willful knowledge will result in a change that is acceptable to God. It does not work that way.

God demands in all His Holiness, Love, Mercy, Grace and Justice that our rebellion must end and that we surrender our will to His. We must accept Jesus Christ as Lord before He will becomes our Savior.

We spoke about the broken heart and the contrite mind. That is the position in which surrender can happen, but it does not mean it does happen. At that point you have to surrender your own will and subject yourself to the will of God.

All the promises are contingent on surrender. Have you surrendered? If the answer to that is yes, then allow me to ask the next difficult question. Do you still make the decisions?

I would venture that the majority of earnest Christians answer that question yes. There is a difference between making decision and making choices. God gave us free will to make choices but those choices are contingent upon knowing God’s will for our lives.

Psalm 27:4 One thing have I desired of the Lord, that will I seek after; that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the Lord, and to enquire in his temple.

Psalm 63:1 O God, thou art my God; early will I seek thee: my soul thirsteth for thee, my flesh longeth for thee in a dry and thirsty land, where no water is;