THE TRUE HEART (Heb.10:22)

The dictionary defines “true” as genuine, a word we would commonly regard as the opposite of false.  However, naturalistic definitions may not apply in spiritual things and “true” in the Hebrew context has in view “spiritually discerning”.  The Hebrew mindset was Judaistic, taken up with form and ritual, figures or types of spiritual realities.  So, in writing “let us draw near with a true heart” to Jewish believers, Paul was using “true” as opposed to figurative, urging approach to God from the spiritual (christian) standpoint.

“True” as distinct from figurative was an expression employed by the Lord Jesus, e.g. “the True Bread”, “the True Vine”, “the True God” and by the apostle in the Hebrew epistle, “the true tabernacle” and “the true heart”.

It is instructive to note that the naturalistic, Jewish mindset was perpetuated by Christendom from its earliest beginnings and is also prevalent among believers gathered to the Lord’s name, with resultant misinterpretation of Scripture.

As the word “true” is of spiritual interpretation, so also is “heart”, denoting the seat of perception, and in the Christian context the new nature as in I Peter 3:4 “the hidden man of the heart”.

The natural equivalent is apparent in Mark 2:6 “and some of the scribes were sitting there reasoning in their hearts”.  Similarly, in Eph.4:17-18 “this I say therefore and testify in the Lord, that you should no longer walk as the Gentiles walk, in the futility of their mind, having their understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart”.  Just as the “heart” in this context is not the organ that pumps blood around the body, so neither is it divorced from the mind, as some would have us believe.

So, it is apparent that the “true heart” speaks of spiritual intelligence, a heart that is able to distinguish types or shadows from spiritual realities, earthly things from heavenly, temporal from eternal, secular from divine; in short, a heart that discerns things that differ.  It is in this frame of mind (heart) that we should approach God and the things of God, understanding what God has made us in Christ – “nigh by the blood” and “accepted in the Beloved”.