"The spirit of man is the lamp of the Lord, searching all his innermost parts."
Proverbs 20:27
We once had a parrot named Mink. I have no idea why the children named him that, but it was his name. Now Mink was a beautiful parrot, sporting a shiny coat with green and red feathers, a big old bird with lots of spunk. He took great pride in his loveliness, preening himself daily. He never learned to speak English; we lived in the Middle East at the time.
Maybe what he spoke was a forgotten form of Arabic!
Anyway Mink. though beautiful on the outside, was something else on the inside. Every time someone walked into the room he would turn around in his cage.
He turned his back on us!
Every time!
Mean old bird.
He learned how to open his cage door and would fly out of his abode. What a
challenge that was! We would chase him around the room, and the more
we chased him the more he seemed to delight in frustrating us. The only
way we could get him back into his cage was to chase him until he
was so exhausted that he would just flop down on my son's bed.
Then we would carefully pick him up and put him back in his cage.
I said carefully because without a glove or cloth to protect our hands
we would receive a not-so-cordial bite! Needless to say, beautiful
though he was, he was not a pleasant bird to be around.
His insides just didn't match his outsides.
Interesting, isn't it, that God compares our spirits, our insides, to His lamp. They light us up and show our true colors. We can preen ourselves all day long with the most expensive lotions and makeups and take great pride in how we look, but when all is said and done, the Lord's lamp exposes the true self.
Why do we fret so over what is covering the true self?
Now I have no problem with looking good on the outside.
I do think we are to look our best for our Master (and our husbands and children.) But unless when the Lord searches the innermost parts
He sees true beauty,
all of our preening bites us in the hand in the end.
Proverbs 23:7 says, "As a man thinks in his heart, so is he."
I want to encourage each of us today to focus on the inner beauty of the heart, matching our insides with our outside.
Let us spend time discovering what God has to say through His Word, the Bible.
Let us ask Him to change us from the inside out.
And let us obey His words of Truth.
Preening the inside together,
Gloria
Proverbs 20:27
We once had a parrot named Mink. I have no idea why the children named him that, but it was his name. Now Mink was a beautiful parrot, sporting a shiny coat with green and red feathers, a big old bird with lots of spunk. He took great pride in his loveliness, preening himself daily. He never learned to speak English; we lived in the Middle East at the time.
Maybe what he spoke was a forgotten form of Arabic!
Anyway Mink. though beautiful on the outside, was something else on the inside. Every time someone walked into the room he would turn around in his cage.
He turned his back on us!
Every time!
Mean old bird.
He learned how to open his cage door and would fly out of his abode. What a
challenge that was! We would chase him around the room, and the more
we chased him the more he seemed to delight in frustrating us. The only
way we could get him back into his cage was to chase him until he
was so exhausted that he would just flop down on my son's bed.
Then we would carefully pick him up and put him back in his cage.
I said carefully because without a glove or cloth to protect our hands
we would receive a not-so-cordial bite! Needless to say, beautiful
though he was, he was not a pleasant bird to be around.
His insides just didn't match his outsides.
Interesting, isn't it, that God compares our spirits, our insides, to His lamp. They light us up and show our true colors. We can preen ourselves all day long with the most expensive lotions and makeups and take great pride in how we look, but when all is said and done, the Lord's lamp exposes the true self.
Why do we fret so over what is covering the true self?
Now I have no problem with looking good on the outside.
I do think we are to look our best for our Master (and our husbands and children.) But unless when the Lord searches the innermost parts
He sees true beauty,
all of our preening bites us in the hand in the end.
Proverbs 23:7 says, "As a man thinks in his heart, so is he."
I want to encourage each of us today to focus on the inner beauty of the heart, matching our insides with our outside.
Let us spend time discovering what God has to say through His Word, the Bible.
Let us ask Him to change us from the inside out.
And let us obey His words of Truth.
Preening the inside together,
Gloria
2 comments:
Oh, I needed this today...we live in a world that's So focused on outer beauty that I get tempted to believe that even God is judging me in the same form. What an easy trap to fall into.
Thank you for the loving reminder that God sees our hearts, and real beauty, beauty that lasts, begins there.
Love you!
Great post! And truly, only God can do a real make-over.
Post a Comment