BIGGER ON THE INSIDE THAN THE OUTSIDE

If you’re ever searching for real estate in the Las Vegas area, then you might run across the house that’s bigger on the inside than the outside. Above ground, this estate features a rather nice stucco home which a red tiled roof. The location is good if you do not mind some nasty-looking high-powered electrical lines out front. Besides this, the home is a few miles from the Las Vegas strip and airport. This makes it a prime Las Vegas cultural location. But this house holds a deep secret. 

Developing Inwards

Below the surface, 26-feet down, is a sprawling 16,000 square-foot mansion. Back in 1978, when the Soviet Union was going full-throttle and Islamic extremism was beginning to burst, the owner planned for a massive underground “doomsday shelter” to be built, acting as a “no other way of survival” escape. The owner designed it to be a five bedroom mansion, complete with an “outdoor” pool, putting course, and barbeque grill (disguised as a large rock). Notably, its “landscape” included artificial turf, plants, and trees with the outer walls depicting murals ranging from mountain views to cityscapes. Its outdoor lights can be adjusted to represent noon-day, night, morning, and twilight. Above this mansion, the owner then built a relatively modest house. The entire complex is on sale for a heart-stopping $22,440,000.00.

I realize none of us are interested in buying such a home. However, this house is as an analogy of what each of us should strive to be – bigger on the inside than the outside. Our focus should be developing the inner person rather than the outer person. Paul the apostle wrote that while the outer man is perishing (if you are over 40), but the inner man is being renewed day by day (if you are a Christian believer). As we submit to Christ’s school of hard-knocks and nurture our spirit through reading the word of God, absorbing of His Spirit through prayer, the inner person will grow and mature. God will revive, renew, and perfect the inner person within us.

This temporal body is just the modest house above. The real born-again and eternal person is below the surface. Though we may go through this life small, homely, and unimpressive on the outside, God is building a towering superstar on the inside. One day the far-greater person will be revealed through the resurrection and our glorification in heaven.

Exaltation

Agreeably, the ultimate example of “bigger on the inside than on the outside” is Jesus Christ. Isaiah 53:2-3 tells us that, when Jesus walked the earth “He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to Him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him. He was despised and rejected by mankind, a man of suffering, and familiar with pain. Like one from whom people hide their faces he was despised, and we held him in low esteem.” Yet behind the veil of his body dwelt the fullness of Deity (Colossians 2:9). Frequently that Deity burst forth, as when He calmed the tempest, walked upon the sea, healed the sick and raised the dead. Similarly, there were those times when Jesus’ Deity really shone through. These included the manifestation of His glory on the holy mountain (Matthew 17:1-8), and when the Roman cohort first tried to arrest Him in the garden of Gethsemane (John 18:1-9). One simple “I Am” from Jesus knocked the entire battalion to the ground.

Fortunately for humanity, Jesus submitted Himself to their wicked plans – through which God was working His own divine plan. He allowed them to arrest, abuse, and crucify Him. The Romans and the chief priests walked away from His grave believing they had won. But on the third day Jesus demonstrated who the real winner was. Christ and all who put their faith in Him. Now Jesus is forever glorified in heaven. And He promises the same exaltation to all who will, in faith and humility, follow Him (1 Corinthians 15:50-58).

PRAYER

Dear Lord Jesus, I choose this day to take up my cross and follow You. I submit to Your leading and Your chastening hand. I trust you to wash me in Your blood, forgive me of all my sins, and to renew and develop my inner person day by day – until the day I stand with You, glorified in heaven. By the power of Your Holy Spirit, please help me to keep this commitment. Amen.