Thursday, August 03, 2006
On Vanities and Pride
"I resolved totally to leave off some of my Vanities; but there was a secret Reserve, in my Heart, of the more refined part of them, and I was not low enough to find Peace." -- John Woolman
The power of Pride and the truth about Humility are difficult concepts for my brain and heart to get wrapped around. The vestiges of self-centeredness and self-exultation that remain in the secret places of my heart, rear their heads in the most unexpected of ways: in a feeling of superiority, in a misdirected expectation that I should be treated with more fairness and respect, in the strand of thought that courses through every decision and conversation -- namely, that at the core I want what I want.
How pervasive is that root of Pride!?
And then to attempt to grasp Humility ... not self-effacement. Not self-degredation. But the relinquishment of claim to my present or my future, because I have chosen to recognize the soverignty of Another ... it is a low place indeed that brings me Peace. That low place is not accesssible throught the portals of "normal life," either of conventional wisdom or contemporary cultural norms. That low place is found only is secret and quiet ... at the foot of the cross and outside of the empty tomb.
But it is there, that I can view Him, and simultaneously, myself through His eyes. Loved beyond measure, formed in His likeness ... yet broken by my own insistence ways and choices. And redeemed by His Insistent and Unrelenting Love.
Thank You, Lord, for low places and the Peace that You furnish those places with.
The power of Pride and the truth about Humility are difficult concepts for my brain and heart to get wrapped around. The vestiges of self-centeredness and self-exultation that remain in the secret places of my heart, rear their heads in the most unexpected of ways: in a feeling of superiority, in a misdirected expectation that I should be treated with more fairness and respect, in the strand of thought that courses through every decision and conversation -- namely, that at the core I want what I want.
How pervasive is that root of Pride!?
And then to attempt to grasp Humility ... not self-effacement. Not self-degredation. But the relinquishment of claim to my present or my future, because I have chosen to recognize the soverignty of Another ... it is a low place indeed that brings me Peace. That low place is not accesssible throught the portals of "normal life," either of conventional wisdom or contemporary cultural norms. That low place is found only is secret and quiet ... at the foot of the cross and outside of the empty tomb.
But it is there, that I can view Him, and simultaneously, myself through His eyes. Loved beyond measure, formed in His likeness ... yet broken by my own insistence ways and choices. And redeemed by His Insistent and Unrelenting Love.
Thank You, Lord, for low places and the Peace that You furnish those places with.
