Today, I was listening to a sermon by Mark Driscoll. In this sermon, he was dialoguing about Matthew 23. When he got to verse 25, I needed to soak this in. Here's what it says:
"Woe to you teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You clean the outside o the cup and dish, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. Blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and dish, and then the outside will also be clean" (Matthew 23:25-26)
When I first looked at this, I was like: "Yea Jesus, tell em'! This is a message the church as a whole needs to hear! Tell em'! Then I felt the Spirit of God ask me: "How often do YOU try to get away with cleaning the OUTSIDE of YOUR cup?" It was then I looked at this verse as a verse for me. How often do I pretend to have it all together, how often to I make my outside look nice, all the while my insides are screaming with pain, or sin. I talk a lot bout authenticity because it's important, but have I been listening to my own sermons, or simply "looking like it"?This is a verse I think we each need to wrestle with, because let's face the reality...we all try to get away with washing the outside of our cup and sometimes we get so stuck on the cleaning the outside, that we completely forget the inside. We become so preoccupied with the outside, that the inside of our cups (being our hearts) get neglected for days, years and decades! I know the inside of my cup isn't pristine...in fact it's pretty dirty. I am encouraged that Christ was so bold about these issues. I challenge all of us to check our cups!
How's YOUR cup?
0 comments:
Post a Comment