Have you ever seen an oak tree surrounded by fallen acorns? If you step on an acorn it cracks easily, but the oak tree that grows from its seed is almost indestructible. The oak tree is much harder than its seed and compared to the acorn looks and feels very different and is made of a very different substance. The acorn is weak and the tree is powerful; the acorn is fragile and the tree is nearly indestructible. But you have to plant the weaker acorn before the stronger tree can grow.

Catch this: the tree does not come from the shell of the seed; it comes from inside of the seed. What releases the power inside of the seed is the death of the shell. When a seed is planted in the ground, the shell dissolves, releasing the life on the inside into the soil and the substance of the tree is created from the inside, not the shell of the seed. So what happens is the inner part of the seed swallows up the outer part of the seed and a whole new substance comes out of the ground called a tree. Likewise we are seeds. The goal of the Christian life is for the inward man to swallow and dissolve the outward man. This will happen completely when Jesus returns, but our goal is for this to happen now here on earth to as full a degree as possible. Since our lives are lived from the inside out, the question is: is your inner man dominated by your spirit? Has it swallowed up your outward man making you spiritual, bold, and confident? Or has your soul swallowed up your outward man making you suspicious, nervous, paranoid, fearful, and hesitant?