Painful Pride

 

The Chiropractor I go to has a history of making me feel a whole lot better after I see him.  This time my right shoulder was killing me.  It was so uncomfortable to sleep that I had to do something.  My chiropractor/magician squeezed my shoulder for a minute and asked me to lay face-down on his table.  He adjusted my elbow and I slept comfortably that night and every night since!

It is still amazing to me when things are not what they seem that there’s someone who has the ability to see things as they are.  Often when I’m uncomfortable it isn’t physical pain but things going on in the brain or emotions that are bothering me. Just like my elbow, it often seems like one thing when it’s actually another – but it takes me a long time to see it.

Sometimes in my reading of God’s Word I realize that there is something I should do.  Make an apology, call someone who’s hard for me to talk to, get into or out of a ministry because that’s what God wants, or change the wording of something I’m writing. God has given me many clear directions from His word;  Sometimes, I know what God has said but for some reason I’m uncomfortable with it.

I think, “That’s the work or the call or the need of someone else.”                                                      “What will others think or say if I do this? “                                                                                  “Where will I find the time to do one more thing?”                                                                            “The wording I have now will do.”

Though these thoughts appear to be the problem the real problem is deeper.  It is not the current “pain” I’m feeling, that’s just a symptom of a deeper issue – like the shoulder and the elbow.  The name of this problem for me in these instances of defying God is:  Pride.  My pride.

For some reason I think that the Creator of the Universe should not have the last word with me, that I know better than He does who I need to apologize to, serve, or work with.  Even in my writing, should I not listen to the One for whom I want to speak?  Is good enough good enough if God has clearly shown me a better way to say something?

Here is (some of) what God says about pride”
When pride comes, then comes disgrace, but with humility comes wisdom.  Proverbs 11:2              Pride only breeds quarrels, but wisdom is found in those who take advice. Proverbs 13:10    
Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall. Proverbs 16:18

(See also Proverbs 15:33, 22:4, 29:23, and Isaiah 57:15)

God’s Word has much to say about our pride.  It also tells us that all the instruction He gives us is for our good.  Like me, do you sometimes question God’s leading as if you know better than He does?  Meditate on these verses and then revisit those leadings of the Lord you and I have resisted.

He is the only one who really sees things as they are, chiropractors not excepted.