Phil Beach Jr. emphasizes the importance of having a 'hearing heart' that is both understanding and obedient to God's will, drawing from Solomon's request for wisdom in 1 Kings 3. He highlights that true beauty lies in a heart filled with God's light and love, and that believers should seek to cultivate hearts that are wise, discerning, and filled with hope. Beach encourages the congregation to pray for these qualities, as they align with God's desires for His people, and reminds them that the source of an obedient heart is Jesus Christ through the Holy Spirit. Ultimately, he calls for a transformation that allows believers to reflect Christ's character in their lives.

The depths of God's heart. Would you like to do that? Have you ever wondered if you could hear Jesus tell you exactly what it is that He would like for you to have now that you're a Christian? How about if the Apostle Paul came walking in here? What do you think his prayer would be if after a time in prayer he began to pray for us as a congregation? Well, friends, believe it or not, we can know these very things tonight. We don't have to be in person with God in heaven to know these things. It is my prayer that the Lord will so stir your hearts as to desire these things beyond and above anything else that you would want to desire. Because these things truly please the Lord. And I know that most of us here, if not all of us here tonight, are in pursuit after pleasing God. So, first of all, I would like to just reiterate for two minutes, 1 Kings 3, you remember? We've been ministering on Solomon's prayer and how Solomon, after being asked by God in a dream, What is it that you would like me to do for you? Solomon comes up with a profound statement, Give me an understanding heart. We learned that that word understanding heart can be translated as a listening heart. A listening heart. Now also, not only is it understood to be a listening heart, but it implies a listening heart with a desire to be obedient. So we have a picture here of a man, King Solomon, who having been asked by God in a dream, What is it that you want me to do for you? Responds by saying, Father, God, Jehovah God, I would like for you to give me a listening heart that is willing to obey you. Now we concluded that the reason why Solomon was able to ask God for such a beautiful desire was because Solomon had come to two main realizations in his life. Number 1, 1 Kings 3, verse number 7, And now, O Lord my God, thou hast made thy servant king in place of my father David, yet I am but a little child. And secondly, Solomon says, And I do not know how. Two of the most perhaps profound statements in the Old Testament. I am a child, and I do not know how. We're talking about a man who was qualified to be king of Israel. We're talking about a man who had money, who had education, who had a tremendous spiritual heritage. Father, Jesse, grandfather, or Father David, Jesse, his great grandfather, had probably heard about the stories of Samuel, possibly even sat under... I don't know. But yet he's able to make this statement. I do not know a thing, I'm a child. And that is what caused him to be able to ask the prayer, I need a listening heart. So this is the Old Testament picture of this New Testament teaching that we find. It is God's will, it is God's desire for you and I to begin to understand His desire for us to possess a listening heart. There is nothing greater than that of a father to see his children possess listening hearts that are willing to obey His every word. You who are parents know that one of the chief joys of being a parent is seeing your child say, Yes, Daddy. Yes, Mommy. Okay, you want me to do that now? All right, I'll do it. Now is this true, parents? Now I understand that we don't see it as often as we want. So an obedient heart that hears the Word of God is one that pleases the Father in great degree. We want to remind you that before we get into this teaching tonight, that the source of an obedient heart is the person of Jesus Christ. The source of an obedient heart is the person of Jesus Christ. We must always remember that Jesus Christ told His disciples and is telling us today, I will not leave you as orphans. I will not leave you as comfortless orphans. But I will come again to you in the person of the Holy Spirit and everything that I require of you and everything that I expect of you and everything that I'm asking of you will be enabled by the Holy Spirit. All you have to do is cooperate. You know we've taught on this over and over again, cooperating with God. Yielding yourself, therefore, unto God. As you yield yourself to the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit enables you to be an obedient Christian. You flow in His power. So we want you to take the attention and focus off of yourself and off of anything within you and place it upon the person of Jesus Christ and the power that works within you. That is the source of power for the Christian today. And it's a matter of learning how to tap into and flow in the very life of Christ that enables us to possess these qualities in an ever increasing manner. Now, we have on the blackboard here several scriptures which we will not be reading in their entirety tonight. I wrote these scriptures down because this is the context from which we will be deriving this particular study. And we will simply be going through all of these scriptures and picking out the highlights of each particular point. Our intent is to develop a complete understanding of what God breathed in a prayer through Paul for you and I so that we can understand the longing of God's heart for you tonight. You can be sure that you are never out of God's will if you will begin to pray and long for these things that the apostle prayed for that the church would experience. These qualities, these attributes can be taken with you in prayer and you can find that as you pray you can begin to long for these things knowing that the very heart of God longs for you to possess them. Now, I'd like if I could to invite you to turn your Bibles beginning in Ephesians chapter 1. We're just going to get right on into this and remembering what these are. These are Paul's prayers to various groups of people. The Ephesians, the Philippians, the Colossians, the Thessalonians. Paul's prayers to these groups of people. And what these prayers are, they are prayers for a hearing heart. Prayers for a hearing heart. First of all, Ephesians chapter 1, like I said, we're not going to be going through these at this time, word by word. But we're going to be taking out of all of these prayers the major desires and showing you as we build this thing up exactly what kind of a heart Jesus wants you to have. This will really be a blessing to you because it will build your faith. And as your faith is built you'll have a better prayer life with the Lord. Ephesians chapter 1, we're going to read verse number 17. Ephesians chapter 1, verse number 17. That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you a spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him. Now the first thing that the heart of prayer breathed out for the church in this particular portion of Scripture was that they would receive a spirit of wisdom and a spirit of revelation in the knowledge of Christ. The spirit of wisdom is a spirit of prudence. The spirit of wisdom is a spirit of prudence. Wisdom in this particular aspect is implying a prudent knowing of God. A prudent knowing of God. Secondly, we find that Paul prayed for a spirit of revelation in the knowledge of Him. Now this word revelation means to uncover or to remove the veil. So what we're looking at here is a marvelous desire in God's heart for you and I to possess prudence and to have unveiled, uncovered hearts in the knowledge of God. To remove that which blinds. To remove that which causes an inability to see. To have no veil. Wow. Next we find Ephesians 1.18 And I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened. So we're looking at a heart of wisdom, a heart of revelation, and now we see a heart that is enlightened. Here the Holy Spirit is saying He wants us to have a heart that is filled with the light from heaven. The word enlightened here means to cause light to shine upon. To illuminate. So what Paul is saying is he wants our hearts to become the recipients of a light. And as that light shines upon our hearts it illuminates the eyes of our heart. It would be like being in a room and your eyes are incapable of seeing because there's darkness round about. But as soon as the light shines you're able to see. And this is the idea here. Here Paul is saying I want your hearts to be flooded with light. I don't want your hearts to be a dark place. I don't want your hearts to be a place where dark things take place. I don't want your heart to be a place where evil things are plotted and evil things are carried out. No. But Paul says rather I want you to have enlightened hearts. I want you to have hearts full of light. Full of illumination. I want you to shine from the inside out. You know we live in a very very sad generation because we seek to make people beautiful outwardly. We seek to make ourselves beautiful by fixing up our outward appearance. But friends this is not true beauty. True beauty is a heart that is filled with God's light. True beauty is a heart that is enlightened. Illuminated. True beauty is a heart that is focused in by heaven's searchlight. I'm thinking now of a big prison and how during the night hours there's a huge tower and there's guards that sit in this prison. This is true in any state prison. And they've got a huge searchlight. Must be three, four foot long. And they just go back and forth on the prison campus. Back and forth on the prison campus. And if they should happen to zero in on somebody during the night my goodness the alarms go off. The lights start flashing. The guards get out of bed and they run and they apprehend that man. Well I'm reminded of that because I believe that God is looking to take this huge searchlight and He's looking to just zero in on your heart and just let your heart be filled with the light of God. With the light of God's Word. Jesus said, I am the light of the world. Do you want heaven's searchlight to pour out into your heart? Do you see what the Lord's concerned about? Don't walk in darkness but pray and say, Lord, enlighten my heart. Ephesians chapter 1 verse 18. That your heart may be enlightened so that you may know what is the hope of His calling. What are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints. Next, the Lord Jesus wants us to have a hopeful heart. A hopeful heart in this context is a heart that is filled with the knowledge of the riches of the glory of His inheritance. What this basically means is this. God has an inheritance. Something that He purchased. You and me. And the riches of His inheritance is the glorious truth that we who believe and are redeemed have the Holy Spirit living inside of us. The Almighty has chose to abide in us. This is what the hope of the riches of the glory of His inheritance is in the saints. God has purchased a field and that field is you and I. Not only has He purchased it but He lives among it by His Spirit. This is His inheritance. We inherit Him. He inherits us. He buys us back by His own blood. A hopeful heart is a heart that never forgets, that always remembers that my body is the temple of the Holy Spirit and that God dwells in me by His Spirit. There is a great person that lives within us and that is the Lord Jesus Christ. So we have a heart of wisdom, a heart of revelation, an enlightened heart and a hopeful heart. Now we'd like to turn to Ephesians chapter 3 and we'll just continue on in the next section. Ephesians chapter 3, beginning in verse number 19. Well, let's just read this from verse number 14. For this reason I bow my knees before the Father from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name, that He would grant you according to the riches of His glory to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man. So that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith and that you being rooted and grounded in love may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge that you may be filled with the fullness of God. Here Paul is praying that we would be filled with the fullness of God's Spirit, the fullness of God's love. All of these things are desires that the Holy Spirit has for each and every one of us who believe. And as you understand these desires and they become part of your spirit you're going to find that as you pray your prayer life will change from just a mental prayer life where you just talk to God in your mind but you'll begin to pray to God in your spirit and through your spirit and you'll actually begin to long for these things. You'll find yourself saying Oh God, enlighten my heart. Shine your light in my heart. Give me a heart of wisdom, oh God. Give me a hopeful heart. And now we seek heart. Give me a heart that is strengthened and filled with the love and fullness of Jesus Christ. Next Let's go to Philippians chapter 1 verses 9 and 10. Philippians chapter 1 verses 9 and 10. See, here he is praying In this I pray that your love may abound still more and more in real knowledge and all discernment. Now he just prayed in Ephesians that their love would abound and now he's praying to the Philippians that their love would abound. So in Philippians chapter 1 verse 9 he talks about a love that may abound with real knowledge and all discernment. So next we want to look at a discerning heart. A discerning heart. Here we find the idea that a discerning heart is a heart that approves what is good by proving all things. A heart that approves by proving. The idea here is if I had two cups and I was asked to make a decision which one of these two cups would I choose? Well I would approve one of these cups but it would first be by proving these cups. So I would look them over carefully and I'd look at this one and I'd say well I'm pretty thirsty now and there's not too much in this one. But there seems to be pretty much in this one. Therefore I approve this cup by proving both of them. And I place my approval on this one. The same idea there is found when Paul says that you would have real knowledge and all discernment. You see, a discerning heart is a heart that approves what is right and rejects what is wrong. It approves what is good and wholesome and godly and edifying and it rejects what is ungodly and what tears down and what is not revolving around the edification of one another. Now how we need a discerning heart in this day, do we not? A discerning heart, one that approves, one that accepts, one that condones, one that places its approval on what is good by properly discerning what is right and what is wrong. Now, mind you, there are many Scripture references for each one of these points that we could be going through. I'm reminded of one tonight in Hebrews, chapter number, I believe it's chapter number 5, where Paul says, but strong meat belongs to them who are of full age, who by reason of use have learned to exercise or discern both good and evil. The same idea there. We learn to approve and discern what is good by proving it. And we reject what is not good. And that comes by learning the Word of God and spending time in the presence of Jesus and walking in the light. I think we've mentioned it before, you know how most bank towers can detect a counterfeit dollar bill. Well, they detect a counterfeit dollar bill because they work with the real ones so much. And it's through working with the real ones so much that they can detect a counterfeit dollar bill immediately. And oftentimes, Christians will try and hunt down evil and study evil and try to learn about evil and learn about the devil and learn about demons and learn about error. And before you know it, they're all messed up because they didn't even have enough of the truth to know how to differentiate between the error and the truth. And before you know it, they're so confused they don't know whether they're coming or going. They don't know whether to say, Am I or am I? Amen or am I? They don't. They get so confused. Listen, don't chase after the evil to learn about it. You spend time with Jesus Christ. Doreen, you spend time with Jesus. You read the Bible. You spend time on your knees before God. You hang around the real stuff long enough. And the moment that fake stuff comes, you'll smell it like a dead fish. How many remember the old days when the fish man used to drive around in the truck and deliver fresh fish to the houses? Well, I remember when I was a kid on Lafayette Street. Remember that, Dad? I'm telling you, you knew the fish man was coming a half a mile before he got there. Oh, the fish man is, you know, and boy, he's just the nicest guy, but he just has the most offensive odor. His truck is filled with the smell of fish. See, so, you didn't need to hunt him down. You knew he was coming. You could smell him. Well, friends, when God establishes in us what Paul is praying about right here, that you would be filled with real knowledge and all discernment, we're going to have hearts that smell. And we're going to know when something isn't right, and we're going to have enough sense to stay away from it. We're going to smell the fishy stuff. Billy, something don't smell right. What do you think? And Billy's going to go, you're right, brother. And we're going to know how to deal with it. See? So, this is what this idea is, a heart of discernment. You'll remember this tonight because I mentioned the fish. Now, every time you think about fish, I'm going to pray the Lord will help you think about a discerning heart so that fish and discerning hearts become one. Okay. Let's look at Philippians chapter 1 verse number 10. This is a good one. Oh, I was blessed when I read this one because some of these struck a chord in my heart to where immediately I stopped studying and said, Oh, Lord, give me this because, oh, they're so precious. Philippians chapter 1 verse number 10. Now, see, that you may approve the things that are excellent. See, verse number 10 carries the idea of what discernment is. Discernment is approving what is excellent. In order to be sincere and blameless. Now, listen here. It says, until the day of Christ. But, you know, in my column rendering, it says that you might be sincere and blameless for the day of Christ. Isn't that precious? Now, listen to this. Of course, we're looking at a sincere heart. The New American Standard says blameless. The King James says a sincere heart. Now, as I looked into this, I discovered something very interesting. A sincere heart was a heart full and filled of pure motives without guile. A heart filled with pure motives without guile. Because Paul said that we might be sincere and blameless for the day of Christ. Here's what I thought of when I read that. It's like a bride preparing herself for her wedding day. And in preparing herself, she's making herself beautiful and she's just fashioning herself in the most lovely manner so that at that day, at that very moment, when she stands before her bridegroom, she presents herself to him. And here's the idea here. A sincere heart, a blameless heart, is one that is kept from impure motive, one that is kept from intentional guile, so that on the day when we see Him face to face, we can come before Him with a pure heart washed in His blood, longing for His appearing, motivated by love for Him. That's what He wants. A blameless, sincere heart. Now remember, if you hang around a person who's got a bad tongue, you're going to get a bad tongue. If you hang around someone that complains a lot, you're going to be a complainer. Unless you're a strong person and you can put your foot down and say, now listen, turkey, I don't want you complaining so much. If you can't talk about good things, then don't talk at all. Now if you're that kind of a person, God bless you. Now some people think, well as Christians we need to be wimpy and we can't really do that. Well my friends, let me tell you, you study Paul's life and you tell me whether he was wimpy. Hey, he walked in love and he was broken before God, but he didn't let the devil get a foothold. And often times we let the devil sit right next to us and talk our ear off and we smile instead of saying, hey, don't you know what spirit you're of? That's gossip. I might offend him. Well they need to be offended then. Jesus said, blessed is the man that's not offended by me. Sometimes we need to be offended. So like I was saying, if you hang around something, you're going to become like him. Now what did we just read about? A sincere heart, pure motives. Let me tell you a secret here. The more you hang around Jesus, the more your heart will be pure. You say, oh God, how can I ever have a pure heart? You can't. But let me tell you something friends, the more you hang around Jesus, the more you spend in His presence, the more you walk with Jesus, the Son of the living God, the more you will find that God will simply purify over and over and over and over and over your heart. And you'll find an ever increasing purity and washing by the Lord Jesus Christ. Let me ask you a question. Did you ever spend time with somebody that had really good characteristics and you found out that six months later you took them on and you were glad you did? In other words, good things from them rubbed off of you and it made a pleasant impact on your character. Well, that's what Christianity is. Jesus, the Son of the living God, abides in us by the Holy Ghost. And He has given us all things that enable us and that equip us to possess these things. So the more we spend time with them, the more they rub off and the more they flow out of us into our personality and into our character, into our temperament, into everything that we do. That's what God wants to do. He wants to take what He's already done inside of you and work it out of you so that it is expressed in your lifestyle. That's what the work of sanctification is, working out what God brought in. Colossians 2, verse number 1. Colossians 2. Colossians 2, verse number 1. Verse number 2, I'm sorry. We'll begin with verse 1. For I want you to know how great a struggle I have on your behalf, and for those who are at Laodicea, and for all those who have not personally seen my face, that their hearts may be encouraged. An encouraged heart is a soothed, consoled, and comforted heart. A soothed heart. Isn't that a nice word? Soothing. It is God's will for our hearts to be soothed, to be comforted, and to be encouraged and built up. Friends, Jesus said, let not your hearts be troubled. You believe in God, believe also in me. Jesus doesn't want us to have troubled hearts. He wants us to have encouraged, soothed, comforted hearts. Next, not only does He want us to have encouraged hearts, but He wants us to have hearts having been knit together in love. This is really, really tremendous. Paul is saying that he desires not only our hearts to be soothed and comforted, but he wants our hearts to be knit together in love. Knit together in love. The idea here is to join, to cause, to coalesce, to grow together and actually become part of in order to make a whole. God wants our hearts to coalesce, to join, joint by joint, marrow by marrow. Again, once again, we could cross reference this for two hours in the New Testament. Paul in Ephesians chapter 4, after praying that the church would not be children tossed to and fro, but rather he prayed that we would be joined together and that every joint would supply and every part would supply itself one with another. So the idea here is to be so united and joined together in God's love and in God's spirit that we lose our sense of independence, we lose our sense of being just an individual and we become conscious of the fact that we are part of a body joined one to another by the eternal spirit of God making up the body of Christ wherein Christ dwells by His spirit. We need each other. We're joined to each other. We've been cohesive to join. That's what God has done. He's joined us together and Paul is reaffirming in this prayer having been knit together in love. It's love that does this. Knits us together. Now let's go to 1 Thessalonians chapter 3. 1 Thessalonians chapter 3 and this will be our next to the last one. And then we have another 10 that we will continue on another night. Don't want to give you too much and of course too this is in no way all inclusive but we do this, we teach you the word of God in order to accomplish something not to infatuate you, not to set you at all. Oh wow! I mean boy! Well you won't do that anyway with me. But anyway why we do this is to wet your appetite for the word of God. Because you know the word of God is so rich and I believe the Lord wants you to see as an individual Christian that you can get in and let the word of God feed your soul. And that's what the Lord's greatest desire is that we all would be turned on to His word. 1 Thessalonians 3 This is another very very interesting prayer. And what it does it places responsibility upon the believer. 1 Thessalonians 3 verse number 13 Now let's begin in verse number 11. Now may our God and Father Himself and Jesus our Lord direct our way to you. And may the Lord cause you to increase and abound in love one for another. Once again we have that love. And for all men. For who? For all men. Just as we also do for you. So He may establish your hearts unblameable. Now we had in Philippians chapter 1 verse 10 a blameless heart. Now we have an unblameable heart. Believe it or not it's a different word that is used. And it has a different connotation. Here Paul is praying I'm asking God to so fill you with His love as to establish your hearts so that they may be unblameable or that they might be free from all valid accusation. A heart free from valid accusation. That's an incredible what an incredible challenge. Lord I'm your vessel. I recognize Jesus Christ as the perfect heart. By the power of Jesus living in me free from all valid accusation. Not just acquittal. That's what makes this word distinct from the other one. To be acquitted is to say alright now brother thus thus and thus and thus and thus and thus and thus and thus is wrong with you but I'm just going to acquit you. I'm just going to dismiss you from your charges. That's not the idea here. The idea, listen to this now is because of our acquittal because of our redemption because Christ has forgiven our transgressions and now Christ is living in me and I'm growing in the grace and knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ I may come to the place where my heart is free from valid accusation because it is no longer I that liveth but Christ who liveth in me and my friend he is free from all valid accusation. I tell you what friends I'm looking for the place in Christ where I'm just not coming in and saying thank God I'm acquitted but I'm looking for this I'm looking for this unblameable heart that not only am I glorying and that my sins have been removed but now it is Christ living in me it is Christ speaking through me it is Christ thinking through me so that my heart is now becoming free from valid accusation. I glory in being acquitted but I glory in being made holy being made like Him. And this is the idea here growing in the grace so that it changes us so that our actions are different our heart is different and we're free from valid accusation. Aren't you glad that when there is valid accusation in our life we can be acquitted? Aren't you glad that if we do sin we have an advocate with the Father Jesus Christ the righteous? But friends that shouldn't be your goal to just know that well I can be acquitted your goal should be Lord deliver me so that I can be free deliver me so that I can be free. Be ye therefore perfect Jesus said even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect. There's the idea. Say well how can a man be perfect? A man can't be perfect remember? But through and by and in Christ we can do all things. Hallelujah. What a great salvation. One last one and we'll let you go. And that is no let's not do that because this goes to the next lesson and it's part of the next list. So we want to just leave it at that and I don't know when we'll do this but Lord willing next time we'll get together and we'll begin to work on the next ten characteristics of a hearing heart and we'll see some more things that God wants us to.