New Year. New Clarity.

2021. How’s it treating you? We were all so ready for 2020 to end, and now, we’re six weeks until the new year. Anyone still going strong on their New Year’s resolutions? Plugging through Genesis in your Bible reading plan? Still hitting the gym consistently as you aspire to be healthier this year? 

And if the answer is “no” to all of the above, rest easy. Grace is abundant. Tomorrow is a new day. Take that next step of faithful obedience—whether to church for worship or to the gym for some exercise.

Our New Year’s Resolution.

Women (re)Purposed has a “resolution” if you will. No, we’re not changing our mission or our logo. But we do want to bring something “new” to our ministry this year. On the edge of your seat? We sure hope so. 

In seeking to help women love God, learn truth, and live transformed we want to dial down on our vision and have it intentionally color every facet of our ministry. From our blogs, to our newsletters, to our podcasts—we pray that all of our content will explicitly both equip and encourage you to love God, learn truth, and live transformed. 

Our New Heart.

We’re one week from Valentine’s Day. The grocery store aisles are littered with milk chocolate hearts, over-priced stuffed animals, and bouquets of red roses. And it’s ever so timely for us to discuss the human heart. 

As Christians, God has given us a new heart. God makes this promise in Ezekiel 36:26, “And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.” 

We live out of our hearts every single day, every single minute of our lives. This fundamental truth shapes our thoughts, our feelings, our actions. In The Dynamic Heart in Daily Life: Connecting Christ to Human Experience, Jeremy Pierre writes, “The heart was designed to worship, and if it is not being utilized to worship God, it will worship something else.” 

God has designed the human heart for the singular purpose of worship. We are born image bearers of God—born to worship and bring glory to God.

And yet, we are complex creatures. Both men and women are complex (yes, your husband agrees!). We are thinking, feeling, and choosing beings. The Scriptures paint a complex picture of the human heart. Jesus himself speaks to the heart in the greatest commandment, “And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.” (Mark 12:30-31)

We think with our head.

From the latest NetFlix documentary to Fox News to the accounts we follow on Instagram, we’re constantly absorbing information. Women (re)Purposed desires to be a curator of truth—Biblically sound, gospel-centered truth. We seek to learn truth because we people are, in large part, what we know and believe. 

Jesus himself ties the connection between our hearts and our thoughts in Matthew 9:4, “Jesus knowing their thoughts said, ‘Why do you think evil in your hearts.’” The apostle Paul also recognized the importance of our thoughts. Romans 12:2 exhorts believers to be “renewed by our minds” and then later in Colossians 3:2 to “set your mind on things that are above.” 

We want to be women who think rightly so that we can worship rightly. Our thoughts grow in holiness as we learn truth.

We feel with our heart.

People are, in large part, what we desire, value, and feel. Just think about how you feel when a co-worker surprises you with your favorite Starbucks drink? Or that feeling when your kids tell you that you’re the best mom in the whole wide world? We all crave to feel valued and loved. The cross of Christ reminds us that we are valued and loved.

Strong desire and emotions motivate us all. Whether in a positive way to lead to holiness or a negative way to lead us to sin, we feel strongly and deeply with our hearts. When we feel frustrated, we might be short in our response to our children. When we feel grateful to receive a handwritten note in the mail, we might smile big as we open it in the post office (even underneath our mask).

Jesus affirmed the passion of the heart that feels in Luke 12:34, “Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” Our hearts follow our affections. We read later in Luke 24:32 of the passion of our hearts, “Did not our hearts burn within us?” And Paul also affirms the significance of the heart in Romans 1:24, “God gave them over to the lust of their hearts.”

God has given each of us a heart full of affections, desires, and emotions. As our minds are renewed with truth, we grow in our love for what God loves. Our affections grow for God, and we love God.

We choose with our hands.

People are, in large part, what they choose to be. We choose out of our heart and with our hands. You made a choice to read this blog just like you’ll make a choice on what time to go to bed tonight. We make choices all day long. 

From the garden in Genesis to the end of Revelation, we see examples of choices of humanity. And Jesus is ever so clear of the foundation of our choices—the heart. Matthew 5:28 tells us, “Whoever looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery in his heart.” Jesus is clear that people live out of their hearts. Later in Matthew 15:8 Jesus reminds the Pharisees, “These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me.”

Our actions often flow from our feelings. When we feel hungry, we eat. When I’m excited, I often jump up and down. 

The Holy Spirit empowers us to have thoughts and feelings informed by the Scriptures—what God says about himself and his creation. Right thinking leads to right feeling leads to right doing. As we learn truth and love God, the Spirit leads us to actions that honor God, and we live transformed. 

What’s the application?

This Biblical framework emphasizes our vision: Love God, Learn Truth, and Live Transformed. So this year, you’re going to see this lens reflected in all of our content. 

God calls us to learn truth with our head, love God with our heart, and live transformed with our hands. Head, heart, hands—you’ll be seeing this framework all over our content.

2021. It’s a new year. And Women (re)Purposed is prayerful and hopeful for the work of the Holy Spirit in our heads, hearts, and hands. The Spirit grows us as worshippers of God with our thoughts, our feelings, and our actions. 

We’re excited for this gospel application to thread itself throughout our content—head, heart, hands. May we think Biblically, desire rightly, and act obediently as we seek to be women who learn truth, love God, and live transformed.