By Don Schatz

Create in me a pure heart, O God

“Create in me a pure heart, O God….”

Psalm 51:10 New International Version

I’m guessing you know the expression, “Have a heart!”  One usually exclaims those three words when someone does not seem to have a heart.  We expect sympathy.  We expect empathy.  We expect compassion.  We expect patience.  We expect a demonstration that one cares.  And none of that shows up.  ‘Come on, man, have a heart.’

Does it ever strike you as interesting that when we encounter someone who doesn’t seem to have a heart, this expression urges them to have what, by definition, they do not have.  How are they supposed to get it?  Or how are we supposed to get it, if we are the ones who ‘don’t have a heart?

King David of Old Testament fame knew the answer.  I cannot ‘get a heart’ of the sort he sought on my own.  Nor could he.  “Create in me a pure heart, O God,” David prayed.  The pure heart, the heart of sympathy, empathy, compassion, patience and caring is God’s work.

The Christian season of Advent is about the God who displays his creative heart in the message of the Coming Messiah.  This display in the beauty of the Gospel story creates that heart in us.  God’s heart.  God’s sympathy.  God’s empathy.

God’s compassion.  God’s patience.  God’s heart in the person of his Christ.  Our hearts, by his grace, beat in a divine rhythm.  They beat synchronized with God’s own heart.  The Lord is doing that for us and in us today.  Everyday.  There is a heart in there somewhere.  A beating heart of grace at the center.

No one needs to say to you, “Have a heart!”  You already have one.  A clean heart.  A pure heart.  God’s heart.  God’s love.  God’s Christ.  His heart stopped beating on the cross.  The moment it did, our hearts had hope.  Hope that they would beat again, a pure heart beating out the wonder of God who comes to us in Christ.

Feel your pulse today.  Can you feel your heart beating?  Amen, Come Lord Jesus.  Beat out your Gospel in my heart.  Amen.

Copyright, Holy Cross Lutheran Church, Colorado Springs, Colorado