Something on the inside working on the outside🎵🎶Ohhhh what a change in my life🎵🎶
We sang that song to the top of our lungs on our 45 minute drive to and from church many a nights. Those memories have never faded. We would inevitably be shushed by someone in that 70’s psychedelic purple van as we pulled up to the drive through window & the smell of Little Joe’s buttery biscuits filled the air on the way home from church. You see, my mom had just recently been miraculously delivered from smoking and was so excited to learn about how The Word could actually come alive in one’s life and make a real difference. Us three kids were young and my Dad was gone most of the time on the big rigs criss crossing the country.
Mom brought us up in church every time the doors were open in spite of the 45 minute drive. “If it’s alive, it’s worth the drive,” we would often proclaim to friends who didn’t understand why we drove all that way instead of attending the little church around the corner with most of our neighborhood friends.
One of the truths I remember learning at a young age and it really just became part of my DNA was that whatever you put in your heart through your eyes or ears would produce a harvest in your life. That you can sow to the things of the spirit or the things of the flesh. One would reap life and the other death. Along with that was to guard your heart because out of it flows the very issues of life. And finally, I came to know that what you think, you become. The Bible says that as a man thinks in his heart, so is he.
So how do we sow to the things of the spirit instead of the things of the flesh? Spend more time dwelling on, reading, and talking about The Word & truth than shopping, decorating, and other self or material subjects. I love all that stuff but the thing is to have the right balance of it all.
How do we get the self control to guard our hearts? By renewing our minds with His Word. Then we think like He thinks & that’s when something on the inside begins to work on the outside and like my Mom, all those years ago experienced…ohhhh what a change in my life!!!!!
You wanta know how long lasting that change is? Now 30 some years later, our whole family loves each other, loves God, and we are all walking out beautiful lives…not without struggle but for sure HAPPY on the inside first and then on the outside as well. Our family tree has been changed all by something on the inside 🎵🎶 working on the outside!!
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My prayer is that you will allow that same something to work on the inside and produce a beautiful life on the outside for you and yours!
Adrienne, Thanks for this reminder that to sow and reap what God has for me, I need to abide in Him. I forget this sometimes( a lot of the time) and I begin to let my level of happiness be dictated by my circumstances( whether life is running smoothly, or perfectly I should say). I even think of material things that would make me happy, new furniture, new wardrobe, etc. But, I have come to realize these are temporary, fleshly "fixes" to my happiness. God’s Word tells me that lasting, true joy and happiness comes from abiding in Him, no matter what my circumstances are, good or bad. This is why I love abiding in Him by doing bible studies such as your "Happy" one, praying, journaling, praising and worshipping Him. I thought I’d just tell you how I so agree with this blog because of what God has shown me. Thank you!!
Thank you so much, Kim! That means so much! 🙌🙌🙌Praise God!!!! 😘