It's Subtle

Love you all, praying for you,
 
I just love God’s Word.  It teaches you humility that brings exaltation.   When pride comes then comes disgrace.  A flood is powerful, and so is erosion.  A flood comes at once, erosion over time, both can be very destructive.  Pride is subtle.  It’s not always in your face.  Disgrace isn’t just a loss of reputation, it’s also a distance from grace.  Grace is pretty valuable.  You don’t want distance from it.  It’s the power to overcome.  Power to say no to sin which could so easily beset you.  Power to know and do the best that God has for you!  Grace – the power that raised Christ from the dead.  That same power is what helps you overcome.  So stay away from pride that could distance you from grace.  It’s subtle.  Most people don’t choose pride consciously.  “I am the greatest!”  That’s why God says, “Let another praise you and not your own mouth, someone else and not your own lips.  When pride comes, its mostly subtle, and it can easily enter if you allow yourself to become self-absorbed.  It’s natural to think of yourself, your needs, your wants, your opinions, but it’s not about you.  Well, if it’s not about me, than what is it about?  God.  And others.  Everything was created by God and exists through Jesus.  God says it’s through Him that everything is held together.  And others are who God said to prefer over yourself.  Let each one look not only to his own interests but also the interests of others.  You’ll be known by how you love one another, not just what you do for or by yourself.  I was coming home recently during an incredibly busy day, and was prompted by the Holy Spirit to jump on a prayer call.  I knew I didn’t have long, but I could at least pray in the Spirit in agreement with what they were praying in the understanding as the Holy Spirit led them.  Even though it was just a few minutes before I had to jump off, it was a huge blessing!  I’m glad I listened to that prompting.  (It’s also subtle – you have to tune your ear to hear Him, and respond quickly – so He can confirm it.)  As I jumped on the call late, and soon had to exit early, a thought crossed my mind.  What if the moderator was watching the callers log?  Here I jumped online when one person was praying, stayed all the way to the end, but when the moderator picked up where the pray-er left off, my call dropped.  What could they have thought?  “Did I offend him?  Did he disagree with something I said?”  No, I only had a few minutes to participate, but thought it was better than nothing.  That moderator could have been bothered all day by a slight that didn’t even occur.  Like when you were in Junior High School, and you see some kids laughing, and you just know they were laughing at you.  No, they weren’t even thinking of you.  You just allowed your sense of self-importance to become overdeveloped and over-sensitive.  It’s easy to do.  It’s pride, but it’s subtle.  God said “Each of you, don’t think of yourselves more highly than you ought.  But using sober judgment, consider others more important than yourself.   One way to do this is always believe the best.  Why believe the worst, nine out of ten times you’re wrong - they aren’t even talking about you, they didn’t even say that, or they didn’t even mean it that way.  You just ruined your day for nothing.  And even if they are, God said a few things about that.  First, an undeserved curse, does not come to rest… so it has no effect on you.  Second “If God be for us, who can be against us.”  Not everyone will like you, what’s that got to do with you, how much God loves you, or what He told you to do?  Nothing.  He said “In everything give thanks for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.” That doesn’t mean give thanks even though people are talking about you.  They might not be at all.  Just give thanks for every good thing that God gives you – and get going with what He told you to do.  Believe the best, rejoice in the LORD always, and again I say rejoice!  Praying that you will not be caught up in the subtlety of pride, that you will always believe the best, and leave the rest to God.  Not naïve, just faithful.  Praying that you will realize, it’s not about you.  Praying that God will help you choose the humility that gets you exalted.  And when He does it, that you will still view others as more important than you, so you can love them, like God loves them.  And that you will know without doubt, how much God loves you! 
 
Love you all,
dad