577. Inside Out, with Julie Harwick

Women World Leaders' Podcast

True holiness is a matter of the heart. Although we can fool ourselves and others by presenting a squeaky clean image, God calls us to concern ourselves with what’s going on inside, rather than what we look like on the outside. Enjoy this important teaching from Julie Harwick.

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Welcome to Women World Leaders podcast. I’m your host, Julie Harwick. Thank you for joining me today as we celebrate God’s grace in our lives, in this ministry and around the world.

They say you can’t judge a book by its’ cover. I always thought that it was a pretty valid statement, but the truth of that statement proved itself on a much deeper level when I observed the unmasking of someone I thought I knew very well.

My husband and I had recently re-connected with a friend we hadn’t seen since our wedding. He was about to get married himself, so we had the opportunity to get to know his new wife from the start of their marriage. She seemed incredibly sweet and appeared to worship the ground he walked on. She was open about the fact that her past had included drug addiction and a failed marriage to another addict, but she seemed as far removed from that life as anyone could be.

She brought three daughters to the marriage and though they were older than our kids, the youngest got along really well with our girls. We vacationed together. They stayed with our kids when we went on a cruise for our 20th anniversary. They joined our church, and she enthusiastically jumped in and began to develop a women’s ministry.

She had her first child at a very young age and was already a grandmother. I was so impressed to hear her talk about selecting the perfect bible study that she could do with her grandson when he was in her care. She seemed like a spiritual giant who was constantly pouring herself into her family, friends and anyone in need.

After many years of such stellar behavior, there were some surprising developments. She was abruptly asked to step down from her leadership role in women’s ministry. Initially, that action really disturbed me, but I was about to discover the reason why. Her husband began to confide in mine that she was not so sweet and supportive of him when no one else was around. Anytime they experienced conflict, she became verbally abusive and unreasonable.

She accused him of being a narcissist, so he volunteered to go to marriage counseling. The counselor sensed much deeper problems and advised them to both be evaluated for any mental illnesses. He was given a clean bill of health, while she was diagnosed with multiple illnesses and prescribed numerous medications . Things improved for a while, but she soon decided that she didn’t need the medications and tried again to convince him that he was the problem.

She had always been generous with family and friends, buying them gifts and helping out with expenses, but soon she began spending unbelievable amounts of money on a daily basis. She ran up large credit card balances and every time he tried to close one out, she simply opened another. She had no explanation for purchasing a hundred dollars’ worth of Starbucks gift cards day after day. He wanted to fight for their marriage, but she seemed set on destroying him financially and became more and more adversarial toward him with each passing day. They ended up in divorce court and she took as much as she possibly could from him, leaving him in deep debt. Although she left the marriage with a settlement that would’ve taken care of her for decades, the money was all gone within two years. Not long afterward, we discovered that she had been arrested for writing bad checks.

As the story unfolded, each revelation of who she really was came like a punch to the gut. I thought I knew this woman. I trusted her with my children. I looked up to her as someone I’d like to emulate. I thought she was far better to her husband than I was to mine, but the reality was just the opposite. I had never been so wrong in my evaluation of someone. She played the character she wished to portray better than any award-winning actress and I completely bought into the deception.

1 Samuel 16:7 says “The Lord doesn’t look at the things people look at. People look at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.” God was speaking to Samuel about who he was to anoint to replace King Saul. Once he arrived in Bethlehem and was directed to Jesse’s family, Samuel was introduced to all but one of Jesse’s sons. When he laid eyes on Eliab, who was tall, well-built and exuded confidence, he thought, “Surely the Lord’s anointed stands here before the Lord.” But God’s response was clear and direct. “Do not consider his appearance or his height, for I have rejected him.” Jesse continued to bring his sons one by one before Samuel, but in each case, God rejected them. After the Lord rejected seven of Jesse’s impressive sons, Samuel asked if there were any more. As an afterthought, Jesse said there was one more, his youngest, who was tending to the sheep. Much to the surprise and dismay of his seven brothers, when David stood before Samuel, God pronounced, “Rise and anoint him. This is the one.” While David was not a perfect king, he ruled Israel well for decades. He had a close relationship with the Lord and earned the enviable title of “a man after God’s own heart.”

Although we don’t always have the ability to know someone’s heart, God certainly does and it is of tantamount importance to Him. His word is full of references to the heart; 725 to be exact. When Jesus was asked, what is the greatest commandment, He answered without hesitation with Deuteronomy 6:5, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.” When King Solomon, David’s son, prayed for his nation, he acknowledged that God alone knew every human heart and he prayed that his people’s hearts would be fully committed to the Lord.

God explains why the condition of the heart is so critical. He inspired Jeremiah to warn, “ the heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it?” God revealed this much to Solomon, the wisest man who ever lived, he wrote in Proverbs, “Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.”

So many of the Old Testament prophets were instructed to warn the people, not just about their behavior, but about the condition of their hearts, which was the source of their sin. Joel cautioned, “Let your remorse tear at your heart and not your garments. Return to the Lord your God, for He is gracious and merciful.” Isaiah gave the Israelites an insightful, but convicting message from the Lord when he said, “ 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.” Jesus quoted that very scripture to describe the condition of the Pharisees, who were considered among the holiest people of His day.

These respected men were experts when it came to interpreting and applying the Law. They were very careful to follow it to the letter, even going so far as to tithe the proper amounts of the herbs they grew in their gardens. They took great pride in their devotion to fulfilling even the smallest requirements of the Law. Jesus, however, was not impressed. He called them out for fussing over minor details while they created exceptions in the Law that would allow them to abandon responsibility for their own parents in their old age. He criticized them for turning His Father’s House, the temple, into a den of thieves and accused them of being like whitewashed tombs – clean looking on the outside, but filled with dead men’s bones and decaying flesh.

No one but Jesus would have ever dared to speak that way about the Pharisees. Aside from the High Priest, no one had more power or influence with Rome. The Pharisees, along with the Sadducees and chief priests, comprised the Sanhedrin which was the ruling, elite class of Jesus’ day. The wealth, power and respect that came with the title led the Pharisees to believe that they were, “just a little bit superior” to everyone else. Jesus pointed it out when He told the story of two men who went to the temple to pray. The tax collector cried out for God’s mercy because he recognized that he was a sinful man, but the Pharisee thanked God that he was not like the tax collector beside him or other sinful people, because he fasted twice a week and tithed a tenth of everything he had. Jesus said only one of them went away forgiven, and it wasn’t the Pharisee.

That probably came as a surprise to His audience, because they were used to thinking of Pharisees as the holiest people around. From their outward appearance, they looked pretty righteous, but no one could miss the disdain they showed for everyone else. Jesus dared to point out their hypocrisy because He recognized exactly where their superiority complex came from – hearts that were far from God. They studied the prophets ad nauseam but failed to recognize that Ezekiel’s words in chapter 11 were meant for them when he said, “ I will give them an undivided heart and put a new spirit in them; I will remove from them their heart of stone and give them a heart of flesh.” Jesus called them out again and again, in an effort to make them see their hearts’ true condition. In Matthew 13:15 He said, “For this people’s heart has become calloused; they hardly hear with their ears and they have closed their eyes. Otherwise, they might see with eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their hearts and turn, and I would heal them.”

Having an authentic relationship with Jesus is impossible without a heart that is wholly His. Just like the Pharisees and my deceptive friend, we can follow all the rules and present a very convincingly righteous outward appearance, but if our hearts are full of ourselves instead of Jesus, we are frauds. And though we may be able to fool the people around us and even ourselves, God knows exactly who and what we are. In Luke 16:15, Jesus said, “ You are the ones who justify yourselves in the sight of people, but God knows your hearts; because that which is highly esteemed among people is detestable in the sight of God.” Ultimately, no one can fool the maker of the Universe and the only opinion that really matters is His. And yet, we often devote so much of our effort toward doing things that will make us look good on the outside while we neglect to open our hearts to the Lord and ask Him to make them more like His. Creating an impressive exterior only requires self-control and determination. Developing a heart for God requires humility, sacrifice, introspection and time. Is it any wonder that our natural inclination is to focus on the outward appearance? But what comes naturally is always inferior to what comes supernaturally. In His Sermon on the Mount, Jesus gave us a pretty good reason to pursue having a heart for Him. “Blessed are the pure in heart,” He said, “ for they shall see God.” The more we allow Him to purify our hearts, emptying them of ourselves and filling them with Himself, the more we will see, know and experience His glory.

I’d like to close with this benediction, from 1 Thessalonians 3:13. “May He strengthen your hearts so that you will be blameless and holy in the presence of our God and Father when our Lord Jesus comes with all His holy ones.”

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