What We Love Reveals What Kingdom We Belong To 

I've been slowly working my way through Genesis over the past few weeks and, if I'm honest, it's not been the passages I expected that have held my attention. It hasn't been the dramatic moments or the familiar stories that have caused me to stop and think so much as the thread that seems to run quietly beneath them all.

The more I've sat with the text and asked the Holy Spirit to help me see what He wants to reveal, the more I've become convinced that Genesis is doing far more than telling us how humanity began. It is exposing the affections of the human heart.

It's made me wonder whether one of the great themes of Genesis isn't simply how humanity fell, but what caused the fall in the first place. Because when you begin to read through that lens, you start to notice that beneath almost every story, every decision and every turning point, God is asking the same question.

Eve, Cain and Babel

At first, that might seem like an unusual question to ask in regard to Genesis, but the more I've reflected on it, the more I've realised that our loves sit underneath everything else. They shape what we pursue, what we protect, what we sacrifice for and what we're prepared to let go of. Long before our actions tell the story, our hearts usually have, because our choices rarely begin in our hands. More often, they begin in our affections.

Take Eve, for example. The issue in Eden wasn't really the fruit. The serpent never began by asking her to reject God outright. Instead, he planted the thought that there might be something more desirable than trusting the One who had created her. Genesis tells us that she saw the fruit was good for food, pleasing to the eye and desirable for gaining wisdom. Those words are so familiar that it's easy to read past them, but they tell us something profoundly important. Before there was an act of disobedience, there had already been a shift in affection. Something had become more beautiful to her than simple trust in God, and once her heart had moved, her actions inevitably followed.

Before there was an act of disobedience, there had already been a shift in affection. 

The same pattern appears almost immediately in Cain's story. We often remember it as the account of the first murder, but murder wasn't really where the story began. Somewhere along the way, Cain's own pride, his own sense of injustice and his own desire to be accepted became greater than his desire to walk with God. What eventually happened in the field had already happened in his heart. His love had become disordered, and the fruit of that disorder eventually became visible.

When we reach Babel, humanity hasn't really changed at all. On the surface, the people are building a tower, but their own words reveal what is driving them. "Let us make a name for ourselves." Those words have stayed with me because they expose something much deeper than human ambition. They reveal a people who no longer wanted their identity to come from God. They wanted significance on their own terms. The tower was simply the visible expression of hearts that had begun to treasure self-exaltation more than the glory of God.

Esau’s story

By the time we arrive at Esau, the same thread is woven so clearly through the narrative that it becomes impossible to ignore.
For years, I thought Esau's story was about a bowl of stew. It's probably how most of us remember him. The man who gave away his birth-right because he was hungry. Yet the more I've reflected on his life, the more I've realised that the stew was never really the tragedy. A bowl of stew has never possessed the power to rob anyone of an inheritance. What it can do is reveal what someone already values.

His marriages reinforce exactly the same point. I don't think Scripture records them simply to tell us that Isaac and Rebekah were distressed, nor do I think they're included merely as a warning about making poor relationship choices. Throughout Genesis, marriage is repeatedly connected to covenant, inheritance and God's unfolding purposes, and Esau's willingness to disregard those things tells us something far more significant than the names of the women he married ever could. Time and again, he chose what was immediate over what was promised, what could be seen over what had to be received by faith and what satisfied him today over what God had spoken about tomorrow.

Given enough time, whatever we treasure most will eventually become visible because our lives have a way of following our deepest affections.

The more I read Esau's story, the more convinced I become that his decisions didn't shape his heart; they revealed it.

Where our treasure is

I think that's one of the most sobering themes running through Genesis. We often assume that our biggest decisions determine the direction of our lives, when in reality they usually expose the direction our hearts have been travelling for quite some time. Given enough time, whatever we treasure most will eventually become visible because our lives have a way of following our deepest affections.

It's one of the reasons I don't think Jesus was introducing a new idea when He said, "Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also." He was drawing our attention back to something God had been revealing from the very beginning. Throughout Scripture, God seems far more interested in what's happening beneath the surface than simply what people do. Behaviour matters; of course it does, but behaviour is always the fruit of something deeper. And God, in His kindness, continually takes us back to the place where those deeper loves are formed.

I've found that both comforting and deeply challenging.

It's comforting because God sees beyond our failures and knows the desires we're still wrestling with. But it's also deeply searching because it's entirely possible to become expert at looking like mature Christians while our hearts are slowly attaching themselves to something else. Success, security, comfort, recognition, financial stability and even ministry can quietly begin to occupy the place that belongs to Christ alone, not because we consciously reject Him, but because our affection gradually shifts without us even noticing.

Success, security, comfort, recognition, financial stability and even ministry can quietly begin to occupy the place that belongs to Christ alone

Uncomfortable questions

As I've sat with these passages, I've found myself asking questions that are far more uncomfortable than I expected.

• What occupies my thoughts when life becomes quiet?
• What do I instinctively run to when I'm under pressure?
• What do I secretly believe I need in order to be content?
• What am I building my life around?

They're not easy questions to answer honestly, but I wonder whether they're the very questions the Holy Spirit wants us to ask, because they take us beyond outward appearances and into the place where our treasure really is.

This is why I find the contrast between Jacob and Esau so fascinating.

Genesis makes no attempt to present Jacob as the hero of the story. His life is messy, full of fear, deception and self-reliance. And yet beneath all of that is a man who genuinely longs for the covenant of God. His methods often needed transforming, but his heart kept reaching towards the promise. Over the years, God patiently stripped away Jacob's dependence upon himself until he discovered that the greatest blessing was never the actual inheritance but the God who had promised it.

Esau's life takes the opposite path. Outwardly, he appears capable, decisive and successful, but inwardly his heart has settled somewhere else. The covenant carries very little weight because something else has already captured his affection.

Over the years, God patiently stripped away Jacob's dependence upon himself until he discovered that the greatest blessing was never the actual inheritance but the God who had promised it.

Loving the present world

As I reflected on that, I couldn't help thinking about Paul's words concerning Demas. There's something heart-breaking about the way Paul describes him. He doesn't tell us that Demas walked away because he had stopped believing the Gospel or because he had lost an intellectual argument. He simply says that Demas deserted him because he "loved this present world." Reading those words took me straight back to Esau because, although they lived in completely different generations and under very different circumstances, the underlying issue feels remarkably similar. In both cases, the heart had found something it loved more than the promises of God, and eventually that hidden affection became visible through the direction of their lives.

Perhaps that's because every kingdom ultimately competes for the same thing.

From Genesis onwards, Scripture reveals two kingdoms, each calling for our allegiance. The Kingdom of God calls us to love the King above all else, while the kingdom of this world continually offers us treasures that promise fulfilment apart from Him. The battle isn't usually as dramatic as we imagine it to be. Most of the time it isn't fought out in public at all. It's won or lost in the quiet places of our hearts, in the things we give our attention to, the things we daydream about, the things we convince ourselves we can't live without. Long before anyone else sees the direction our lives are taking, our hearts have already begun to follow the things we treasure most.

Redeeming our hearts

The wonderful news of the Gospel is that Jesus didn't come simply to change our behaviour. He came to redeem our hearts. The work of the Holy Spirit isn't confined to exposing the things we've loved more than Christ. He patiently reshapes our affections until Christ Himself becomes our greatest treasure. That is the miracle of discipleship. It isn't simply learning to resist sin. It's discovering, over the course of a lifetime, that nothing this world offers can compare with the surpassing worth of knowing Jesus, and finding that as our love for Him grows, everything else gradually finds its rightful place.

.... allow the Holy Spirit to search the deepest places of our own hearts until every competing affection is brought into the light and Christ becomes, once again, our greatest treasure.

As I've continued reading through Genesis, I've realised that I can't keep asking what Esau loved without eventually asking myself the same question. It's all too easy to examine his life while assuming the Holy Spirit isn't holding the same mirror up to mine. Yet perhaps that's exactly why these stories have been preserved for us. They aren't simply there to teach us about the people who came before us. They're there because they reveal something about every human heart.

Moving towards Christ

The question isn't whether we've ever made poor decisions. We all have. The question is whether, beneath all of our failures, fears and imperfections, our deepest affection is still moving towards Christ. Because whatever has our heart will eventually have our life, and over time it will become increasingly clear which kingdom has captured our allegiance.

Perhaps that's the invitation Genesis has been extending all along. Not simply to admire the faith of its heroes or learn from the failures of those who went before us, but to allow the Holy Spirit to search the deepest places of our own hearts until every competing affection is brought into the light and Christ becomes, once again, our greatest treasure.

When that happens, obedience stops feeling like duty and becomes the natural overflow of a heart that has found the One it was created to love.

Hannah Damary-Thompson. Hannah is Commercial Director at Specialist Wind Services, working across the UK’s onshore and offshore wind sector. She is a mother of four, attends Powerhouse Church in Doncaster, and is currently writing her first book, Diary of a Disciple.

Image by Franz Bachinger from Pixabay