Posts

Falling Down: The “Trip” of Humility or Pride?

/in /by

Zephaniah 2:3 Seek the Lord [inquire for Him, inquire of Him, and require Him as the foremost necessity of your life], all you humble of the land who have acted in compliance with His revealed will and have kept His commandments; seek righteousness, seek humility [inquire for them, require them as vital]. It may be you will be hidden in the day of the Lord’s anger.

Since our church-wide fast in January I have been asking the Lord, What does humility, or humbling myself, look like – practically? There are several implications in this passage. “…seek humility [inquire for them, require them as vital].” Seek humility? Inquire for it? Require it? Humble people seek the Lord. Those who are seeking to humble themselves or put it into practice – SEEK the Lord through worship, thanksgiving, prayer, obedience, repentance, change in lifestyle, practicing things they have clearly been shown in Scripture – but have been ignoring, or disobeying. They seek the Lord through seeking after His Manifested Presence. They change their schedules to make room for more of His Presence. They open the Door of Revelation 3:20 – to spiritually “hear” the WAYS He speaks; to “feel” around to discover, Am I spiritually hot, cold, or lukewarm? They open the DOOR to Jesus, the DOOR, to “see” spiritually – asking, What Are You Showing Me? What do You want me to see – spiritually? Seekers – humble people, those who are trying to humble themselves before the Lord – will open the DOOR to make room for all of these things.

John 10:7 So Jesus said again, I assure you, most solemnly I tell you, that I Myself am the Door for the sheep. Only Jesus’ sheep go through His DOOR. You have to belong to Jesus to go through these kind of “doors.” You have to be able to “hear” and “see” to follow Jesus – to recognize His Voice. You have to be a sheep – not a goat. John 10:10 “The thief comes only to steal, kill, and destroy…” What’s the thief going to steal, kill and destroy? You and I being sheep. What do sheep do? They eat, drink, and flock with other sheep. They follow the Shepherd. Where’s a shepherd going to be? With the flock – with the sheep. If you are following Jesus, the Shepherd, you are going to follow Him to where the flock is. The thief is going to convince you that you can be a sheep all by yourself. (Of course you can – while the “wolves” of life destroy your life)

Jesus’ sheep are humble. They are teachable. They follow the Shepherd. They recognize His Voice. They see and hear spiritually. As they humble themselves God’s Grace is abundantly supplied. Yet, God opposes all those who set themselves against His Shepherd (disobedience is opposition). As Scripture says, He knows the proud from afar. The Grace, or empowerment, desire, and thoughts – to seek God’s Presence, to humble yourself, to walk in humility, to be Jesus’s sheep, to follow the Shepherd, and enter the DOOR – is minimized. And Scripture is fulfilled: Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall. (Proverbs 16:18) Isn’t it interesting that the word for prostration in the Hebrew is often translated “fall down?” There you have it: fall down on your own – in humility OR fall down in destruction – because of pride and haughtiness. What kind of “trip” do you want to take? Humility or PRIDE?

A Sleeping Narcissist

/in /by

Jonah 4:9-11 And God said to Jonah, Do you do well to be angry for the loss of the gourd? And he said, I do well to be angry, angry enough to die!10 Then said the Lord, You have had pity on the gourd, for which you have not labored nor made it grow, which came up in a night and perished in a night.11 And should not I spare Nineveh, that great city, in which there are more than 120,000 persons not [yet old enough to] know their right hand from their left, and also many cattle [not accountable for sin]?

All Jonah cared about was himself and his comfort. His self-centeredness went so deep that he turned a blind eye to the possible deaths of 120,000 children. What’s really interesting regarding this passage is that God not only cared for the cruel Ninevites, and their children, He also cared for the cattle that would die if He brought judgment and destruction. But not Jonah.

In the 1980’s the psychological designation of narcissus began to pick up popular, cultural steam as it entered pop psychology designating someone we used to categorize as self-centered. Sunday, August 24 I googled the question: What do you call someone who stubbornly refuses to change their behavior? I was surprised by one of the articles I discovered. It stated: “People with narcissistic personality disorder are extremely resistant to changing their behavior, even when it’s causing problems.”

What is repentance? Change. First it begins with an acknowledgement that you have missed God’s Perfect Way of Love. Next it culminates with a change of mind which leads to a change in lifestyle. Elul is a time of conversion and repentance in order to seek God.

Jnh. 1:5-6 – Jonah refused to have his mind changed – refused to be teachable – regarding his responsibility for his neighbors. How many messages have you heard, repeating the same theme, that you have refused to change your mind, behavior, actions or attitude about? Are you Christ-centered or self-centered in your lifestyle and actions? Is it possible to be a follower of Jesus and still remain a narcissist? Are you teachable? Is your thinking aligning more with the truths of God’s Word and the example of Christ than the lies of this world and popular culture? Has your thinking and lifestyle been changed to be more in line with Jesus and His Word in the past year or would others state you have remained relatively the same?

Jnh. 1:6; 2:1-2 – Jonah had become faithless in prayer – choosing sleep over praying for his neighbors. Jesus told Disciples – Followers of Jesus – to watch and pray. Would you characterize your spiritual life as watching and praying? Do you watch and pray with Jesus? Do you have a daily quiet time with the Lord? Do you sleep while a small minority remain faithful in prayer? Are you sleeping while third world countries and believers are spending sleepless nights in prayer? Are you spending time in leisure while brothers and sisters around the world faithfully pray as they face the threat of death, rape, persecution, torture, beating and imprisonment? What does your prayer life reveal about your faith?