A New Spirit, A New Heart 新灵肉心 (2)
“And I will give them one heart, and a new spirit I will put within them. I will remove the heart of stone from their flesh and give them a heart of flesh”
Author：Rev Ng Eng Keng
Our church’s theme this year is “A New Spirit, A New Heart”. In the first pastoral sharing of this year, I shared that this year’s theme brings out two aspects:
New Spirit: A spirit that is active and alive.
New Heart: A heart that is sensitive to God’s smallest whispers.
In our spiritual life, the heart and the spirit cannot be separated. When we open our hearts to accept Jesus as our Lord and Saviour, we also invited the Holy Spirit to come into our lives. From then on, the Holy Spirit kickstarts the process of “transformation” in our lives. At the same time, we are given the necessary power to obey God’s “laws and statutes” (Ezekiel 11:20).
The work of purification and renewal through the Holy Spirit will wake our spirit from spiritual sleepiness so that our spirit is awake and alive. Only then, we will have the ability to do great things for our Lord, especially the work of evangelism. Just like Acts 1:8 says: “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses…to the end of the earth.”
Having the Holy Spirit inside us, not only wakes us from spiritual sleep but also changes our “heart”. The Holy Spirit rids us of the heart that was originally stubborn, rebellious and cold, like “stone”. Changes it to one that is sensitive, gentle and soft, like “flesh”!
The Israelites were far from God because their hearts are hardened against God, sinning against God through their idolatry. Prophet Ezekiel heard the calling of God to warn the Israelites against sinning against God and to turn back to God. Dear brothers and sisters, as disciples of our Lord Jesus, we must always go back to God and repent of our sins against Him. We must always search our hearts by His Word to ensure we are still following His will!
“我要把一颗心赐给他们，把新的灵放在他们里面；
我要从他们肉体中除掉石心，赐给他们肉心”
作者：黄永庆牧师
教会今年的主题是“新灵肉心”。在今年第一个主日的牧者感言中，我在分享这个主题时带出两方面：
“新灵”：是一种活泼并对罪敏感的灵
“肉心”：是一种柔顺并敏感于神那微小声音的心
我们属灵生命中的“灵”与“心”是不可以分割开来的。当我们认识并打开心门接受耶稣为我们的救赎主的那一刻，我们就已经邀请圣灵进入我们的生命。从那时开始，圣灵就会在我们的生命中做“改变”的工作，同时也会赐我们力量去遵行神的“律例和典章”（结11：20）。
圣灵在我们生命中的净化与更新过程，会唤醒我们那沉睡已久的灵，以至于我们的灵会苏醒过来，并有能力为主做大事，特别是在福音的工作上。就如使徒行传1：8所说：「圣灵降临在你们身上，你们就必领受能力…直到地极，作我的见证人」
圣灵的内住，除了能唤醒我们的属灵生命，祂也会改变我们的“心”，即除掉我们原本那顽梗、悖逆与冷漠的“石心”，取而代之的是一颗对神敏感、对人温柔的“肉心”！
以色列民因为心里刚硬远离神，且拜偶像得罪神。以西结先知领受了神的呼召，除了提醒他们远离罪恶，也引导他们回到神的面前。亲爱的弟兄姐妹们，身为主的门徒，我们必须常常来到神的面前，为着自己的罪向他悔改。并常常藉着他的话，来察验自己是否有走在他的旨意中！