Focus 2020 – The Great Commission: Perspectives from LeadersSample

Soften Your Heart and Believe 

Bible passage: 

They did not understand about the loaves, but their hearts were hardened. (Mark 6:52, NIV) 

At the beginning of 2020, as our international mission fellowship was fasting and praying together for breakthrough in five specific unreached people groups, the comforting but perplexing message came to us: “Soften your heart and believe.” I had been seeking the Lord for His timely word for the start of the year as I normally do, but this surprised me. The words of Mark 6:52 unveiled the point further: “They did not understand about the loaves, but their hearts were hardened.” Having just been straining at the oars, the disciples’ failure to gain understanding through Jesus’ miracles, His walking on the water, and calming the violent wind were related to their having hardened hearts.   

My first inclination during periods of emergency, turmoil, or testing is not to soften, but to toughen into a steely resolve to prevail, or at least to survive. It can seem like the raw determination to believe is synonymous with keeping faith. But straining at the oars is not enough. What I really need is a gentle trust, a softened heart to believe the Lord and the truth of His promises to me and to all His own.    

Our hearts can be hardened by our response to disappointment, pain, or trauma. A hardened heart is an attempt to protect ourselves from repeat injury through a willful stance of invulnerability. It may seem to us that we have good reason for our hardness. But it blocks faith and trust.   

Softening my heart involves a return to dependency, reawakening my trust in the Lord concerning things far greater than my ability to control. As I trust God and believe in His promises, even storms, winds, global catastrophes, and cataclysms return to their humble place of dependence upon Him, for “He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.” (Colossians 1:17). 

I soften and confess that He is loyal. I soften and admit that He is more reliable than I am. His soft heart agrees with mine as I pray for the lost. I know that He responds to my prayer for them.   

If I will soften my heart and listen, He has a wonderful instruction for me, whatever the days may bring: “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.” (John 14:27). 

Quote: As I trust God and believe in His promises, even storms, winds, global catastrophes, and cataclysms return to their humble place of dependence upon Him, for “He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.” 

Question:  How can softening your heart bring you into agreement with the Lord about His purposes in the ministry He has given you?  

Burt Plaster 

CEO, WEC International