On the Inside

Matthew 23:27 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of the bones of the dead and everything unclean.”

Pastor JJ continued with another soul searching message in the Sunday Sermon series: Identity Theft that took a look at us “on the inside.”

Satan wants to steal our identification and give us a counterfeit one externally; re-focusing us on the outside appearance and our expectations of that look in the mirror. But the truth is that you can be beautiful on the outside, but a mess on the inside. We ought to desire to be judged by what’s in our hearts, which is the real and lasting work in our life. What’s going on inside can be controlled while outwardly we are wasting away. In our walk, we should be looking more like our Savior Jesus and His obedience to God; his willingness to sacrifice Himself for us. We need to be renewed each and every day because of what God is doing in, through and with us; not in outward appearance, but inwardly in the heart. Whatever we fix outwardly on our own, the mirror points out another area that needs to change anyway.

James 1:22-25 “Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like someone who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. But whoever looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues in it—not forgetting what they have heard, but doing it—they will be blessed in what they do.”

The one that does what they believes by faith gives an outward expression of their inward conviction. The action is what makes the difference between talking the talk and walking the talk in the life that walks the walk. If we know “the Word”, but do not put in into practice, then it does not become experience and misses the joyful virtue of being, for which we were created. We do not look in the mirror though the eyes of the world’s lies that enslave, but through the eyes of God and His Holy Word that blesses. Freedom comes from knowing the Word of God in true liberty aligned with God’s Will. And in doing so, our eyes will be opened to the opportunities in this life that we were blind to before.

  

What do you believe? God is good? God provides? God is Love? Then put it into action by faith. Taking your eyes off the Lord will cause us to look at false things that are trying to convince us that they are important. Experience is a beauty-mark in your soul from God to teach you about yourself. God created you and meets you were you are at, but loves you too much to not leave you where you are at. We are to learn, grow, mature and be an improved Child of God on the inside, by His Holy Word from the inside out as we experience the God life.

Psalm 136:1-3 “Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good. His love endures forever. Give thanks to the God of gods. His love endures forever. Give thanks to the Lord of lords: His love endures forever.

In Christ, Brian