Proverbs 4:23
I have more security protecting my phone than some small businesses probably have protecting their buildings. Face ID. Passcode. Two-factor authentication. Occasionally, my phone looks at me first thing in the morning and apparently decides even Face ID needs a second opinion. We protect things that matter to us. We lock our doors. We protect our bank accounts. We create passwords so complicated that even we cannot remember them. Yet when it comes to our hearts, we can be surprisingly careless about what we allow inside.
Proverbs 4:23 says, “Guard your heart above all else, for it determines the course of your life” (NLT). That is a pretty strong statement. Above all else, guard your heart. Why? Because what gets into our hearts eventually finds its way into our lives.
What we repeatedly watch matters. What we listen to matters. The voices we trust matter. The conversations we participate in matter. The people we spend time with matter. The accounts we follow matter. The thoughts we replay over and over in our minds matter. None of those things may seem particularly significant in the moment, but they are quietly shaping something inside us.
Guarding your heart does not mean hiding from the world or becoming suspicious of everyone around you. It means paying attention to what you are allowing to influence you. Not everything that gets our attention deserves access to our hearts. Maybe that is the question we need to ask more often: What am I allowing to shape me internally?
If I constantly consume anger, I should not be surprised when I become angry. If I constantly listen to voices feeding my fear, fear will eventually shape how I see the world. If I continually compare my life to everyone else’s highlight reel, contentment does not stand much of a chance.
The opposite is also true. When I fill my heart with Scripture, spend time with Jesus, worship, pray and surround myself with people who point me toward Him, something begins changing inside me. So guard your heart. Pay attention to what gets access. Ask God to show you what has been shaping you lately. Then give His Word and His Spirit greater access than all the other voices competing for your attention. Your heart is shaping the direction of your life. It is worth protecting.