We’ve all heard of the proverbial question: Which came
first, the chicken or the egg? How about
this one: Where does a person experience change first—from the inside or the
outside? People often talk about getting
their life together so they can start going to church. Actually, it is just the opposite. The church is supposed to be a place where a
person comes just the way they are and allows the work of God to begin to
change them from the inside out. I hear
people all the time talk about trying to live the Christian life only to
fail. They got things backwards. Through their own strength, they tried to
become someone they aren’t.
It’s through an encounter with God that Christ enters a
person’s life and goes to work changing them from the inside. The outer display of life comes later as a
testimony to the inner workings of God.
The Bibles says, “I have been
crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith
in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.” Did you catch that? “Christ lives in me.” You see, Christ did not come to help me
change my life; he came to live his life through me! Jesus did not come to solely get men out of
hell and into heaven; he came to get himself out of heaven and into men.
God always works from the inside out. Jesus said, “I stand at the door and knock.”
The door he is referring to is the door of your heart. He says, “If
anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him, and
he with me.” He’s talking about a
relationship--the kind of relationship that changes a person from the inside
out. Jesus Christ laid down his life for
us. Why?
So that he could give his life to us.
Why do we need his life? Because
we are born into this world spiritually dead.
That just means that we are born into a physical world without a
spiritual relationship with God. Jesus
is the answer to this problem. He brings
us to life through a spiritual rebirth.
This encounter with God changes our heart.
The Bible tells us of how deep God’s love for us is and
his power to change us from the inside out:
“But because of his great love for
us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead
in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved.” Being fully alive is what everyone wants to
experience. Don’t settle for changed
external habits that you produce when you can have the life of Christ working
within you. God always works from the
inside out and not from the outside in.
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