Keep your heart as you would keep a garden. Your heart is a garden (Song of Solomon 4:12); weed sin out of your heart. Among the flowers of the spirit, weeds will be growing, the weeds of pride, malice, and covetousness—these grow without setting. Therefore be weeding your heart daily by prayer, examination, and repentance.
Weeds hinder the herbs and flowers from growing; the weeds of corruption hinder the growth of grace. Where the weed of unbelief grows, it hinders the flower of faith from growing.
Weeds spoil the walkways. Christ will not walk in a heart overgrown with weeds and briars. Christ was sometimes among the lilies (Song of Solomon 6:3), but never among the thistles. Poor sinner, you complain that you have no communion with God. There was a time when God made Himself known to you, but now He has grown strange and never comes near you. This is the reason: Sin has spoiled Christ's walks. Your heart lies like the field of the sluggard (Proverbs 20:4). And will Christ walk there? Indeed, we read that Christ was once in the wilderness when He was tempted (Matthew 4:1), but He did not go there for delight, but so that he might duel and skirmish with Satan. It is the garden Christ delights in. Oh, weed your heart daily; do not let it become a thicket for Satan! ~Thomas Watson, The Spiritual Watch
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