Find information about Joy at: joybrown.org.
Today’s blog is from the book, Finding Joy, by my friend, Joy Brown. I hope you enjoy her insight for us.
After Adam sinned, he hid from God’s presence. When God came to commune with Adam in the cool of the day, He asked, “Adam, where are you?” (Gen. 3:8-9)
God’s question was rhetorical because He knew where Adam was. God is omniscient (all-knowing), omnipresent (everywhere at once) and omnipotent, (all-powerful). Hebrew scholars suggest that a better understanding of God’s question might be, “Adam, where is your heart?”
God asks each of us that same question. Like Adam, we may find ourselves hiding out, unwilling to answer. Why? Because we’ve allowed something else to take God’s place. We’ve become too busy, too material, too consumed with life and ourselves.
Blaise Paschal, the French philosopher, spoke of how empty our hearts become when we’re separated from God. Paschal said, “This infinite abyss can be filled only with an infinite and immutable object; in other words, by God Himself.”
I once learned something beautiful that took my breath away. In Hebrew, the alphabet letter shin means Almighty God (El Shaddai). If you were to see an outline of a cross-section of the human heart, you would see that it is shaped just like that letter. In other words, our hearts are formed in the shape of God’s name. That is why nothing else in the world can take God’s place in your heart. God put a portion of Himself within your heart from your first appearance on earth.
Ponder that thought and ask yourself the question, “Where is your heart?”
note from Karen: I was unable to reproduce here the photos from Joy’s Book, Finding Joy. The letter shin is shaped somewhat like a “W” and the cross-section of the heart, has a similar shape. It’s pretty awesome. God has indeed placed a portion of Himself within us.