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April 16, 2023
by Pastor Chuck SwindollScriptures: Isaiah 29:13–16
From a distance we in the church often look like beautiful people. We're well-dressed. We have nice smiles. We look friendly. We appear cultured, under control . . . at peace.
The Lord says:
“These people come near to me with their mouth
and honor me with their lips,
but their hearts are far from me.
Their worship of me
is based on merely human rules they have been taught.
Therefore once more I will astound these people
with wonder upon wonder;
the wisdom of the wise will perish,
the intelligence of the intelligent will vanish.”
Woe to those who go to great depths
to hide their plans from the Lord,
who do their work in darkness and think,
“Who sees us? Who will know?”
You turn things upside down,
as if the potter were thought to be like the clay!
Shall what is formed say to the one who formed it,
“You did not make me”?
Can the pot say to the potter,
“You know nothing”? (Isaiah 29:13–16)
From a distance we in the church often look like beautiful people. We're well-dressed. We have nice smiles. We look friendly. We appear cultured, under control . . . at peace.
But what a different picture comes in view when someone gets up close and in touch! What appeared so placid is really a mixture of winding roads of insecurity and uncertainty . . . maddening gusts of lust, greed, and self-indulgence . . . and pathways
of pride glazed over with a slick layer of hypocrisy. All this is shrouded in a cloud of fear of being found out.
From a distance, we dazzle; up close, we're tarnished. Put enough of us together and we may resemble an impressive mountain range. But when you get down into the shadowy crevices . . . the Alps we ain't.
That's why our Lord means so much to us. He is intimately acquainted with all our ways. Darkness and light are alike to Him. Not one of us is hidden from His sight. All things are open and laid bare before Him: our darkest secret, our deepest shame, our
stormy past, our worst thought, our hidden motive, our vilest imagination . . . even our vain attempts to cover the ugly with snow-white beauty.
He comes up so close. He sees it all. He knows our frame. He remembers we are dust.
Best of all, He loves us still.