Easter 7 OT Reading: Ezekiel 36:22-28
There’s a saying when we intend to do something: “I’m fixing to.”
I’m fixing to clean the garage. I’m fixing to call my mother. But how often do those intentions remain just that — intentions?
Look around your home. See those stacks of papers? Those weeds in the yard? All those things you were “fixing to” handle but never did.
Our human intentions often fall short of action.
But God is different. When God says He’s “fixing to” do something, it’s as good as done.
In Ezekiel 36:26, God makes an extraordinary promise: “I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.”
This wasn’t an empty intention. This was a divine guarantee delivered to people who had repeatedly broken their promises to God.
The Israelites were living in idolatry, profaning God’s name among the nations. Yet instead of abandoning them, God promised transformation.
What does a “heart of stone” look like? It’s cold, unresponsive, and dead. It’s a heart that makes promises it never keeps. It’s a heart full of good intentions but lacking follow-through.
But God doesn’t just point out our failure. He offers the remedy: “I will give you a new heart.”
Not a repaired heart or an improved heart — a completely new one.
This isn’t about trying harder. This is divine heart surgery. God removes what’s dead and gives what’s alive.
He doesn’t say, “Fix your own heart” but rather, “I will give you a new heart.”
And did God follow through? Absolutely!
Through Christ’s sacrifice and resurrection, God has given believers new hearts.
Through the waters of baptism, He has cleansed us.
Through His Spirit, He empowers us to live differently.
When you look at your own broken promises and failed intentions, remember that your hope isn’t in your ability to change yourself.
Your hope is in the God who specializes in replacing hearts of stone with hearts that beat with His very life.
Contributor Tim Droegemueller is Senior Pastor at Living Faith Lutheran Church in Cumming, Georgia.
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