April 29: Insight Post by Rusty Coram
Wednesday Insight Post
by Rusty Coram
Many years ago, Becky and I purchased a used Toyota Corolla. It appeared to be in excellent shape, reflecting the owner’s care for it. A few months after we bought it, though, the paint started peeling off in huge patches. The car looked good for a while, and then the real condition came through. The only bright side to the now hideous-looking car was that no one would be tempted to steal it!
In our reading this week, we see a group of people going through the motions to look spiritual, but their hearts and minds are far from God-honoring. Listen to God’s assessment:
“We have fasted before you!’ they say. ‘Why aren’t you impressed? We have been very hard on ourselves, and you don’t even notice it!’
“3I will tell you why!” I respond. “It’s because you are fasting to please yourselves. Even while you fast, you keep oppressing your workers. 4What good is fasting when you keep on fighting and quarreling? This kind of fasting will never get you anywhere with me.” Isaiah 58:3–4 (NLT)
As Kim Feld wrote on Monday, it is easy to go through the motions of spiritual disciplines without getting the purpose. God isn’t interested in us having a nice, shiny veneer that covers up a diseased and decaying soul. When disciplines like fasting are practiced correctly, they draw us closer to God and help us examine ourselves so that we can remove what is unhealthy and develop an internal life that reflects the heart and character of our Lord and Leader. Spiritual disciplines are valuable only as long as they are used as means, not as an end.
Jesus addressed this clearly,
“25What sorrow awaits you teachers of religious law and you Pharisees. Hypocrites! For you are so careful to clean the outside of the cup and the dish, but inside you are filthy—full of greed and self-indulgence! 26You blind Pharisee! First wash the inside of the cup and the dish, and then the outside will become clean, too.
27“What sorrow awaits you teachers of religious law and you Pharisees. Hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs—beautiful on the outside but filled on the inside with dead people’s bones and all sorts of impurity. 28Outwardly you look like righteous people, but inwardly your hearts are filled with hypocrisy and lawlessness.” Matthew 23:25–28 (NLT)
Rusty Coram
Senior Pastor
New Hope Church
Lorton, Virginia
www.newhope.org