In the vast majority of instances, the word ‘heart’ in the Bible is not a reference to the organ that pumps blood through your body. The main meaning for ‘heart’ in either the Old or New Covenants is a reference to your spiritual makeup. It is the part of you that determines who you are. Just as DNA markers define your unique physical attributes, your heart, in a spiritual sense, determines who you are within. Your heart is the totality of who you are … it is essentially you … it is the person you know and love.

The Bible tells us we are made up of three parts … spirit, soul and body (see 1 Thessalonians 5:23). Your soul is generally equated with your mind, and the spirit with your heart. These are both spiritual components. You can know someone’s mind on a matter, but to know their spirit is to understand them completely.

10 For to us God revealed them through the Spirit; for the Spirit searches all things, even the depths of God.

11 For who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Even so the thoughts of God no one knows except the Spirit of God. (1 Corinthians 2:10-11)

Your heart is the kingpin among your three components. It is your heart, and not your mind, that directs your speech and actions as Jesus clearly indicated.

“You brood of vipers, how can you, being evil, speak what is good? For the mouth speaks out of that which fills the heart.” (Matthew 12:34)

“But the things that proceed out of the mouth come from the heart, and those defile the man.” (Matthew 15:18)

“For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, slanders.” (Matthew 15:19)

We are all born with a heart that is fleshly, sinful. As was stated in an earlier lesson, Covenant Replacement, we are all born into the sinful covenant Adam made with Satan in the Garden of Eden. Therefore, we are born with a heart in agreement with sin, and our behavior is contrary to the ways of God. However, we were created in the image of God, and it is back to God we are to return. In other words, we must have a change of heart, a total heart make-over, if you will.  Therefore, to repent is to return to the Lord with all your heart, that is, you sacrifice all of your Satanic nature in order to receive a new heart of the Spirit. This is death and new life. This is making covenant. This is repentance. Therefore, to return to the Lord with all your heart is to return to Him with everything that is YOU! It is the total giving of yourself in the making of a covenant with Jesus Christ.

12 “Yet even now,” declares the Lord, “Return to Me with all your heart [repent], and with fasting, weeping and mourning;

13 And rend your heart and not your garments. “Now return to the Lord your God [repent], for He is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger, abounding in lovingkindness and relenting of evil. (Joel 2:12-13)

‘I will give them a heart [you get a new heart when you make covenant with Jesus Christ] to know Me, for I am the Lord; and they will be My people, and I will be their God [that is, it will be a covenant relationship], for they will return to Me with their whole heart [this is a covenant-making repentance]. (Jeremiah 24:7)

The heart that knows Him is the heart that has come into intimate, close relationship with Him, and your heart becomes like His heart when you repent. The following points are very important:

• 1. Those who return to Him with their whole heart receive a new heart that is united with His heart and knows Him.
  2. In New Covenant language this means — those who repent receive the Holy Spirit who will show them the hidden truth by way of revelation.
  3. Repentance = Return to the Lord With All Your Heart = Making Covenant With Jesus Christ.

Please understand: Repentance is not a matter of turning in a series of little steps, over a period of time. Blood Covenant requires that blood be shed and a death takes place. It is impossible to be a little bit dead. Therefore, ALL of your spiritual life must be given … All of your sinful nature must be crucified. And this is important, unless ALL is given a covenant is not made. The old sinful nature must die for a covenant to exist.

16 For where a covenant is, there must of necessity be the death of the one who made it.

17 For a covenant is valid only when men are dead, for it is never in force while the one who made it lives. (Hebrews 9:16-17)

Therefore, Jesus had to die because covenant requires it. He gave up His life in human flesh … His fleshly life … to make covenant with everyone who would join Him. Therefore, we must also give up our fleshly life. That is, we must crucify THE SIN NATURE INHERITED FROM OUR FOREFATHER’S (ADAM’S) COVENANT WITH SATAN. Our flesh must die if we are to make covenant with Jesus. This is what the writer of Hebrews spoke of:

11 But when Christ appeared as a high priest of the good things to come, He entered through the greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, that is to say, not of this creation;

12 and not through the blood of goats and calves, but through His own blood [His covenant-making blood], He entered the holy place once for all, having obtained eternal redemption.

13 For if the blood of goats and bulls and the ashes of a heifer sprinkling those who have been defiled sanctify for the cleansing of the flesh,

14 how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without blemish to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?

15 For this reason He is the mediator of a new covenant, so that, since a death has taken place for the redemption of the transgressions that were committed under the first covenant [man’s covenant with Satan], those who have been called [those who are convicted by the Holy Spirit of their sinful heart] may receive the promise of the eternal inheritance [a new, eternal life].

[And to repeat the necessity that the old self, the old heart, must die …]

16 For where a covenant is, there must of necessity be the death of the one who made it.

17 For a covenant is valid only when men are dead, for it is never in force while the one who made it lives. (Hebrews 9:11-17)

You must repent to become born again. You must be born again to receive the Holy Spirit. You must have received the Holy Spirit to receive revelations of all truth, and this is the one and only way you or anyone will ever truly understand the Bible. Question: If a person mistakenly believes he or she has repented, and if that person nonetheless believes he or she is born again, and if that person even erroneously believes he or she has received the Holy Spirit, and if that person receives spiritual revelations … then who or what is the source of those revelations? Is it the Holy Spirit? Such revelations are certainly not from the Holy Spirit!

Please understand that you have the obligation to be confident of your salvation. It is your responsibility to examine yourself to make certain you have made covenant and not merely said a simple prayer at a desperate time in your life. Making covenant is not done to find a remedy for your circumstances. A blood covenant is a love relationship. Jesus died because He loves you and desired to be in a relationship of love, peace, security and unity with you. In like response, you must die to make covenant with Him because you love Him and desire to be in the same relationship with Him. In like manner, two people do not marry just to get something from the other. The marriage covenant, like the covenant with Jesus Christ, is to be entered into because of a mutual deep and abiding love. The traditional vows at a Christian wedding are actually declarations of the man and woman’s covenant-making death. The marriage ceremony is, therefore, a covenant-making procedure where the covenant-making partners become one, united, through mutual repentance.

Repentance is the way to become born again … saved … to enter the kingdom of heaven. The requirement is that your whole heart is given. You must meaningfully, but symbolically, crucify your old sinful heart on the cross with Jesus. That is the Way to salvation. There are many ways offered today that claim to bring you into a right relationship with Jesus Christ. You could say a sinner’s prayer, get baptized in water, become an active member of a church, et cetera and et cetera. The Bible, however, speaks of just one way. You must die … return to the Lord with all your heart, soul, mind and strength … you must repent. A blood covenant with Jesus Christ is only made when you crucify your flesh along with Jesus by symbolically placing it on the cross as Jesus did. Then and only then will you receive the new life that is the outcome of your death to your former life in sin. Then and only then will you be born again. Then and only then will you step into a new life in the kingdom of God. And it’s all about your heart.

Have you given your whole heart to Jesus Christ? Have you crucified your fleshly nature?Have you repented? It would be of great benefit to you to be certain of that one fact.

This concludes our discussion of repentance as the means and necessity of entering the eternal covenant with Jesus Christ. Next, we turn our attention to how we keep this covenant we have entered.

May you fine peace in all your days,

Peter Giardina