The simple beauty of this flower makes my heart sing. I love flowers. They seem to brighten my day and lift my spirits. They speak to me of how beautiful they are and their sweet fragrance fills the air with sunshine. As I gaze at these flowers I realize that they have nothing more really to offer me. In reality they offer me nothing except their beauty and sweet fragrance. Oh they also provide nectar for the bees to make honey, but they actually do nothing. They produce nothing, they are basically worthless and empty. They sit around on their branches and just look good. How many of us live like this?
I know for me I would sit around grooming and taking care of the external side of me that everyone sees. Make up, hair, jewelry, clothing, all makes me look good outside, but what about the inside? What about the heart? Am I covering up my heart by adorning the outside of me?
God I hope not! Listen I love to look good. I do my makeup everyday and I do my hair everyday. I put on jewelry and nice clothes but I pray that I am not doing it to hide my heart. Yet there are days when I feel that I spend more time preparing my external self than I do preparing my heart for the day ahead. Am I alone?
For me, I had a wake up call a few weeks ago. My mission this year was to connect with God deeper and learn as much as I could about the Holy Spirit. But one day God had pointed out to me that I spend more time preparing my external self everyday than I do my internal self - my heart. How in the world could I ever be ready to face the day ahead of me and rely on the guidance of the Holy Spirit if I didn't spend time with God first? I thought I had it all together. My beauty, my heart all seemed to intertwine or so thought.
Oh trust me I could face the day alright but I wasn't being guided by the Holy Spirit. My heart wasn't as beautiful as I had hoped for. Oh my external self was fine, but my heart was lacking. Like this flower my concern about my external self left my heart basically empty and ugly. I saw everyone else's flaws except my own. The funny thing is that no matter how beautiful we look on the outside, out heart, (our actions and words) truly reveal the ugliness of our inside, our heart.
1 Peter 3: 3-4 Do not let your adorning be external—the braiding of hair and the putting on of gold jewelry, or the clothing you wear— but let your adorning be the hidden person of the heart with the imperishable beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which in God's sight is very precious
You know as a human we can sometimes get so wrapped up in our external beauty that we forget about the internal beauty that our heart exposes. Some of the worlds most beautiful people are the ugliest on the inside. Their hearts are empty, meaningless caverns of selfishness and greed and hatred and lust and judgment. These beauties feel superior to everyone else and they push and shove to get their way. Society is overflowing with people like this. How sad!
I will probably never give up my makeup and hair but I will no longer allow that external beauty to define my. My heart will define who I am and whose I am.
Jesus Christ lives in my through His Holy Spirit and I must display that at all times. My heart belongs to Jesus and I want everyone I meet to know that. I want my inner beauty to,shine like a beacon of hope for a lost world. I want to spend more time preparing my heart to greet the day then worrying about how I look and dress. I will not allow society to define my beauty, Jesus does!
My beauty is not external but internal. Some of the most beautiful people I know would be considered externally deficient by Hollywood standards. External beauty fades,but a beautiful heart will never fade. No matter how many plastic surgeries we have to reduce the fine lines and wrinkles, they will always return. We can have surgery to remove the external flaws but as far as the heart is concerned, the heart reveals our true internal beauty or lack of it.
I would rather have a beautiful heart any day! I want my heart to reveal who I am and whose I am!
May the beauty of Gods amazing love shine forth from my heart and my lips. May I never become so consumed with my external beauty that I lose focus of my internal beauty give to me by my Savior, in Jesus name I pray, amen!
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