The heart means love. A good heart means love to the Lord and to the neighbor, while a hard or stony heart means the love of self or the world -- riches and things. When the psalmist asks the Lord to search his heart, he wants the Lord to see what it is that he loves. And we are what we love. What we eat may form our earthly body, but it's only temporary, what we love forms our spiritual body, beautiful or ugly as we have chosen. It's interesting to note that the first multi-cellular motion of our embryo is the pulsating that starts in a twist of blood vessel that is to become our heart, and the last motion of our natural body is our heartbeat. It is there for all of our natural life. And of course there is a beating heart in our spiritual bodies when we come to put them on.

6273. “玛拿西原是长子” 表因为良善的确占据第一位。这从 “玛拿西” 的代表和 “长子名分” 的含义清楚可知: “玛拿西” 是指属于意愿的良善, 如前所述; “长子名分” 是指在先和更高位置 (参看3325节), 因此, “长子” 是指占据第一位的人。只要更高级的光稍微光照属世之光, 谁不能仅凭这属世之光看出, 良善占据第一位, 就像人的意愿占据第一位一样; 而真理占据第二位, 就像人的思维占据第二位一样？谁还看不出, 人的意愿使他以这种方式, 而非另一种方式思考, 因此, 他所拥有的良善使他思考这个或那个是真的; 因而那真理占据第二位, 良善占据第一位？请思考并反思一下构成信仰的真理除了扎根于良善外, 是否能扎根在别处; 或信仰若不是扎根在那里, 是否还是信仰。由此你就能得出以下结论: 对教会, 或有教会在里面的人来说, 首要或本质的要素是什么。