Valentine’s Day prayer to cultivate a kind heart towards God
By Lynette Kittle
Bible reading: “Enter your heart, not your clothes. Your God will return to your God, because he is graceful, caring, and slowly and loving in anger.
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In today’s culture, Valentine’s Day focuses on romantic love aimed at couples. It seems that many people in the world find romantic love than love of all kinds, its number one goal, aiming to detour and divert countless people from loving God.
But when it comes to love as Christians, isn’t our preferred relationship of love that we have with God more than anything else? We respect and cherish the love relationship between husband and wife, but our parents, children and friends, love for God takes the back seat at the forefront of our attention.
If so, how do we cultivate a kind heart towards God this Valentine’s Day? What does God need to maintain our kindness as we go along in our lives?
Four Ways to Help You Develop a Kind Heart to God
Below are four ways to help you develop a kind heart towards God.
1. Ask God to look into our hearts. To maintain a kind heart, we continuously ask God to look into our hearts and reveal what He has found in us. Psalm 26:2 says, “Test me, the Lord, and me; look into my heart and my heart.”
Similarly, 2 Corinthians 13:5 states, “Test yourself to see if you are in faith. Test yourself. Don’t notice that Christ Jesus is in you. Um? Of course, unless you fail the test?
It’s good to look into ourselves, but God’s exams reveal what we may not recognize. Both are beneficial to us, but his examination involves a way to keep our hearts soft and harden towards him.
Proverbs 21:2 explains the difference between our observations and God’s observations. “People may think that their way of doing things are correct, but the Lord overwhelms the heart.”
2. See Repent if necessary. Acts 3:19 urges, “A refreshing time may come from the Lord so that you repent, and against God, that your sins will be wiped out.”
Christians believe they believe they will be saved once, but they do not need to seek repentance for their sin. But repentance is healthy for us, cultivates God’s kindness and brings us to a refreshing age.
It helps to keep our hearts soft and soft towards God. 2 Corinthians 7:10 states, “While respectful sorrow leads to salvation, leaving no regrets, secular sorrow brings death-inducing repentance.”
If we find it difficult to repent, God suggests ways to help us lead us to it. “Even now” declares the Lord, “fasting and crying and mourning, and return from heart to me” (Joel 2:12).
3. Stop sin. Sin has a way of strengthening our hearts and causing distance between us and God. Isaiah 59:2 explains the impact on his relationship with him. “But your iniquity has separated you from your God. You cannot hear him, because your sins hide his face from you.”
The sin of our lives prevents God from listening to our prayers. Psalm 66:18 reminds us, “If I had valued sin in my heart, the Lord would not have listened.”
The apostle Paul of Romans 6:1 challenges us. Do you sin as grace increases? ”
4. Love each other deeply. Loving one another helps to cultivate kindness towards God. As 1 Peter 4:8 encourages, “For more than anything, love covers many sins.”
Loving others softens our hearts because God has given us the ability to love. “We love because he loved us first” (1 John 4:19).
Loving others cultivates kindness towards God, bringing unity with others. Colossians 3:14 says, “And I have more love than all these virtues, and it brings them all together perfectly.”
Let’s pray:
Dear Father,
Today and every day, we will guide you to look into our hearts, seek repentance, and to stop sin.
Thank you for loving us first, soften our hearts so that we can love others and love you.
It cultivates kindness in our hearts and guides us to help others’ hearts to be kind to you.
In the name of Jesus,
Amen
Photo Credit: ©Getty Images/Irina Vodneva
Lynette Kittle is married to four daughters. She enjoys writing about faith, marriage, parenting, relationships and life. Her writings have been published by Focus on the Family, Decision, Today’s Christian Woman, Kirkcameron.com, ungrind.org, startmarriageright.com and more. She holds a Masters degree in Communications from Regent University and is an associate producer at Soul Check TV.
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