One of the hardest things I have wrestled with this year is
pride. In one of Jason Upton’s
songs he says, ” If the whole world is looking at me, then they can’t see You
(God).” Praise be to God, much
pride has left me and fallen back to the pits of hell where it belongs, but
what does that mean? Does that
mean I won’t ever deal with it again?
Does it mean I’m scott free and shine as the most humble person alive? No, not even close.
Just the other day, Rocio and I were hanging out with Miles
and Cam while looking at a picture that posed a question, “Who would be able to
push who in the pool?” Yes, us
girls have a little bit of that fight in us too! After no conclusion could be made, the guys said, “Arm
wrestle it out!” Prideful and sure
of ourselves, we both thought without a shadow of a doubt that we could beat
each other…so arm wrestling it was. As we began I held my own for a few, but
shortly Rocio took my hand down.
We did it one more time just in case…one more time Rocio had my hand
down.
It killed every square inch of me. I always win at things I put my mind to…I don’t get beat,
but today I did and I hated it.
But what I loved about this is that God was in it. You can debate that all you want or
think I’m off my rocker, but God ordained that moment to get that much needed
pride out of me. The bible says, ”
When pride comes, then comes disgrace, but with humility comes wisdom.” God has been teaching me a lot about
wisdom, knowledge and fearing the Lord, but if I am still consumed with pride,
how can any of that reside in me?
You see we both had so much hope and glory in ourselves that
we were determined. Pride was conceived at the beginning of the conversation, it brought forth humiliation and a downward spiral from there. It made me sick to think of the way I
reacted in this situation. If I
can’t see above my own pride in a silly game of arm wrestling, how do I expect
to see God in anything? Or for
that matter, how do I expect others to see God in me?
In Upton’s song, he continues to sing about pride and what
we do with it. “We better trash
our idols if were going to be in the army of the Lord…the greatest idol is you
and me…when will we learn that Gods strategy is giving glory to the Lord. We look just like our enemies, we are
full of pride.”
I have put myself and my glory above God far to many times and it
has gotten me nowhere. When will I
learn that wisdom and humility are far greater than pride? I pray that today I am that much closer
to giving glory to the Lord and not to myself. My prayer for all of us would be that we would trash our
idol of pride/self and seek God’s strategy.
