John Murphy:
This is the Rock House Center Podcast, and I'm John Murphy.

Beth Murphy:
I'm Beth Murphy, and we're talking today about guarding your heart. Virtually every client who comes to Rock House is struggling or suffering in an emotional way because something has gotten to them, and that something is external things that have in some way affected them because of what's going on inside. The remedy for that ultimately comes around to getting at the root cause of why anything can get to us and the need to guard our hearts from that.

John Murphy:
And our approach is to focus on what's going on inside, and we talk about it from a heart perspective, what's going on in the person's heart that has set them up to have the external create that response inside that robs them of their peace. And it can be resentment or fear or dependency. There's so many things that we have discovered in our conversations with folks that have allowed a sensitivity to an external thing to rob them of their peace. So basically things around them ultimately end up controlling how life feels. And it feels very out of control to just go through life with sensitivities and you never know what it is that's going to pop up and create an issue for you and cause someone to lose their peace. And it's just so critical. The heart is really the centerpiece of where the peace is coming from. And that's why we focus there. And there's a lot of scripture that deals with or addresses or speaks to how critical it is for us to have truth in our heart so that we can have peace.

Beth Murphy:
So in the process of resolving the root cause, we're always going to be helping clients guard their heart from allowing new roots of suffering in. And addressing those existing roots that are there often get things that were set in motion in the very earliest years of their lives. And so truth is at the epicenter of what's going to guide us in both aspects of helping people. It's going to guide us to the revelation of what's at the core, what's underneath the emotional or behavioral disruption, the way in which they're stuck in life and suffering. And it's also going to be the way in which we help our clients keep their peace and avoid the loss of all those sorts of disruptions from reoccurring as life goes forward.

John Murphy:
The scripture in John 8:32 is really great, and people have heard it so many times. You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free. So there's a great example of the authority by which we help people get free of these things, is that we're using truth. Truth is the guide. And so what we're doing is we're comparing the truth of what God says about Himself, about His Son, and about the person who God loves, who is our client, and we are testing the things and looking for the things which they may be believing in, which oppose any of those truths. And that's the way it guides us, and it shows us what it is that we need to focus on. And then what's fascinating also is that that same truth can also be used as protection. The more and more in which the truth is poured in and accepted and internalized in anyone, the stronger their filter will be to avoid taking on something. Because when something from the outside comes at them, a lie comes at them or a wrong belief about themselves or about God or about anything, that if it hits this truth of what God says, then it gives them the opportunity to deflect it, to not accept it, and not to become a part of who they are and create a new sensitivity and therefore setting them up to lose their peace when something happens on the outside.

Beth Murphy:
So an important aspect of what we're talking about here with truth, we're talking about capital T, truth, in the many ways that you've referenced here, the truth of what God says about who He is, about kingdom principles, the way He has set our world in motion, and the essential foundational truth about us, life, and God, which is very different from what people occasionally will think when they read that scripture and think that we're talking about information. Like if I get correct information about a given situation or, and actually not that infrequently, we've had people say, well, what I need to know is the truthful information about what my spouse is doing. I've got to get that and know what they're doing, what they're up to, or if they've told me the truth or what, and that's what's going to make me happy or set me free. And that is absolutely not what this scripture is talking about. This is talking about the higher, big picture level of the foundational truth that we all need to live in and abide by in order to have peace, and the absence of it is what causes our disruption. So actually in that example, the thought that my peace would come from, or I would be set free by getting some information about my spouse and whether or not they're deceiving me or whatever's going on.

John Murphy:
Or about my child or about a situation that somehow that's going to give me freedom, it's not true.

Beth Murphy:
Right. So we can pursue information about what really went on in that work situation, and what did the other person say, and were they lying, or did someone accuse me? None of that's going to set me free from anything. Maybe information that you want to have for one reason or another. But that's not what this scripture is talking about. What it is talking about is the foundational truth of living in that place that God intends for us to live in His truth.

John Murphy:
Proverbs 4:23 is also a great scripture that applies here, and I think it's really wonderful in the way it's expressed to point us to the importance of guarding your heart. And it reads, keep and guard your heart with all vigilance. So there's a pretty important statement, with all vigilance. That's a pretty strong statement. We're supposed to really understand that guarding our heart is really a critical aspect of our well-being. But then it goes on to say, and above all that you guard. So anything in your world that is precious to you and you're protecting your garden, whatever that is, you're supposed to be guarding our heart at an even higher level. And why? Because for out of it flows the springs of life. So the actual well-being and the fullness of life and feeling complete and feeling at peace and being resilient in the challenges of life no matter what's coming. All of these things come because of the condition of our heart. And so we want to guard our heart to keep things out of our heart that create sensitivities and fears and resentment and torment, and we want to understand that what is in our heart determines what life feels like. And so we want to guard it to keep things out, and we want to be sensitive to what's in so we can get it out, which is a lot of what we're doing here at Rock House. But I love the second-half, I got to say it again. It talks about guarding with all vigilance, and then it goes on to say, above all that you guard. So everything in your life that you may be relying on and protecting for your sense of peace, none of those things are going to give you the peace of keeping your heart in the right place, and that's why we guard it as the most precious thing in our lives for peace.

Beth Murphy:
So just to punctuate that further with the scripture from 2 Timothy 1:14, knowing that, as in all cases, our scriptures are being quoted from the Amplified Classic Version. Guard and keep with greatest care in the precious and excellently adapted truth. So we want to keep and guard with great care and back on the Proverbs scripture, guarding our hearts because that is the wellspring of life. Out of it flows the springs of life.

John Murphy:
And also in 2 Peter, a very similar way of saying, talking about wellsprings, but in this case using well-being, which is expressing sort of the result of the wellspring is that I live in a place, I exist in a place of well-being. But this 2 Peter 1:2 scripture, which is so great, it talks about that degree of well-being we have is based on the truth about who God and Jesus are. So here you go again. It's really critical to have the truth and that the basic foundational truth that we're looking at is the capital T truth of Jesus, who is truth, and the character and the full knowledge of who God is. And I believe the reason why is because if you, to the degree that which you know them and you know how much they love you and how much you can trust them for all things, that is the source of our peace and our resilience and our certainty and our assurance about life. And so therefore, the knowledge of the reality of God and Jesus is the basis of our peace in the most foundational way, and it is so precious to how life feels. What people commonly experience here is that they don't really have a true understanding of who they are. They don't have a full understanding, and a lot of times they have a false understanding. And so God doesn't seem to be as focused on us from the perspective of being our Father and we are His child in the degree to which He loves us the same way He loves Jesus. A lot of people lose their peace just because they don't have the full understanding of who God and Jesus are and the degree to which they love them and how trustworthy they are.

Beth Murphy:
So an unguarded heart is prone to experience all kinds of disruptions and angst. When you think about it, anxiety, fear, depression, laying awake at night processing on things and going in a loop in your head, the sense of feeling alone in life or untethered, certainly anything as deep as despair. That all comes directly from an unguarded heart, sort of like having the fence down. We've unwittingly, usually, have allowed in things that have got a grip on us, and they are the antithesis of living in the truth and the peace of how much God loves you and is who He says He is. He is your protector. He is your provider. He is your comforter. He's the source of all wisdom and truth. He chose you and set you apart before the foundation of the world and finds you precious and lovable, and living in those and many other truths about how God sees you, and then just the character of God, the truly awesome character of God, is the central focus. It's the landing pad. It's the foundation of all peace in our lives.

John Murphy:
There's so many situations and a couple of great examples in scripture where when we begin to focus on the things of the world instead of focusing on truth, that's when we start getting in trouble. That's when things start coming apart. And a great example is when Peter is encouraged by Jesus to walk on the water and he starts looking at the conditions that he is in and he starts focusing on the world and the storm around him and the challenge here. And maybe this is bigger than Jesus, I don't know. But he's got his eyes off of Jesus and he's thinking about all these other things. And that brought the beginning of him sinking into the water because he wasn't focused on the truth and the authority and the power of Jesus, but was focused on something evil around him, something dark and difficult and challenging around. So we're made to focus on truth, the way in which we guard our heart and we stay at a place of peace is to focus, again, in the Bible, the word truth is capitalized, it's referring to Jesus. So as we focus on the truth of Jesus, then that is really where our peace is going to come from. And that's also going to be the basis of testing the things that come at us.

Beth Murphy:
So everything that we accept as true, things that we just assume, we want to challenge our assumptions and look at what we've been living under, what we've been accepting as true by testing it, and testing it against the truth, the truth of most especially the truth about God and Jesus and their character. And so a way to get your mind around that and how that works is the analogy of a currency inspector and the way in which they are trained to identify counterfeit bills. In that training, they don't ever look at the counterfeit bill. They just look at the real thing and study it in great detail so that when they do see a counterfeit bill, there's a tiny little ink mark on it. It jumps off the page at them, literally, because of the contrast of what they've studied and internalized so much about what the right thing looks like. That's what God wants to help train us into becoming, so that we're so tuned in, connected to Him in our heart, directly connected in our heart and mind, knowing the truth about Him, that when people say things, or we read things, or a thought goes through our mind, or we hear some message and we kind of wince, we want to recognize why are we wincing? Maybe I'm wincing because that's not true. That doesn't feel good. And so I want to take a look at why it doesn't feel good and what is it disagreeing with. Or there can be things that actually are kind of comfortable because we're so used to them, but they aren't true. And we want to connect with God and ask Him to help us identify those things, have discernment. Hear His still small voice to know when there are things that are disrupting our peace so we can bring them to Him and test them for whether or not they agree with His character and with His truth.

John Murphy:
God does not make us so that we can effectively focus on things that are evil to avoid evil. First off, there is no end to all kinds of versions of evil. And if we start trying to experience them all and understand them so that we make sure that we avoid them and we don't let them in, what's going to happen is we're going to be drawn into those things. And also, you can't remember there's a limitless number of things that people can do that oppose God's purity and God's truth. But God has made us to where we can focus on truth, we can stay in truth, and it can also help us expose lies and expose evil and expose things that are coming at us while we are focusing on truth as a very effective way for us to avoid being drawn into any evil, any lie, no matter what it is. But if we just focus on the truth, then we have the shield, we have the ability to reject an infinite number of lies and evil ideas and thoughts and practices.

Beth Murphy:
You're using the word shield actually as a reminder that this is foundational to what it means to put on the armor of God. And so you think about all the analogies in the armor of God, which is breastplate of righteousness, belt of truth. So the belt of truth kind of shores us up in establishing our armor, our defense, truly our spiritual warfare by connecting with the truth of God so that His truth is internalized and He's essentially doing the warfare on our behalf so that as we're submitting our heart to God and resisting Satan and he must flee, well, in doing that, we've got to submit our hearts to the truth of God and invite Him in to change our thinking about ourselves, life, and most especially, internalizing the truth about Him.

John Murphy:
And of course, in that category of internalizing the truth about Him, there is a lot of wrong teaching in the broad Christian culture. There are many things which are not correct, and so how do you know? When I became a believer at 26, I was uncertain. I had no background. I had nothing to test what it is I was hearing. I heard different things from different pulpits and different books and different programs. And I didn't know where to go with it and how to make those decisions. And in the middle of that uncertainty, this thought popped in my head, it has to be tested. And the way it has to be tested is it has to be consistent with the character of Christ. And that is the truth. That's the capital T truth in the Bible. That became a hugely helpful guiding thing for me, was that when I hear something, I would go, now is that like Jesus is? I mean, is that who He is? Would He do that? Is that His behavior? Would He think that way? Would He act that way? Would He react that way? Would He put forth that concept or that idea? It just was a very consistent thing that I was able to repeatedly go to and test all the things that were coming at me as a new believer, trying to figure out what the truth. And I tried to only let the things in that were consistent with His character, and it was extremely helpful at a time when I was sort of lost trying to figure out, of all these things I'm hearing, what's really the truth? And it's only going to be the truth that's going to satisfy any of us. So it is important that we get this right.

Beth Murphy:
So one of the encouraging things about that is then as you continue along in your faith and the journey of allowing God to change you and transform you, then the truth gets more and more established as the basis. And then the more that's established, then the more you're able to connect directly with God. Ask Him. Pray to Him. Ask Him for leading. Ask Him for discernment. And you can have clarity of whether or not He's leading you in a given direction or if He's warning you against something. But without a foundation of truth set up in your heart, it's very difficult to know what is my pull toward doing this or thinking this or making that decision. It's really hard to tell who's pulling you in what direction. Is this my flesh or is this a leading from God? And so foundational to getting to where that muscle is built is building the foundation of truth in your heart directly from God, directly from the Word, and what we know to be true about His character from what He's revealed about His character.

John Murphy:
So there are some specific lies that do create an erosion of our understanding of who He is and therefore our erosion of peace and well-being. The kinds of lies that we hear often from folks that come in are things like, I have to earn God's love. No, you don't. You can't earn it. You can't make Him love you more or love you less. God tests people. No, the world tests people. And we take the things that we suffer from in the world to God and He redeems them. That's His promise. He doesn't test people. And some other things like God causes my suffering. I've had people say that I have an illness and He's causing me to suffer. Scripture is very clear. He doesn't cause evil. He's not evil. It doesn't cause suffering. So these are some of the things that people are living under and so therefore they're cut off from the truth. Another one would be God could not love me if He only knew the full truth of who I am and the sins I've committed. Not true. I cannot trust God with the things that are most important to me. He's the most trustworthy place to go with the things that are important to you.

Beth Murphy:
Then it's really common for people to have fallen into a belief that if I don't get what I'm praying for, then that means that God has turned His back on me, He's distant, maybe He's mean, maybe He has something against me. We've even had people truly believe that God set me up for this pain. Very understandable—we get these beliefs by things that happen to us, often the ways in which we've been treated by what we call parents, the gods of our youth, or other people in spiritual authority. And God understands where we get all these things, but it's important for us to begin at the beginning of knowing that all those things we've said simply are not true about God. And it's certainly a lie that this problem is either too big for God, like there's just no way out of this, which means that it's too much for God. If I'm overwhelmed and overcome and there's no answer for this, then that essentially means it's too much for God. It's also a lie that it's too small to bring to God because neither of those things. God loves you intimately, knows every detail, knows your thoughts before they're fully formed and your words before they're on your lips. And there isn't any chance that He is unaware of your situation or uncaring about your situation. He wants it all. He wants your burdens. He wants to demonstrate how much He loves you. When we fall into believing stuff that's swirling around us, the threats of the world, or the enticements of the world, and that somehow those things are more truthful than what God says, and that we've got to rely on ourselves, or the sort of artificial supports of the world, that somehow I've got to rely on those dependencies other than God. We want to kind of pull ourselves up short and realize, oh wow, I've gone way down that track, and that track is causing me a lot of suffering. I need to reel myself in, Lord, and open my heart to you to establish the truth of your love and your character in my heart.

John Murphy:
So the point we're making is that there are a lot of lies that are out there that are in people's hearts, and it's so critical to know the truth. And so it's really important to test for the truth. And one of the ways that we can test the truth, obviously, is it consistent with His Word? One that I think is much easier and sort of simple, and I think it works with kind of the way we think is, would it please Him? So keep in mind that if it pleases God, the reason it pleases God is because you're going to have a blessing come from it. So it's not that He's lording over you or it's just that He wants you to do something just because He wants to control you or He just wants you to obey. Just remember His will is that He is a loving Father. So when you're asking God about whether or not, or thinking about God in terms of whether the thing you're considering would please Him, it's important to remember that the basis of His pleasure is when you are full of delight and love and you are peaceful and you are resilient and life is good for you. So I think it's probably time to go ahead and get into a prayer. So we want to pray for two things that will move you with God's help toward having a heart with more peace that does not easily take on or accept anything that will take away your well-being. So if you're interested in taking on the lies that are in your heart and replacing them with the truth of who God is and the peace that comes with it, then this prayer is something you want to follow me along with. So let's pray. Heavenly Father, I declare that only Your truth will bring me the peace and the well-being I desire and that You desire for me. I reject any belief that opposes Your truth, and I accept Your truth as the one truth for all time. Father, please heal me of how I've suffered from the lies I have believed and please shut off the access they have given to the enemy and to the world to rob me of my well-being. Father, please expose and remove any lie in my heart and replace them with Your truth. I also invite Your Spirit to invade my heart at any time to show me Your truth whenever I need to guard my heart. Thank you for protecting my heart with Your truth. I pray this in the name of Your Son, who is the truth. Amen.

Beth Murphy:
Amen. Please know that you can call us anytime at Rock House Center or connect with us online at rockhousecenter.com. If this has stirred up anything in you or a desire to know more about our resources and how they can help you, whether they're things online or counseling resources. And please, of course, always share this with a friend who you think would be blessed. So thank you for joining us.

John Murphy:
Thanks for joining us. Goodbye.