In my last update I shared my spiritual troubles and doubts, and I got great feedback from some of you. Everyone experiences God differently, and God speaks to us all differently. Maybe God’s way of speaking to me is through the wisdom of others. I am a lot more at peace with where I am spiritually now, but still hungry to grow.
I want my faith to be built on a solid foundation of the knowledge of God’s existence. I don’t think that will come through an emotional or “relational” connection with God, although I’m not closed off to that possibility. I think about the way my parents, my older Christian mentors, and some of my college roommates and friends talk about God and it does not involve heavy emotions, it all revolves around some sort of deep rooted knowing of God’s existence. I’m not sure how to come to that knowing, and no one can instantly enlighten me.
It’s a little frustrating but also filled with hope and possibilities. Hope because so many around me have come to a knowing of God’s existence. And possibility because God seems to always work in different and mysterious ways with every individual person.
In addition to my all encompassing doubts and questions, I’ve been thinking about my character. Specifically I’ve been thinking about my pride. I started reading Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis this month and came upon a chapter called “The Great Sin”. Lewis says this about Pride:
“According to Christian teachers, the essential vice, the utmost evil, is pride. Unchastely, anger, greed, drunkenness, and all that, are mere fleabites in comparison: it was through pride that the devil became the devil: Pride leads to every other vice: it is the complete anti-God state of mind.” P.121 of Mere Christianity.
If someone tells me about how strong they are or how many countries they have visited and all I want to do in return is show my muscles or the number of stamps in my passport, then that is pride. Or if someone receives praise for their education and all I feel is disgust and a desire to bust out my diplomas and GPA, then that is pride. And sadly, so often I do feel the desire to out-doo others, to win, to be the best, and to make it about me.
Desiring great things is not a sin. Lewis says “Pride gets no pleasure out of having something, only out of having more of it than the next man… once the element of competition is gone, pride has gone.” Even desiring praise is not bad, but taking satisfaction in yourself and not in the praise itself is bad. My new goal is to desire excellence, but not to desire superiority.
So what’s my humility game plan? To have Humility is to realize that I am broken and lowly. Or as the dictionary states, Humility is to have a modest or low view of my importance. To be honest I rarely have a low view of my importance and I give no credit to God but instead take it all for myself. I need to come to a realization that I am a pathetic looser in comparison to God and that nothing I can ever do will earn salvation. However, I don’t want to think less of my self but merely to think of myself less.
To achieve this I believe that I need to experience a level of brokenness, which was one of my original goals for the year. So pray that God will grant me humility, if necessary through breaking me. But don’t pray the brokenness too hard, ask God to be gentle hahah.
Really quick, here’s what I’ve been up to in Nepal. Painted the inside of a language school for a week, did door to door ministry, attempted to talk to prostitutes and tell them they are worthy, prayer walks and other miscellaneous ministry. Did you know that you can buy a prostitute for 50 cents an hour here? That really vexed and gave me a deeper understanding of the sex trade industry.
Anyway, we’ve had 2 day weekends here so I’ve been up to some adventures too. Took a crazy 6 hour buss ride to Pokhara to hike, paraglide, and explore. This weekend rode a motorbike across crossed countless rivers, over 2 suspension bridges, got a flat in the middle of nowhere, saw Tibet from a distance, and touched snow in the high Himalayas. It was a true adventure and it really fueled me up to take on whatever life/God throws at me next. Also, I searched the entire city of Kathmandu for mustache wax… and there is none to be found. We leave for Thailand on Monday and I’m hoping to find wax there.
