I’ve been learning difficult lessons on humility lately. Which, as the blog name suggests, can sometimes feel like its hard to put my finger on. However, I hope in sharing my struggle, and my honest reality with pride and selfishness, that I can convey the hope found in the Lord’s faithfulness. (FYI, there are no more booger references in this post, it just seemed an appropriate title…but the further I contemplated taking the analogy, the less comfortable with the concept I became…I’ll leave you to your own imagination, lol)

I am in a season of being humbled. And it is the most painful season with the Lord that I’ve been through yet. But it is also the most wonderful. Because part of being humbled is having to break off my selfishness and my judgement and pride. So I’m learning, more than ever, how to balance confidence in who I am and the gifts the Lord has created me with naturally with not taking myself too seriously. RT Kendall defines pride as taking oneself too seriously. For example, getting frustrated that I’m not getting the attention I deserve or the affirmation for my awesome skills or other similar things is a sign that I’m taking myself too seriously. Jeremy Taylor challenges that we should know our own unworthiness, and then it is easier when others don’t value us enough because we already knew the truth! Like I said before, it is a balance. I want to know who I am in Christ, but not be pious about it. Be confident in my abilities, but need the affirmations of MEN less and GOD more.

Let me be more plain (transparent). For years, I have KNOWN that pride was an issue for me. Whether it was a therapist, professor, roommate, or mentor, I have been told over and over, for years, that I have an issue with pride. Which always frustrated me! Pride isn’t like other sins that are easy to point out and know how to fix. Pride is clever and crafty and feels genuine. I didn’t know how to identify the difference in healthy confident thoughts and prideful ones. So, as all treacherous growth stories start, I asked the Lord to show me what pride looks like. I prayed and asked for clarity. And the Lord, in his vast amounts of grace and wisdom, did not open my eyes immediately to my pride. Instead, he has taken me on a 6 year journey to discover it. However, last summer I took a GIANT leap forward in finally seeing what other people see.

I was knocked out of my ivory tower and slammed face first into the ground. Maybe the Lord decided to take a giant leap forward in the lesson. Or maybe he just got tired of my stubbornest and decided I needed a bigger push. Whatever the case, I experienced something that I have never experienced before. (I’m leaving out the physical/natural story and focusing on the spiritual aspect of this story…so I hope I can communicate clearly). The Lord, for the first time I can EVER recall in my life, allowed me to see my own sin. And he did so by showing me his faithfulness. His holiness. His purity. And for some reason, the veil was pulled back and I saw the ugliness in my own heart. I really DID think I was better than other people. I really DID think the rules didn’t apply to me. I realized my own selfish motives, selfish desires, manipulative ways, and it was sickening. God’s faithfulness was the most important aspect of it all. He loved me and chose me and he never left my side. He just finally decided to open my eyes to the reality that was within me. And the Lord, in a sweet way, kept saying what RT Kendall says in his book “get over yourself!” So many situations that used to get me upset and annoy me about other people was all about ME anyway! “They didn’t give me credit for that, I worked hard on that!” or “Wow, that person really sucks. I know I could have done that better.” and on and on and on the idiotic thoughts ran through my brain.

But back to God’s faithfulness. I’m sharing because upon reflection the other day of my continued struggle not to get upset and to seek clarity when I’m upset, the Lord’s faithfulness was revealed to me in a new way.  When I am offended, or upset, or frustrated at others, my course of action is to sit and write in my journal. I do so with the expectation that the Lord will guide my writings, which always start selfishly and angrily, and I allow the Lord to guide my thoughts to his Truth about me and the situation. So, recently, I was writing out my anger in my journal and a prayer was formed. This prayer was formed from the reflection on the joy to be taken in the pain/suffering which the Lord is allowing me to process. Because the fact that life has been difficult, and I am not able to react and think like I did before, is a sign of the Lord’s faithfulness to complete the work he has started in me!! He began the process of rooting out my pride and selfishness and he is going to see it through! So, here is my prayer, which I hope encourages anyone else that is in a difficult season of growth:

>>Be faithful to the work you began in me. Break me. Do not release me Father. Hold fast. Hold tight. Be faithful. Break me. Break me Father. Be faithful to what you started. Do not release me until you are done with me. I release the comforts and affirmation I seek from others and want only what you have to say and offer. I want only what you say and think of me to define me. Forgive me for being so easily swayed. Forgive me for caring about these other things. Forgive me for being so easily offended. You are the most glorious, most beautiful, most trustworthy and I settle into you and what you think of me. You alone define me. You alone humble me. You alone can raise me up. I will wait. I will trust. I will listen. You alone are good.<<

God was promising me that he will not desert me. When he started rooting out my pride, he knew it would take YEARS! He will never get fed up and say “oh, you stubborn senseless woman! how many times must I repeat myself? How many times must I give you chance after chance to show me you are listening?? I am done with you!” No, he will never and has never said that.

If you have ever been trained in restraining children, then you know something that is important to know BEFORE you restrain a child. If a child is having a fit and is uncontrollable, then you can take the child, if they are small enough, and sit cross legged on the floor and hold them tight and close to you in your lap. And you must hold this pose until the child is calm and safe (for both themselves and other children that may be around them). However, if the child is stubborn and persistent enough, and are adamant about being “released,” then they may pee on you to try and force you to release them. Knowing this ahead of time is important, because you do not need to move or get up until the child is calm and safe. If you were not expecting it, then you might overreact.

So, when I take a child and hold them tight and sit down, I know that no matter what that child says or does, that I will persist to keep them safe until it is the right time to release them. And while I’m holding them, do you know what I do? I calm my breathing. I speak truth over them and tell them how wonderful they are. And I tell them they are safe. And loved. And I may sing a song and rock them until they relax and surrender. And you know what? That is exactly how Father God deals with my outburst and anger and stubbornness. And nothing I do will surprise him and force him to release me. NOTHING I do can remove me from the protective, loving, hand of God.  No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons,neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. – Romans 8: 37-39  He even sings over us!! The Lord your God is with you, the Mighty Warrior who saves. He will take great delight in you; in his love he will no longer rebuke you, but will rejoice over you with singing.” – Zephaniah 3.17

He is faithful. He is good. When there is nothing good in me. I cannot strive in my flesh and make him more faithful. I cannot ignore him and make him less faithful. I can scream and cry and kick and even pee in his lap, and it will not change his faithfulness. He started this work in me and he will see it through. He loves me too much to let go until he is done. Because he is good. Here is a scripture that embodies the lesson he taught me that day:

I thank my God every time I remember you. In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now,  being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.… And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight,so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless for the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ—to the glory and praise of God. – Philippians 1: 3-6,9-11