Cultivating a Culture of Transformation

There’s a verse in Proverbs that has radically shifted my perspective on the internal world. Proverbs 20:26, TPT says it best, “A wise king can discern corruption and remove wickedness from his kingdom.” 

When I read this verse, the Holy Spirit spoke to my heart and said, “This isn’t just about an external kingdom, this is about an internal kingdom.” 

I was thrust into a journey of learning who I am from the inside out. Digging deeper on how to cultivate the kingdom within me partnering with the Holy Spirit to remove things that don’t align with His kingdom.

As a distant mentor once said, “I will reproduce the kingdom I am most aware of.”

The prophet Ezekiel declared, “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.” 

Jesus said, “Out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks.”

Every action is an overflow of what is in our hearts. How we behave will always rise or fall based on what’s been established and cultivated in our internal world. 

2 Corinthians 3:17-18, “Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.  And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.”

The heart’s internal gaze shapes our whole being. When we contemplate on His face, transformation is a by-product. As Kim mentioned last week, the fruit the comes from our life is the result of the Vine we are connected to. When we abide in Jesus and continually to remain in Him as our main source of life and wisdom, the by product is the fruit of the Spirit.

Our life, then, becomes an external expression of a greater internal reality. So in learning to live from the inside out, anchoring ourselves in Christ, His glorious riches can be made manifest within me into this world outside of me. 

Why is this important?

Because I believe the mission of the Kingdom is to cultivate a culture of transformation wherever we are planted through a community of people have been transformed by the life and love of Jesus. And that community of people is called the Body of Christ. The culture within us is essentially what will transform the culture around you and me.

The invitation is for every heart to come alive again, returning a people back to a secure relationship with the Father, their created purpose as image-bearers of God, who has partaken of His divine nature. They are restored as co-creators with the indwelling life of God through the Holy Spirit, raised as co-heirs with Christ, and released as co-laborers with God in the here and now establishing the culture and atmosphere of heaven on the earth.

Simply put, the body of Christ is a collective expression of a people who have individually made Jesus their king and have embodied the ways of the Kingdom within them.

And you and I get to be a part of that.

My encouragement to you is to continually abide in Jesus.
Through abiding, let Jesus teach you how to become wise kings and queens of your own hearts.
Keep leaning in to a community that can impart courage to you as you fight for your healing.
And know the breakthrough that you carry might be someone else’s source of transformation.

So freely receive. Freely give.
And let us cultivate a culture of transformation together as the body of Christ.