Inside Out-Outside In

Life grows.

Christianity grows like a seed from the inside, bearing fruit on the outside.

Other religions and worldviews believe that the solution can be found by changing outward behaviors, thereby gradually changing the inside.

This, in a nutshell, is what makes Christianity unique.

Both systems produce changed behavior, but the causes of that change are radically different.

This week, I would like to explore our fundamental assumptions about Christianity. What is Christianity, and what does God want to accomplish? What assumptions do we bring to our faith, and are those assumptions accurate?

First, we have to take an honest look at what’s inside our own hearts. We are not good, we are not okay, and we are not even broken—because this implies we just need some repair work. We are not fine, bent, or broken; we are wicked and spiritually dead.

Then Noah built an altar to the Lord and took some of every clean animal and some of every clean bird and offered burnt offerings on the altar. 
And when the Lord smelled the pleasing aroma, the Lord said in his heart, 
     “I will never again curse the ground because of man, 
       for the intention of man’s heart is evil from his youth. 
Gen 8:20-21[ESV]

The story of Noah is the story of human wickedness. Wickedness that had run wild for so long that God decided to wipe the slate clean, cover the earth with water once again, and start over with a new couple. But God said this was the last time he would do this to the earth because the problem was not with the earth, it was with mankind.

Paul described this problem very clearly in Ephesians 2:

And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, 
     following the course of this world, 
     following the prince of the power of the air, 
     the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience—  
           among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, 
           carrying out the desires of the flesh and the mind, 
           and were by nature children of wrath, 
                 like the rest of mankind. 
Eph 2:1-3[ESV]

Paul wrote this to Christians, and when he said “we,” he included himself in this group. Paul knew better than most what kind of evil lurks in all of our hearts. But Paul was not trying to repair himself; he knew he couldn’t. Instead, he trusted the work of God in Christ and, by faith, trusted God to recreate him so that he might bear the fruit of good works.

The Pharisees, on the other hand, felt that by doing the right things, their works of external goodness might somehow change their evil hearts. Jesus disagreed.

“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! 
     For you clean the outside of the cup and the plate, 
     but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. 
You blind Pharisee! 
     First clean the inside of the cup and the plate, 
     that the outside also may be clean. 
“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! 
     For you are like whitewashed tombs, which outwardly appear beautiful, 
     but within are full of dead people’s bones and all uncleanness. 
So you also outwardly appear righteous to others, 
     but within you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness. 
Matt 23:25-28 [ESV]

Nobody wants to be a Pharisee; in modern language, the term Pharisee has lost its original meaning and has come to mean a self-righteous person. But what were they doing wrong? They were working hard to control their impulses, at least their uglier outward impulses. Doesn’t prolonged discipline build character? Can’t we change who we are through self-discipline and self-control? Not really, no.

We are only putting lipstick on the proverbial pig. All of our attempted repairs are applied from the outside; they do nothing to repair the cause of our problems. In fact, those things we see on the outside are not our real problem; they are the fruit of our real problem. We are spiritually dead, that is a problem only God can fix, and He has fixed it—in Jesus. We must repent of our pride and the determination to fix our own problems and cover our own sins, and allow God to do something truly new in us. To recreate us from the inside out. Our earlier passage in Ephesians goes on to state:

But God, being rich in mercy, 
     because of the great love with which he loved us, 
          even when we were dead in our trespasses, 
     made us alive together with Christ
          —by grace you have been saved
     and raised us up with him 
          and seated us with him 
               in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, 
so that in the coming ages he might show 
     the immeasurable riches of his grace 
           in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. 
Eph 2:4-7 

We have not been repaired, we have been resurrected as new creatures, created in God’s image for a purpose. That purpose is good works. Paul concludes with:

For we are his workmanship, 
     created in Christ Jesus for good works, 
which God prepared beforehand, 
     that we should walk in them. 
Eph 2:10[ESV]

This week, let’s remember that we are not trying to work goodness in—we are trying to work goodness out. God has already given us new life in Christ. Our job is to let it out. We work because we are new creations, not to become new creations. Fish swim, birds fly, and children of God do good works. It’s who and what we are in Christ. Let’s allow what God has done in us to bear fruit this week and let those good works out everywhere we go.

Have a great week!