A good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth good, and an evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart brings forth evil. For out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks.” Luke 6:45 NKJV

Inside Out

In a hurry, I grabbed my blouse, only to find one sleeve was inside out. Rather than fix it, I threw it on the floor in angry frustration and grabbed another blouse to put on as I ran down the hall. Normally this would not have been an issue but since I was running late, it was that proverbial “straw that broke the camel’s back.”

The situation did bring my behavior to my attention. If what is inside came out in that behavior, I had better take a hard look at what is inside. I believe that “out of the abundance of the heart”, ATTITUDE and body language speak as loudly as the mouth. I was clean on the outside, ready to appear in public but was it well with my soul? Was my inside ready to be seen? Was the Holy Spirit comfortable inside my heart? Why was I so irritable? I certainly did not want my “inside” to be showing on the “outside” today.

Have you ever taken your car to the car wash and the clean car just made you feel like it was brand new? It was shiny and pretty outside, but what if the inside was full of discarded candy wrappers, old food, dirty diapers, or other “stuff” that needed to be discarded?

Jonah rebelled against God and chose to book passage on a ship bound for Tarshish rather than Ninevah, where God had told him to go preach. When Jonah disobeyed, God stirred up the seas. The crew was on the deck throwing crates of supplies overboard, but that did not help stabilize their ship. When it was discovered that the solution to the problem was not on the deck, but inside the ship, Jonah, the disobedient prophet, was thrown overboard. The turmoil ended, and the sea was calm.

 Jesus, sometimes we throw “stuff” off of our deck, cleaning the outside of us, only to find there are deeper issues. Help us by Your Holy Spirit to find all of our deeply buried issues that cause unpleasant odors to You. Help us to surrender them to You so that those around us may enjoy the sweet fragrance of Your beauty, and know that we have been in Your presence. May we become a pleasant fragrance to You.