Words Of Encouragement To Start The Day (Tuesday 09/07/2010)

It Is A Set Up…

Proverbs 11:2-3 (Amplified Bible)

²When swelling and pride come, then emptiness and shame come also, but with the humble (those who are lowly, who have been pruned or chiseled by trial, and renounce self) are skillful and godly Wisdom and soundness. ³The integrity of the upright shall guide them, but the willful contrariness and crookedness of the treacherous shall destroy them.

I had a situation come up recently where someone did not receive the words and the intent of my heart in the way that they were meant. It is my belief that offense came in and a misunderstanding came about as a result. The misunderstanding could have kept on and on and on, but in my spirit I heard, apologize and close the door to the enemy. That in that moment was a hard pill to swallow because the allegations that were being levied against me in my opinion needed defending and to be set straight. Again gently in my spirit the Lord said don’t defend yourself because this will continue and this situation is designed to pull you into an arena where you are seen a certain way and it may even affect your ability to minister. So I humbled myself and apologized for the perception and misunderstanding although it wasn’t mine.

Being prideful and allowing pride and our need to be right can take us down a path that can ruin us, even destroy us. In Proverbs 16:18 it says, “Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall.” So many times we allow our emotions to speak to us and to guide us, we want to be right, we want to prove our innocence and what we meant by what we have said (by any means necessary), but as Paul said not everything is good for us to do, just because it is something we can do(Paraphrased). If we are paying attention to that still small voice within it will tug at us and shut down the loud clanging of prideful emotion that is swelling up within us and taking over. Because it has been engrained in us that humility and to really allow “God to fight our battles,” is being weak, we feel the need to be heard loud and clear and to ensure that no one gets one up on us. So we stand and deliver, but not because God has told us to but because pride won’t just let it go or allow us to humble ourselves to just walk away from a fight. So we engage and it does more damage than good. It drives people away from us, it sets us up to lose and it sometimes even places a wedge between us and God because we have in those times entered a place where we cannot hear Him, and we do not want to submit to Him.

Don’t let pride be the thing that defines us, nor let it be the thing that sets us up for a disaster. Because the more the pride the bigger the destruction, the more we let haughtiness comes in and pump us up the bigger the fall will be. We should want to take everything to God in prayer and lay it at His feet and allow Him to say which battles to fight and why, but not to be ruled by emotion and pride. Letting humility and submission to God become the default because it is then that wisdom will prevail and sound judgment will be displayed. Then we do not have to worry about setting ourselves up to fail, lose, fall or be destroyed at our own hands. When God is out in front, we cannot help but win, when we are out in front, our victories may come but they are short lived and usually come with casualties and a price. Have we counted up the cost of pride? Is it worth what we may be setting ourselves up to lose? That is a question only each one of us can really answer!