27 Sep Living from the Inside Out
Sometimes our souls get sifted and shaped in surprising ways and places. For me it was in a city on the Florida gulf coast nick-named “New Port Nowhere” because, as the joke goes, “Why would anyone be from there?”
We were a little over two years into starting a church from scratch, and I was not handling it well, although I didn’t know that at the time. My wife and I just had our third son, I was overworking, the baby church wasn’t going well, I was out of ideas, loaded with internal pressure, frustrated, empty…and did I mention overworking? Then one day it happened. I melted into a puddle in my chair right in front of my wife. Gratefully she didn’t panic because she’s a strong woman. I faintly heard her talking to someone on the phone, and the next thing I know she was standing in front of me with a packed bag, my cell phone, and directions to a retreat house in hand and she said, “Don’t stop until you get there.” I have no recollection of the drive that day but I somehow made it. I checked in and with no cell reception, no internet, no emails to answer, no sermons to prepare or people to “save”, I quickly realized there was a gaping hole inside that I had been ignoring. To say that my faith was weak was like saying the Pope doesn’t date much. The embarrassing part was that I was paid to be spiritually strong, and I thought I was…but I wasn’t.
My guess is that most of us are weaker than we know. There are many reasons this is the case, but there is one that seems to sit at the top of the list: we think life is to be lived from the outside in vs. the inside out. Our outer world is where our work, accomplishments, and resumes exist, so because we can “see” it, we believe it must matter more. Our thoughts, hopes, and souls exist in our inner world and are by nature invisible, which means we think they are less important and neglect them easily. So what’s the net result of living this way? Weakness.
“Our outer world is where our work, accomplishments, and resumes exist, so because we can “see” it, we believe it must matter more.”
The Bible tells us that life is lived in the opposite direction.
Proverbs 4:23
Above all else, guard your heart, for everything [emphasis added] you do flows from it.
Everything? Yes, everything we do flows from the inside out. Now, some of us think talking about our souls sounds like something reserved for wimpy, robe-wearing, herbal tea drinking guys who don’t have anything better to do but sit around and emote. First of all, we are not going to just sit around and share our feelings. And second, Almighty God who made heaven and earth with His words, who is not bound by time and space says that strength as men comes from looking inward first. So that means we should probably take the Almighty’s advice. Otherwise, we may end up melting into a puddle in our chairs.
-Chris Curtis, Harrison Bridge Campus Pastor
Our new Men’s Roundtable study, A Man and His Faith, launches next week. We will wrestle with issues like The Fear of Man vs. The Fear of God, Anger, and what it means to Pursue God as men. We would love for you to join us as we look inward and upward. You can register for your specific campus on our website.