You live in a society that screams that you be successful. When you are a young child success is drilled into your head. It does not matter if it is making A’s in elementary school or winning on the sport field or almost anything you do; there is this sense that success or winning is what really matters most.
If you are not careful, that same mindset will carry over into your Christian walk with the Lord. In order to feel accepted by God and the body of Christ, you think that what you do is what matters most. To make matters worse, you feel compelled to let others know what great things you are doing for God. Peer pressure seldom goes away as one ages.
“Moses spent forty years thinking he was a somebody; then he spent forty years on the backside of the desert realizing he was a nobody; finally, he spent the last forty years of his life learning what God could do with a nobody!” D. L. Moody. You do not like the desert experiences in your life, but it is those experiences which are necessary to teach you complete obedience to God.
Scripture rings true with this philosophy of thinking. The Wisdom Literature nails home the point, “The fear of the Lord is the instruction for wisdom, and before honor comes humility,” (Prov. 15:33). This verse tells you that just to begin to become a wise person in your spiritual life requires “the fear of the Lord.” This is a reverential kind of fear where you respect God and want to please Him before anything else. The result of you living this kind of life results in God’s blessings, but here is one more lesson you must learn before the Lord will use you greatly; that lesson is you must learn to be humble.
Thus, the road in life that leads you up to blessings on earth and heaven is to go down. Let God humble you. Just keep in mind, He is the Master and you are the servant; He is the potter and you are the clay. The way up is down!
