What Is Shaping My Heart?

Daily Office Reflection for Monday, September 28, 2026
Psalm 106; Hosea 14:1–9; Acts 22:30–23:11; Luke 6:39–49

Psalm 106 begins with praise and thanksgiving, but it soon becomes a confession:

“Both we and our ancestors have sinned;
we have committed iniquity, have done wickedly.”

The psalmist does not stand at a safe distance and condemn previous generations. He recognizes that their failures are part of his community’s continuing story. He confesses, “We have sinned.”

One particular statement caught my attention:

“They mingled with the nations
and learned to do as they did.”

This does not mean that Israel sinned by meeting, trading with, marrying, or living among people of other nations. The problem was not racial or cultural mixing. The following verses explain that the Israelites adopted practices that violated their covenant relationship with God. They served idols and even sacrificed their children.

They allowed the destructive values surrounding them to reshape their worship, their relationships, and their treatment of human life.

That raises a difficult question for us today:

What attitudes and practices have we absorbed from the world around us, and are they leading us toward God or away from God?

Our idols may not be carved from wood or stone. They may be money, possessions, political power, nationalism, social approval, religious influence, or our desire to be proven right. Anything can become an idol when we give it the trust, loyalty, and devotion that belong to God.

Hosea carries this thought further:

“Return, O Israel, to the Lord your God,
for you have stumbled because of your iniquity.”

Israel had placed its confidence in idols, military alliances, and human power. Hosea called the people to return to God with honest words and changed hearts.

God’s response is filled with grace:

“I will heal their disloyalty;
I will love them freely.”

God does not merely expose what is wrong. God offers healing. God promises that those who return will take root, blossom, and bear fruit.

In Acts, Paul stands before the religious council. The leaders believed they were defending God and their religious tradition, yet the high priest ordered Paul to be struck before his case had been heard.

Paul exposed the contradiction:

“Are you sitting there to judge me according to the law, and yet in violation of the law you order me to be struck?”

That is a warning for every religious community—and for each of us. We can become so convinced that we are defending truth that we violate the truth we claim to defend. We can speak about God while acting without justice, mercy, or love.

Religious words do not automatically make our conduct faithful.

In the middle of Paul’s danger and uncertainty, the Lord stands near him and says:

“Keep up your courage!”

Sometimes faithfulness requires courage—the courage to examine what we have been taught, to question the loyalties surrounding us, and to resist the pressure to conform when conformity would lead us away from the way of love.

Jesus brings the examination directly to our own hearts in Luke 6. He asks whether one blind person can guide another. He warns us about trying to remove the speck from our neighbor’s eye while ignoring the log in our own.

It is easy to identify the idols, blindness, and failures of other people. It is much harder to recognize what has shaped our own hearts.

Jesus then gives us a way to examine ourselves:

“Each tree is known by its own fruit.”

What kind of fruit are my beliefs, loyalties, words, and actions producing?

Do they produce love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control? Or do they produce fear, anger, cruelty, prejudice, contempt, and division?

The fruit often reveals the condition of my heart more clearly than my religious claims do.

Jesus concludes by describing two people who build houses. Both hear his words, but only one acts upon them. The difference is not knowledge. The difference is putting what Jesus teaches into practice.

A life built upon love, mercy, justice, forgiveness, and faithfulness has a foundation that can endure the storms. Hearing the words is not enough. We must live them.

Together, today’s readings ask us:

What destructive ways have we learned from the world around us?

What false loyalties must we release so that we can return to God?

Are our actions consistent with the truth and justice we claim to believe?

What kind of fruit is our life producing?

These questions are not meant only for our neighbors, political opponents, religious leaders, or previous generations. Like the psalmist, we must begin with ourselves:

“We and our ancestors have sinned.”

But confession is not the end of the story. God remembers the covenant. God hears the cries of the people. God invites us to return. God offers to heal what has become distorted within us and teach us how to bear good fruit.

Perhaps the question I need to carry with me today is this:

What is shaping my heart, and does the fruit of my life reveal that I am building upon the love and teachings of Jesus?

Let us pray:

Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on us.
Teach us to see what is shaping our hearts.
Remove the blindness that keeps us from recognizing our own failures.
Heal our divided loyalties and free us from the idols we have learned to trust.
Give us courage to practice justice, mercy, and love, even when the world teaches us otherwise.
May our lives bear good fruit, and may everything we build rest upon the firm foundation of your love.
Amen.