Weeding the Heart

by Allen Avery Jr.

“Take every thought to make it obedient to Christ … Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry … See to it that … no bitter root grows up” (2 Cor. 10:5, Eph. 4:26, Heb. 12:15).

“Take every thought to make it obedient to Christ … Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry … See to it that … no bitter root grows up” (2 Cor. 10:5, Eph. 4:26, Heb. 12:15).

I looked up at the fast approaching rain shower and gunned the Honda 250cc motorcycle up the embankment of the railroad. The front tire began to slide along the rain-splattered steel rail, flipping the bike on its side and pinning my leg to the rail. After pulling myself out from under the motorcycle, I stared at the two-dozen eggs I’d been carrying, now smashed and dripping.

I stood shaking with a built up rage that had been simmering in my heart for years. In my mind I heard the words, “Allen, I am afraid of you!” It was then I realized how desperate my heart situation had become because of the corrosive effects of years of resentment and anger. I should have been thanking God that my leg was not broken, but instead my anger flew out of control. How could I have gotten to the point where I found myself exploding? How could a missionary let himself get into this spiritual state?

Unfortunately, through the years I have seen this same pattern repeated scores of times in the lives of my fellow missionaries. It happens because we forget the basic principles of spiritual warfare and the deceitfulness of sin. Missionaries have a special proclivity that allows Satan to take advantage of us. Oddly, our special weakness is our deep, emotional attachment to the people we serve.

At the beginning of our first tour in Africa in 1969, you couldn’t have found a person more committed to being a missionary to Africa. After the honeymoon was over in my adjustment cycle, I began to see that the political and economic situation was serious. The president made decisions that began the country’s rapid decline into abject poverty. With each new law or action that beggared the people we loved, resentment and anger flooded my heart. Before many years had passed, I found myself hating the president and the government he ran. The more I saw the relatively stable and livable lifestyle of our village friends being destroyed, the more it fed my angry emotions. My heart became completely embittered.

In my spiritual naiveté, I was unable to see that the resentment and anger I harbored was a spiritual Trojan horse for Satan. I absolved myself because I knew I had correctly evaluated the situation.

What I had failed to understand spiritually was that every thought must be made captive to Christ and filtered through his Word. The battleground is the mind. The thoughts we allow to reside in our hearts dictate our spiritual health and victory.

Satan does not care if our anger is generated from things true or false. Irrespective, the devil rides each thought of uncaptured anger right into our hearts. I still believe I had analyzed the political and economic situation correctly, but Satan simply laughed at my spiritual dim-wittedness and took up residence in my heart. Ironically, he shielded himself behind my correct evaluation of the situation.

Harbored anger is always spiritually corrosive. That’s why Paul said that anger must be dealt with before the sun sets (Eph. 4:26). When anger takes up residence in a person’s heart it provides Satan with a place or an opportunity. Picture him digging his claws into that part of our sinful flesh, getting a deeper and deeper grip on our lives as he pours out his venom and deception into our hearts through that unresolved anger.

So, how can we capture every thought for Christ? To use a rural analogy, the answer is weeding. Jesus told the parable of the four soils. The third soil actually appears to be good soil. The problem was that the weeds were left to grow. The good soil is soil that has been cleared of weeds and then continues to be weeded. Any African farmer will tell you that corn needs at least two major weeding efforts for the crop to grow properly.

Have I won the battle? No. But, now I know how Satan has built strongholds in my heart. He did it by encouraging me to accept one thought at a time, one untested and unbowed thought at a time. As weeds in the soil they soon became a stronghold that was not easy to tear down. It was plated with a veneer of truth and cemented by my self-righteousness. Only by not giving excuses and by calling my angry, cynical thoughts sin, what they really are, was I able to begin destroying what dominated my life.

Honest confession is the only doorway to holiness. I invite you to ask yourself, “When was the last time you weeded your heart?”

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Allen Avery Jr. has served in church planting and leadership training in Zambia and Zimbabwe since 1969. He is field supervisor for African Outreach Ministries based in South Africa.

EMQ, Vol. 40, No. 2, pp. 148-149. Copyright © 2004 Evangelism and Missions Information Service (EMIS). All rights reserved. Not to be reproduced or copied in any form without written permission from EMIS.

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