Many years ago I joined a church. I did so because I was invited by my best friend who told me that his minister was an intelligent and capable scholar. I knew little about the Bible at the time, and I trusted, perhaps gambled, on my friend's advice, and changed churches. I may have wanted something new and different, and the whole process sounded like a great adventure for a young college student.

As I studied with this gentleman and learned much of Scripture from him, I heard him say over and over again that what is important is the condition of a person's heart. If, he taught, one had a "good and honest heart," then his Christian life would follow naturally. He would make the right choices and live a life that would please God and result in heaven. He had in mind the many scriptures that speak of calling on God from a pure heart (2 Timothy 2:22), obeying from the heart (Romans 6:17), receiving the word with a good and honest heart (Luke 8:15), and the goal of teaching being love from a pure heart (1 Timothy 1:5).

I shall never forget the day when I asked him the question that was troubling my soul: "What makes the heart good and honest?" His answer, after reflecting a moment, was, "the Word." Somehow, that answer did not satisfy me, for I wondered why, if the Word made the heart good and honest, did not everyone who heard the Word then have a good and honest heart?

Many years later the Lord kindly gave me understanding. Man's heart naturally is evil (Jeremiah 17:9, Ecclesiastes 9:3, Mark 7:21, Hebrews 3:12, 2 Peter 2:14, and others). There would be no good and honest hearts were it not for God's direct and gracious intervention. Because of the Fall, man lacks the inclination or ability to create a good heart within himself or to change his bad heart to a good heart. The leopard cannot change his spots nor the Ethiopian his skin (Jeremiah 13:23). God must take away the heart of stone and give us a heart of flesh (Ezekiel 11:19; 36:26). He must create in us a clean heart (Psalm 51:10). Only God has power over the human heart.

It took many years, but I am grateful for the answer, and now I know that God alone must receive the glory for the work that He alone has done, that He alone can do!