The Humble Shall Speak...

“Let your actions always speak for you, but be forever on guard against the terrible traps of false pride and conceit that can halt your progress. The next time you are tempted to boast, just place your fist in a full pail of water, and when you remove it, the hole remaining will give you a correct measure of your importance." ~ Og Mandino

There's a missing link somewhere between learning confidence and consciousness. If I'm self-confident, it's quite possible that I can see others and think I'm better than them. If I'm self-conscious, it's quite possible that I can see others and think they're better than me. Either way, there is too much of an imbalance. The only way the swing of my pendulum finally balanced itself out to perfect calm was the introduction of the X Factor into my life.

That X-Factor--or should I say, Cross Factor--was turning my life over to the only One Who has always maintained perfect control. I met Jesus on the floor of my dorm room, crying my eyes out. I thought I'd met Him in church, but there was too much formality for me to get to Him. I thought I'd met Him at the volleyball championship game where I played my heart out but we still lost...but even though He was there, I got angry at Him because I didn't win. I thought I'd met Him at military training, but I think it was only in passing...everyone meets Jesus either at basic training or in prison. LOL But when I met Him for real on a personal level, I began to see that the X-Factor was really HIS type of Humility!

So if I have God-Confidence, I know that regardless of the situation or circumstance, as long as He is guiding me, I can't go wrong. Even in the darkness, His Words gently whisper in my ear about who He created me to be. You mean to tell me that in the midst of all this debt, I still have the potential to be an investor and not a consumer? You said it, and I know You can't lie! Let's make it happen!

If I'm God-Conscious, I can look at others and see beyond where they are right now. I can see them in the future where they look much better than they look now. I can see beyond the sprouts budding now, but the trees and forests they are about to become!

So like Og Mandino, I guard myself not only against false pride, but false humility. The next time I'm tempted to belittle myself to make someone else look big, I need to think about the force of that water saturating everything that it comes in contact with and remember that if God created me, it's possible that greatness is inevitable if I lean the totality of who I am upon the vastness of Who He is.

Then the humble shall truly speak of Him and be glad that they no longer have to pretend that they are not who God says they are.

Someone pass me a microphone...I've got something to say.

Aftermath

"After crosses and losses, men grow humbler and wiser." ~ Benjamin Franklin

When I think about some of the issues I've endured over the years, it's amazing to me that I could think I was humble and wise, but then get to the other side and realize I was just the opposite. I hesitate to continue typing simply because I don't know what to say about myself that would elicit an understanding of where I'm coming from at this very moment.What does it say about me to have to endure a cycle of the same trials over and over again, but that:

1. God was testing and trying me;


2. I failed the tests and trials;


3. I was neither humble nor wise enough to see the err of my ways, so;


4. God's grace continued to test and try me until I GOT it.

And with #4, the fact that my mind generated that thought makes me question whether or not I DID get it! Who am I to say that I got it if God is the one Who is doing the testing and trying? I don't know!

What I DO know is this: I can't let my guard down and totally lose sight of how difficult the past few months have been. I need to catalog that sense of humility and the wisdom it cultivated. Why? Because I have the sneaking suspicion that things are about to explode around me in a positive way. And if I'm not careful, I'll let it go to my head, thus mentally and spiritually finding myself in a lower place than I ever could have been when my mere outward circumstances were the only challenge.

I've found that my biggest tests of humility and wisdom were not in daunting times, but when everything was going well for me. Everything is on its way to going well for me again. This time, I don't want to fail the TRUE test of remaining humble, even in prosperity.