The “mighty change of heart” is a scriptural phrase referring to the change that occurs in what you desire. The scriptural meaning of the word “heart” is a combination of what we would call our thoughts and our desires. Change of heart would be better expressed as change of mind and change of desire.
Your desires come from your beliefs,1 what you value, and by how much you value it.2 Though few realize it, every desire is actually just the preferred outcome from a list of possibilities. That list might include impossible outcomes, or it might be missing possible outcomes. For each imaginable outcome, including the one you presently desire, you may have an incorrect idea of the cost or benefit.
Your desires are subject to change. When your beliefs and value appraisals change, so do your desires. Changes to your desires come completely from information about what you desire, what alternatives exist, the cost and benefit of each, and your response to it.3 As you live up to all you presently know, and seek for more, God will:
- Provide you with more information4 to persuade you to improve,
- Delineate new options that you do not yet know about,
- Remove options you think you have but don’t, and 4) Suggest more accurate cost5 and benefit in options of which you are aware.
From this information, those who seek him will find sufficient means and motivation to become more like he is.765 As you diligently learn and honestly respond to this information, your desires will change to align more closely with God’s.766
You can change what you want and by how much you want it without being spiritually reborn. A shift in desire occurs any time an honest person learns something different about the options available to them, the cost they incur, or benefit they provide. The mighty change of heart transcends changes to your specific desires, taking place when you decide to value all things as God does, appraising their value based on the long-term net benefit rather than how they make you feel right now.
Following God requires you to act against your feelings. The path of growing toward God consists of choosing what is best, even when it feels worse than alternatives. What feels good to you will only match what the Lord would do in your place to the extent that you have become like him. You come to want what God desires through submitting to what he desires, even when it doesn’t feel good in the moment. As you yield to your sincere understanding of what he would do in all ways, all the time, he will teach you more about himself, and as you continuously remain reconciled to him, you will find greater and greater joy in doing so.
Footnotes
- 1. For as he thinketh in his heart, so is he... (Proverbs 23:7) ↩
- 2. For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. (Matthew 6:21) ↩
- 3. Nevertheless they did fast and pray oft, and did wax stronger and stronger in their humility, and firmer and firmer in the faith of Christ, unto the filling their souls with joy and consolation, yea, even to the purifying and the sanctification of their hearts, which sanctification cometh because of their yielding their hearts unto God. (Helaman 3:35) ↩
- 4. No power or influence can or ought to be maintained by virtue of the priesthood, only by persuasion, by long-suffering, by gentleness and meekness, and by love unfeigned; By kindness, and pure knowledge, which shall greatly enlarge the soul without hypocrisy, and without guile—Reproving betimes with sharpness, when moved upon by the Holy Ghost.... (D&C 121:41-43) ↩
- 5. Behold, he changed their hearts; yea, he awakened them out of a deep sleep, and they awoke unto God. Behold, they were in the midst of darkness; nevertheless, their souls were illuminated by the light of the everlasting word; yea, they were encircled about by the bands of death, and the chains of hell, and an everlasting destruction did await them. (Alma 5:7) ↩