OUTSIDE INSIDE OUT

(Mark 7:15 NLT) ^"It’s not what goes into your body that defiles you; you are defiled by what comes from your heart.”

 

We get so hung up on externals, appearances, and facades.  It's not just a matter of taste, or maintenance problem.  Fashionistas, compulsive exercisers, workaholics, social butterflies, sports nuts, extreme dieters, the primal urge to splurge shoppers, or excessive decor revolutionists.  All the over the moon habits are  intense needs for control in our lives and become the breeding ground for perfectionist pathology.  Not everything is beautiful from every view point. Healthy people organize their enjoyable activities around their lives, whereas control-dependents organize their lives round their excessive activities. Horace, the Roman poet, sums it up: "Clogged with yesterday's excess, the body drags the mind down with it".   

"Jesus said to the crowd, 'Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; a man's life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions.'"  (Luke 12:15)  "For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also." (Luke 12:34)

Hold everything in your hands lightly, otherwise it hurts when the Father has to pry your fingers open!  Corrie Ten Boom

A pearl to string: Jesus cuts to the core of God's concern -- our spiritual heart condition. He wants us to not only focus on what we put in or on our body, but what we allow to grow in our hearts and simmer in our heads. The inner world is what needs our most earnest attention.  

The LORD does not look at the things man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart. (1 Samuel 16:7) 

Our weary hearts, our wayward hearts, our broken and fearful hearts - our inner selves need a Savior.  Whatever brings our hearts to Christ brings us near to God. 

Count your blessings and

know you are loved,

                       Lyndi