What's on the inside?

As I was reading in my morning devotions I came upon a scripture in Titus that caught my eye since we have been talking about pure hearts this past week or so. Titus 1:15&16 "To the pure in heart all things are pure but to the defiled nothing is pure; their very minds and consciences are defiled and polluted. 16. They profess to know God but deny, disown and renounce Him by what they do; they are detestable, unbelieving and disobedient, disloyal and rebellious, unfit for good work of any kind."
Whew! Kinda strong. As I was pondering this I thought of what Jesus said to the Pharisees---He called them white washed tombs that looked great on the outside but inside were full of deadness. It goes back to what I said a couple of days ago---God is looking for transformed hearts so what we do and say spring forth from that, instead of people who may do the right things and say the right words, but inside they are not really transformed—they are full of deadness. I think the scripture that says we will know true Christians by their fruit is backed up by this one in Titus. We can call ourselves Christians, but it is what we do that really tells who we are and who we belong to. Do we screw up and make mistakes? Absolutely. That is why God's mercies are new every morning---He knew we needed that cushion. The issue is the condition of the heart and what is ruling our lives. When the Holy Spirit is in control, and we are walking accordingly, scripture tells us we will not fulfill the lusts of the flesh. When we are the ones in control just the opposite is true—we give in to the lusts of the flesh. Galatians 5 gives quite a listing of what that includes. It's not just sexual issues, but also includes---impurity, immorality, strife, anger, selfishness, and division. So if we see ourselves giving into the flesh we need to take a hard look at ourselves, own that we have placed our will on the throne of our lives, repent of it, and go forward in the mercy that is new each day. If we want to be the ones that have hearts propelling us to do and say the right things, a lifestyle of repentance is the ticket. So how do we know what is an outward show and what springs from a transformed heart? Scripture says that anything hidden will eventually be exposed. We might get fooled for a while, or even fool ourselves, but who we are has to eventually show itself. Fruit is the best way to know if we are what we profess. This doesn't mean we expect every time in every situation that 'real Christians' will act accordingly. We have to give room for learning and growth. It all goes back to the heart and its deepest desires and our will to act out our choices. Our free will that God gave us can get us into heavenly places or into lots of trouble! Where our will is, our fruit will be, so if our fruit has a pattern of disobedience, disloyalty, rebellion, or anything mentioned in Gal. 5, we need to go before God, repent, and ask Him to purify our hearts. The decontamination process of purification is sometimes unpleasant, but if we are really serious about our relationship with God, we will submit to it. And submit is the right word to use here, because it is a most definite surrender of our will to His. We come back to 'nevertheless' once again. A heart wanting a deeper walk, a heart not satisfied with settling for just what is acceptable, but one that strains toward what is desirable will always find its way back to 'nevertheless'.