This One Sin Delays You from Receiving A New Heart

Why do we constantly battle with sin? Very likely, it's not weakness, but wickedness. The gist is not to fight harder but to fight smarter by first receiving a new heart.

In this article:

• Fitness vs. Faith

• The Sin of the Tongue

• 7 Steps to Receive a New Heart

• My Testimony

---

Fitness vs. Faith

Many of our struggles with sin, especially with repeated, willful sin, are not because we’re “spiritually weak,” but because our heart is still that carnal, deceitful heart of our before-Christ life, filled with strife, rage, envy, pride, ego, lust, and all kinds of wickedness.

The sicker the heart is, the more struggles this believer will have with sin. And in my opinion, that kind of Christian life is more miserable than unbelievers. At least unbelievers “knew not what they did.”

Fitness

Having made many mistakes in my five-year fitness journey, I find Christian life somewhat similar.

Many women are strict with diet, forcing themselves not to eat carbs or basically just anything, pushing hard on all kinds of cardio, being disciplined on and off and miserable in their weight-loss odyssey for years but somehow, they just can’t get that ideal body they worked so hard for.

They are consistent but consistency means misery according to their fitness plan, so eventually, they give up and choose to live in deception, self-brainwashing that desirable bodies are genetic, beauty standards are inhuman, and all bodies are just as attractive.

All this bitterness could have been avoided if only they knew how to do it the right way.

Faith

Christian faith is likewise.

You focus on resisting sin—just like they resist delicious food; you focus on fighting against the devil—just like they sweat their life out with cardio.

If you get the priorities and the methods wrong, your faith will suffer because to battle with sin is against our sinful nature and the sinful world and is never-ending as long as we’re still in our flesh and on earth.

Just like the battle against fat cannot be done once and for all. All athletes, bodybuilders, and supermodels train non-stop to maintain their body shapes.

Sounds exhausting? It certainly is. All things that are good, valuable, and lasting in this life come by effort and discipline.

But the good news is, there’s a secret doing it painlessly, even delightfully, in both fitness and faith.

The secret of breakthrough

Fasting and weight training are the breakthroughs people who failed neglected.

Likewise, a new heart and a renewed mind are the breakthroughs every believer must first receive to enjoy their Christian life.

---

---

The Sin of the Tongue

Photo by Sophie Dale on Unsplash

Yes, that one sin delaying you from receiving a new heart is the sin of the tongue.

What we speak reflects what’s harbored in our hearts. It’s not what comes into the mouth that defiles us, but what comes out of it from the heart. (Matthew 15:17-20) Our speech sheds insight into the diagnosis of our heart.

Many believers got this wrong—

1. they pray for a new heart;

2. they believe that all sins they struggle with will be gone without any work from their side.

Faith without work is dead.

“You see that a man is justified by works and not by faith alone.” James 2:24

I discovered this one thing early on that made my walk with Christ much easier:

Keep God’s Commandments first, then you’ll receive the understanding of why keeping them.

It’s the same when it comes to the Heart: bridle your tongue first, then watch your heart revive.

14 Sins of the tongue

1. Lie—exaggerate, undermine, or speak half-truth to manipulate

2. Rant/yell/scream, outbursts of anger and hysteria

3. Complain/whine, out of self-pity or a lack of faith

4. Curse, out of self-righteousness, rage, or unforgiveness

5. Boast/brag, about the presence or the future

6. Pierce/poke to hurt others, explicitly or implicitly

7. Argue, out of a contentious nature

8. Gossip, overshare information of other people

9. Slander, out of jealousy or manipulation

10. Usage of foul, sexual words(“f,” “c,” “b”)

11. Judge, out of pride and self-righteousness

12. Swear, to impress or to manipulate

13. Call upon the Lord’s Name in vain

14. (Comment here)

    ---

Photo by Steve Harrris on Unsplash

7 Steps to Receive A New Heart

1. Repent your sin of the tongue and every other known sin

2. Pray for a new heart

3. Bridle your tongue, aka, watch your mouth all the time

4. Immerse yourself in the Word, read the Bible every day

5. Speak of love and truth

6. Keep praying for a new heart

7. Repeat 1-6

---

My Testimony

Photo by engin akyurt on Unsplash

Foul-mouth

I used to have a foul mouth. I cursed, swore, ranted, boasted, gossiped, pierced, judged.

My tongue was the bane of my before-Christ life.

It got me into relational troubles, but I was not aware of my sin, on the contrary, I prided myself on being “brutally honest” when indeed, I was rather brutal than honest.

I had a few loyal friends and only when I was delivered from this sin then I realized how crazy loyal they’d been as most people simply didn’t want to deal with me.

I also had problems regulating my emotions. And once it broke loose from my mouth, that emotion, like oil being added to the fire, blazed even greater and the smog completely shrouded my head.

I frequently had a bad day. Every tiny little thing that fell short of my expectation could ruin my day, such as a cup of warm coffee, my favorite gym machine being occupied throughout the time I was there, or a driver didn’t stop seeing me trying to cross the road.

I first acknowledged that this was a sin by reading the Bible, particularly, The Book of Proverbs. More than that, God revealed to me how this sin created all my miseries in life. I repented the first time in September 2022, the second time in 2023, and the third in 2024.

You see, my deliverance from the sin of the tongue is a continuous process, and the reason was that I undermined some of my sins at first, but as I gained an increasing understanding, I repented them one after another.

Here’s my deliverance in the sin of the tongue:

1. Complete deliverance-Screaming, yelling, ranting

2. Complete deliverance-Cursing(curse other people), swearing, judging

3. Complete deliverance-Boasting

4. Occasionally struggle-Gossiping

5. Occasionally struggle-Arguing

6. Occasionally struggle-Piercing

7. Occasionally struggle-Usage with the f word

The last three happened within the past six months, so I believe the time hasn’t been long enough to prove if I am completely delivered from that.

Why do I watch my mouth so much?

Because the Bible talks about this sin and its consequences so much.

How I bridled my tongue

1. Withhold the impulse to gush

2. Pull back from the conversation

3. Leave the triggering environment

4. Find an outlet—take a walk, write it down, self-reflect on why this happened

5. Bring it to God and let Him search my heart to find the root of my evil

6. Forgive if I was wronged, seek reconciliation

7. Apologize and take initiative in reconciliation if I was to blame

8. Conclude this experience and try to do it better next time

The revival of my heart

Photo by Markus Blüthner on Unsplash

I noticed a day-and-night difference ever since I acknowledged this sin and repented—each time when evil broke loose from my mouth, my heart twinged and trembled in my chest, physically. I simply couldn’t utter evil anymore. That is how strong the heart is attached to the tongue. It was those sinning experiences that enlightened me on how sick my heart was and how much treachery it harbored.

“Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.” Matthew 5:8

In this tongue-bridling process, my heart has been purified. I could feel that filth being cleansed and that darkness being expelled, replaced with light and lightness. By faith, I asked God to take away all the darkness in my heart and let it be full of light; by work, I intentionally watched my mouth.

Repentance must precede all things

There are many Christians who love God but have not tamed their tongues. It’s not that they are “spiritually weak” and therefore they failed at conquering this sin—no.

They simply aren’t convinced that this is a sin, and it leads to death. Some of them hardly read the Bible so they don’t know how much God detests foul mouths, while others make their own decision on what Commandments to keep and what not. They undermine it, joke about it, neglect it. They don’t know that their words are eating them away. They don’t know that a majority of their struggle with faith and sin come from their wickedness, not weakness; and that one sin they are unwilling to acknowledge and repent is the GIANT they must kill to receive a new heart that is pure and fertile, that will bring forth the fruits of the Word of God.

---

The condition of your Heart decides your fruits:

Again, I want to bring up the Parable of the Sower.

We talked about double-mindedness last week, and that it is a heart problem. And Jesus directly compared the heart with the soil in which the Word of God(the seed) sows. The seed is the same for everyone, but the fruits depend on the fertility of the soil—the condition of your heart.

To be fruitful and multiply, to make our walk with God enjoyable and fulfilling, repentance is the first step while the receiving of a new heart is the first breakthrough. Do not focus on the wrong thing—battling with sin like people suffering from cardio—but focus on the condition of your heart for it decides your fruits.

If you haven’t done so, try the “7 Steps to Receive A New Heart” above—

Very often, it’s the one thing we’ve been hearing about but for indescribable reasons, we just haven’t had the resolute to give it a try that will change our life.

---

For those who haven’t read the subscriber-exclusive post on double-mindedness, make sure you read it since it’s highly relevant to today’s topic: