It Came From Within
Introduction
Growing up spending many days at my grandfather's home we watched television a lot. While I was a child of the 80s, we also watched old films. There were those that put my young mind in suspense with titles like The Creature From the Black Lagoon and It Came From Outerspace. These movies were products of their time. The idea was that an enemy would come from outside.
In the year that I was born Ridley Scott directed a different kind of movie, Alien. I remember watching the 1986 sequel Aliens. In the closing scene of the movie, Ellen Ripley (played by Sigourney Weaver) tucks Newt in, a young girl she has rescued from a female alien who is intent on laying her eggs in Newt so she can be the host of the embryos. As she tucks her in as they begin their long space flight back to earth Newt asks, "Can I dream?" "Yes honey, I think we both can," Ripley replies, "Sleep tight."
The plot of the movie is about a group of marines who are sent to a planet that is in trouble because it has been taken over by an alien race. Ellen Ripley comes along because she has experience with the aliens from the 1979 film. When asked what they should do, she says they should blow up the whole planet. The problem with the aliens is that they are parasitic. They use humans as their hosts, laying their eggs in them. Once the embryo matures, it burst from the human's midsection killing the human. Eventually, the battle ensues between Ripley and the queen of the aliens and Ripley rescues Newt.
As dramatic as all of this is, this is illustrates something that happens around us every day. Inside of every one of us is the embryo of an invader that occasionally bursts forth and surprises us and those around us, potentially destroying us and them. We put our hands over our mouths when we say some things and in shock ask, "Where did that come from?" There is a moment when we commit some offense and others are shocked around us. We wonder what happened.
(The idea for this illustration and sermon comes from two books by Andy Stanley: It Came From Within and Enemies of the Heart).
Matthew 15:16-20 NIV
16 “Are you still so dull?” Jesus asked them. 17 “Don’t you see that whatever enters the mouth goes into the stomach and then out of the body? 18 But the things that come out of a person’s mouth come from the heart, and these defile them. 19 For out of the heart come evil thoughts—murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander. 20 These are what defile a person, but eating with unwashed hands does not defile them.”
Unlike the Creature from the Black Lagoon or It Came From Outerspace, Jesus said that the most terrifying things that happen are those that come from within!
It Came From Within!
The heart is the center of our lives. We can live without a lot of things but we cannot live without our hearts. It pumps life-giving blood to the extremities of our bodies. The Bible speaks of another heart in our text. Not the physical organ, but the core of our being. The writer of Proverbs says of this heart that we should, "Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it" (Prov 4:23 NIV). We often think that our behaviors are our biggest issues. We think that if we can just change what we are doing, everything will change. Jesus warns that while external change is important, real change is based on the heart.
May times things are not what they seem. If you love basketball, you may know that long before LeBron James, or a Majic Johnson, or an Air Jordan there was a Pistol, Pistol Pete Maravich. He was a showman, in college and the NBA. His flamboyant passes and amazing shots earned him a place on the all-star team more than once. He broke records. He was a lanky shaggy-haired young man who seemed to be in the best of health. Then one day at a pick-up basketball game he fell to the ground at 40 years old, died of a heart attack. He had a congenital disease of the heart that no one was aware of until an autopsy was performed after he had died. His performance was not an indicator of his overall health.
There are other people, you may know some, whose regular meal is a box of Krispy Kream and a six-pack of diet cokes. Their lifestyle and eating habits seem like they should be moments away from a heart attack. Yet, they are as healthy as a horse. Their heart is running like a Swiss clock. Again, the behavior is not always a good indicator of what's going on inside.
We learn early on to modify our behaviors. Often this is based on pain. We know that if we do this or that thing that we may be disciplined. We recognize that if we do not restrain ourselves from saying this or posting that, we could lose our jobs, or our positions, or our relationships and so we modify our behavior, but not always our hearts.
Each of us has a public self. That persona that everyone sees. Often it is our best self. The self that makes a good first impression. Our warts are hidden, our blemishes covered.
Each of us has a private self. Our families see us when we wake up in the morning. On our bad days. When we aren't afraid of someone catching a snapshot of us. When our hair isn't combed and our teeth aren't brushed. When we are not afraid to raise our voices...
Each of us has a secret self. Deep in the core of who we are there may be secrets that no one but ourselves and God, and maybe the devil, know. We keep our hearts hidden even from our spouses and children or parents, and sometimes even from ourselves.
Jeremiah said it this way, "The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it?" (Jeremiah 17:9). Just like Pistol Pete Maravich, there may be things lurking within that could destroy me that I don't see and others don't see.
We often avoid silence. There are places of silence where you can hear the gurgling of your bowels and the beating of your heart and the sound of your own breathing. You can also hear the secret self speaking. Since we do not like these silent places, often God has to give us other warning signs about what is in our hearts.
There are warning signs that come to those with physical heart trouble. Almost like the tremors before an earthquake or the seismic activity before a volcano erupts. There may be headaches or indigestion or back pain. Any number of things that are often treated by other means before anyone ever goes to the cardiologist. It is the same with the spiritual heart. Symptoms like those unguarded emotional moments when we think, or say, or do something that surprises us and others. We sometimes like to blame the devil. We like to blame our parents, or our pastor, or our environment, or the president, or congress. But Jesus stops us in mid-sentence and says that all of those things come from the heart. Ouch! A-L-L. Even though we didn't mean to say it, even though we didn't mean to do it. Somewhere lurking deep down within, it was there! It came from within!
Our restraints were down on our public self and private self or worst yet secret self came out!
The Pharisees were amazing at keeping the rules. They had rules that they made to keep themselves from getting close to breaking the rules. Jesus frustrated them because he ignored their extrabiblical rules. Right before our text, they were upset with Jesus because He had eaten without washing his hands. Their practices were one that they thought made them clean, but their behaviors could not change their hearts. In fact, the observance of their extrabiblical laws had a way of keeping them, spiritual babies. They were never able to grow up because they looked so good on the outside that the inside of their lives was never open to critique. Until Jesus showed up... He could see the inside.
When we are born again, baptized in Jesus Name and filled with the Holy Spirit we are immediately justified and sanctified. We are immediately placed in the right standing with God. But, then we have to live into what God says that we are. This work is a work that begins and then continues to flow from the inside of who we are.
Jesus said, “Anyone who is thirsty may come to me! 38Anyone who believes in me may come and drink! For the Scriptures declare, ‘Rivers of living water will flow from his heart.’” 39(When he said “living water,” he was speaking of the Spirit, who would be given to everyone believing in him. But the Spirit had not yet been given, because Jesus had not yet entered into his glory.) (John 7:37-39 NLT).
God wants to finish what he began in you when you were born again, but you've got to keep going back to how it started. Paul asked the Galatians, "Are you so foolish? Having begun in the Spirit, will you now be perfected by the flesh?" (Gal 3:3).
Too often we are like the Pharisees or those who Paul confronts in the book of Galatians, we are depending merely on external actions and behaviors rather than relying on the inner working of the Spirit. We think that if we can just change our actions everything will turn out right and then... The works of the flesh manifest themselves. We think these are the issue when in reality they are symptoms of a deeper problem. Our actions are not our issue, our hearts are our issue. And so often we find ourselves in a vicious cycle of failure as the outward restraints fall away and what is in our hearts raises its ugly head and explodes from within!
Sin is all about broken relationships. Our broken relationship with God and our broken relationships with others. How do we diagnose what is hidden? Andy Stanley suggests that practically every conflict and relational wound we will ever experience can be traced back to one of four different heart issues.
1. The Big Four
Guilt
Anger
Greed
Jealousy
If you read the Ten Commandments or the Sermon on the Mount you will find these four being evident in the things that break God's Law. They are issues of the heart.
2. The Power of Debt
In the book Enemies of the Heart, Stanley frames each of these four core sins in a “debt-to-debtor dynamic.” That’s the uncomfortable feeling you get when you think you owe somebody something, or they owe you. (And if we’re honest, at times we may even think that “somebody” is God.)
If you’ve ever been in a situation where someone owed you money and refused to pay, you know that the person owed can feel as powerless and as put upon as a person who’s in debt. It all depends upon the personalities (and the arrogance) of those involved.
Either way, things aren’t even. Someone has the upper hand. There’s an imbalance.
Guilt says, “I owe you.”Anger says, “You owe me.”Greed says, “I owe me.”Jealousy says, “God owes me.”
3. 4 Heart Medicines
There are only two ways to resolve this kind of tension: Either somebody has to pay up, or somebody has to cancel the debt. As long as the debt is unpaid or unforgiven, the debt governs the relationship.
Proverbs 22:7 says that "the borrower is a slave to the lender."
Stanley suggests four things to get free from the grip of those inner enemies that lurk deep in the dark of our secret self. He says:
To free your heart from guilt: Confess.
Not just to God, but to all the offended parties. And confess to change, not just to relieve a guilty conscience.
1 John 1
This then is the message which we have heard of him, and declare unto you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the truth: But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin. If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. 9If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.
God invites us:
Isaiah 1:18
Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord: though your sins are as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall be as wool.
James 5:16
Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.
To remove your anger: Forgive.
Make the choice to forgive; don’t wait for the feeling. And forgive specifically for exactly what you think was taken from you. Cancel the debt so the offending party no longer owes you anything.
Mark 11:25
And when you stand praying, if you hold anything against anyone, forgive them, so that your Father in heaven may forgive you your sins.
Matthew 6:12
Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors.
Remember that the debt we owe to God is so much more than we could ever repay, and the debt anyone owes us is so much smaller in comparison to the debt we owe to God. And God has chosen to wipe the slate clean for us! Jesus prayed for those who crucified Him, "Father, forgive them for they know not what they do" (Luke 23:34). Stephen prayed for those who stoned him, "Lord, lay not this sin to their charge" (Acts 7:60). Forgiveness is as much, if not more, about your own heart being released from the bondage that lurks within than it is about the person you are forgiving!
There are even moments when you must make a decision to forgive God. He does not need your forgiveness, but you need to forgive Him of the areas where you may feel He has failed you. He has not failed, but there is a release in you releasing Him.
To eliminate greed: Give.
Ask yourself, “Why do I have so much? Why do I already have more than I need?” And ask God, “What do you want me to do with my extra?”
Don’t wait for God to change your heart before you start giving; start giving as the opening for him to change your heart.
Jesus warns us against covetousness. It is okay to have things, but dangerous when things have us. Paul warned that greed is idolatry (Colossians 3:5). The human heart is an idol factory. When my possessions no longer possess me I am freed from the monster of greed that lurks within!
To rid yourself of jealousy: Celebrate.
Jealousy begins when we don’t get what we want. So make a habit of congratulating others for their accomplishments, even though you don’t want to.
Changing these heart habits can revolutionize our lives.
Make it routine
Confess
Forgive
Give
Celebrate
Pray for an establishment of godly habits to root out temptations. Settle your outstanding debts. With yourself. With others. With God. That’s what he’s done with us.
His grace changed our debt-to-debtor dynamic forever. He paid the price and canceled our debt to give us a new heart.
How will we take care of these hearts (Proverbs 4:23)?
And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. Ezekiel 36:26
(Part of these points were taken from http://lisanotes.blogspot.com/2011/11/enemies-of-heart.html where the author of the blog reviews and summarizes Enemies of the Heart by Andy Stanley.
And most of all find yourself daily at His feet! You began in the Spirit. God has not completely healed the corruption of sin in us. He has given us a heart transplant, but we must maintain its health. We need a continual flow of God's Spirit in our lives!
Conclusion and exhortation:
What happens when we realize that the enemy is not outside ourselves, but inside? We can begin to yield to the Divine Heart Surgeon. He is the Heart-Knower (Acts 1:24; 15:8).
Saint Augustine was the first autobiographer. In his Confessions, he tells the story of his conversion and his struggle with sin. He says to God, "You have made us for yourself, and our hearts are restless until they find their rest in you."
Oh, he has already defeated the enemy within. He is wanting to tuck you in and wish you the sweetest of dreams as we head home to the heavenly world where we are safe from the invader of sin. But, if we are to remain in fellowship with Him we have to continue to depend on Him. It was grace that brought us safe thus far, and grace will lead us home. Rest in Him!
