Inner Beauty

The seed for this thought was planted in church last night:

I think we could find a good example for our spiritual life in our physical life. What do most of us do each morning? We wake up, take a shower, and look in the mirror to see what we need to do to make ourselves presentable. Do I have any dark circles under my eyes that I need to cover? Are there any blemishes on my face that I need to hide? My eyelashes are pretty short, I’d better curl them or put some mascara on. Hmmm… my lips are pale, I guess I should at least throw some lipgloss on. I don’t know about you, but that sounds kind of familiar. What are we focusing on in our spiritual lives?

When you wake up each morning, do you look to the word of God to wash you? Do you look in the mirror, the Bible, to see what you need to fix before going about your day? If there is pride in your life, do you try to get it out with prayer? Do you spend time before the throne of grace seeking the face of your Lord?

In our physical life, we spend time “fixing” the problem areas… blemishes, dark circles, and the like. In our spiritual life, though, why is it that we like to focus on what we have right? Yes, I might have a tiny bit of a pride problem, we think, but I wear dresses all the time. Sure, I might not tell as many people about my Savior as I could, but I sure can sing a pretty special to bring honor and glory to Christ. Do you ever think like this? We might not all have the same spiritual strong points, but we all have them, I believe. Are you focusing your time and energy on those? Why not take some time to cultivate the areas of your spiritual walk that you are struggling with! I believe that’s what I Peter 3:3-4 is talking about: "Whose adorning let it not be that outward adorning of plaiting the hair, and of wearing of gold, or of putting on of apparel; But let it be the hidden man of the heart, in that which is not corruptible, even the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price." Obviously this verse isn't telling us not to wear clothes, etc. It's simply telling us that the inward man and his condition is far more important than the way the outer man looks. The second part of 2 Samuel 16:7 says, "for man looketh on the outward appearance, but the LORD looketh on the heart." We should be more concerned with what God thinks about our hearts than we are about what others think about our looks!

I am “blogging to the choir” on this one. I just thought this might be helpful.