The Overflow of the Heart

Matthew 12:33-36

"But I tell you that men will have to give account on the day of judgement for every careless word they have spoken" (Matthew 12:36).

You might figure that this is a nice text for extreme introverts since they speak so little, they don't stand a chance of saying a careless word. But what about the talkers, the stay-up-all-night-gabbing-until-their-audience-falls-asleep-ers? The can't shut-upers? Do they even have a chance? Will heaven be full of just really quiet people who attained saintliness through silence? I don't think so.

Just a verse before in Matthew 12:35, we learn that "the good man brings good things out of the good stored up in him, and the evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in him" (Matthew 12:35). If we are judged by what we are saying, it is because God is measuring our hearts. "For out of the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks" (Matthew 12:34).

In some ways God's measurement of our hearts is startling. Our culture's cure for a former love affair with a "vindictive God" has been to domesticate him--to paint him as only concerned with our happiness and not particularly worried about our holiness. But God's judgement is the same as a doctor's diagnosis or a teacher's honest appraisal of a student's work. It is given to cure. He must tell us who we are. He says, "You say, ‘I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing.’ But you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked" (Revelation 3:17).

Thankfully he never leaves us where we are. He said, "I counsel you to buy from me gold refined in the fire, so you can become rich; and white clothes to wear, so you can cover your shameful nakedness; and salve to put on your eyes, so you can see" (Revelation 3:18). "And I will give you a new heart, and I will put a new spirit in you. I will take out your stony, stubborn heart and give you a tender, responsive heart" (Ezekiel 36:26).


*I know some people who would find a place full of quiet people paradise.