Leaving Beyond – Grounded In Scripture

Written by: April J. Buchanan

There are many reasons within the sinful heart to destroy what God has made beautiful. We do not appreciate beauty. We are dissatisfied with it, and through our distorted lens and corrupt hearts, we despise what is good. We long for, burn for, and pine after what is not ours, what is corrupt, and what we believe ought to belong to us.

The heart is sick and desperately wicked.

To read such words stirs the heart to burn against the accusation. How dare I be charged with such things? Perhaps you, but not me. Speak of yourself and do not count me among your wicked desires.

When Scripture declares that all have sinned, that none seek God, that none are good, the heart rises in protest. Not me. No. Not me. Yet the words, “no, not one,” leave a man burning and raging against the charge. They permit no exceptions, no refuge for self-defense, no corner in which to hide a cherished image of self.

Sinful men follow after the sinful desires of their hearts. Though they may resist certain lusts that other men eagerly pursue, counting the cost worth it to destroy what they have for what they desire, their resistance does not prove them wise or good. It only proves that they boast in a righteousness they have imagined for themselves, an inherent goodness they believe sets them above other weak and sinful men. Such comparisons give them cause for boasting. They measure themselves against foolish men and congratulate themselves on their own perceived virtue.

One man lusts for what he cannot have. Another lusts just as fiercely to protect the image of himself he believes to be beautiful, pleasing, and worthy of admiration, especially when compared to men he considers beneath him.

The heart is sick and desperately wicked.

Such men do not see themselves rightly, for they do not measure themselves against perfect righteousness. They do not cry out against their own hearts.

Beauty remains obscured, for if we were to behold beauty in its perfection, it would expose the wickedness within us. It is the grace of God that shows a man what he truly is, gives him a new heart, and reveals the beauty and glory of God in Christ. Nothing so utterly shatters a man’s view of himself and the world as seeing himself rightly before God and beholding the beauty and glory of God in Christ Jesus.

Only a heart made new in Christ can behold, cherish, and praise God for His beauty and glory in all things. God gives a new heart, a heart that can see. A heart that recognizes the futility and depravity of what it once cherished, now finding those former loves repulsive, even as the flesh must still be daily put to death. His loves, desires, and affections have been changed. His heart, mind, will, and emotions have been changed and are being changed.

He now beholds a beauty his heart longs for. A beauty he sees only in part, yet one day will behold in fullness beyond imagination. He has come to know the love of God, His grace and mercy displayed toward one so undeserving. His eyes are open. He has tasted and seen the beauty and glory of God in Christ Jesus.

Grace and peace, y’all.
Soli Deo Gloria