Pride, Expectations, Offense, & Isolation Remedies – Love, Humility, & Forgiveness Purity 833

To see today's photo, go to mt4christ.org or follow me, M.t. Clark, on Facebook or Twitter. Good morning. Today's photo of a lone woman sitting on a, on the rocky coast of Lake Ontario at sunset comes to us from Celestial Blue Photography as they captured this moment on August 30th, 2020, and it was reissued on social media when Facebook prompted our friend to share their memory once again. Well, however rocky the course of the week has been in your life, we made it to the weekend, and it is my prayer that my friends enjoy it by counting their blessings rather than remembering offenses. This week I spent some time with family as my mother's 75th birthday was Wednesday, and like today's woman on the shores of Lake Ontario, I'm sitting alone and reflecting on the rocky ground and rough edges of human relationships. But luckily, the Lord has provided a lot of instruction on how to take corrective action when we become offended or our expectations are not met when it comes to our interactions with others. Although the path of Christian discipleship can be a solitary journey at times, and the decision to follow the Lord, uh, with the way you live your life can make you feel isolated from others, Christ's second greatest commandment reminds us that we are not supposed to isolate ourselves, but instead we are to endeavor to love others. And Scripture also reminds us that even though our walk in the Spirit can be a solitary endeavor at times, somehow this walk isn't just about us. Our path is supposed to be one of humility and not pride. Which just happens to be the root cause of our offense, and can grow into relational difficulties. Of course, I have this insight only after spending some time in prayer, Bible study, and reflection this morning, because in the moment, I'm not always skillful with handling offenses or unmet expectations, and sometimes respond in my unenlightened ways of the past that centered upon myself, causing me to isolate and forget about that call to love others and forgive where necessary. So it's back to the drawing board. But the good news is that when we stay committed to follow the Lord's ways for living, our errors are exposed, and we can change the patterns of our thoughts and behaviors to correct the coping mechanisms we developed in the past that we may have, may have, quote unquote, worked for me, but just happened to not be good for you or the other people in your life. Um, here are some scriptures that will help us all to put things into perspective about what it is we should do when we seek to represent God's kingdom and subsequently have peace in our lives. The first verse they share is Matthew 22:37-39, and it says, Jesus said to him, you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. And then the next verse I share is Matthew 18:15, which says, Moreover, if your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone. If he hears you, you have gained your brother. And I also share from Matthew 18:21-22, where Peter— which says, Then Peter came up to him and said, Lord, 'How many— how often shall my forg— brother sin against me and I forgive him? Up to 7 times?' Jesus said to him, 'I do not say to you up to 7 times, but up to 70 times 7.' And finally, the last verse I share is Luke 23:34, and it says, 'Then Jesus said, Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.' Yeah, in thinking about our responses to our fellow man when we encounter offense or unmet expectations in our human relationships, I figured I would go right to the source of wisdom, the living word of God himself, Jesus Christ. These verses give us an idea about how we should seek to love our family, friends, and neighbors by resolving conflicts if possible, and through an active and ongoing campaign of forgiveness. In talking to family the other night, and in my relationships in the past, I realized that the, um, sense of our inner peace can really be tied to our view of ourselves and our expectations of what others should or shouldn't do in our interactions with them, according to us. As the sole born-again Christian at my mother's birthday dinner, uh, the other night, I had the mixed feeling of happiness at being with my family and feelings of isolation as I felt like a fifth wheel at times when I didn't have a lot to contribute to some of the conversations. While the concepts, topics, and pop culture references that were discussed were completely foreign to me, I realized just how much the Lord has caused me to change from my past, as my interests aren't what they used to be, and in some areas of conversation I had absolutely nothing to contribute. Also, I noticed that I found myself somewhat saddened by the tone of the conversation, as there were laments and complaints about certain aspects of life in our modern society that seemed somewhat hopeless. But I was also somewhat saddened by the fact that the solutions to the problems, or the ways to seek comfort, uh, that were being presented were either unwise or actually a root cause of the problems that were being discussed. It was all very subtle, of course, um, but as the evening moved on, I realized that I was disturbed because the gripes of what was bad, or the praise for what was good in life, were all coming from a non-biblical worldview where everything, the good or the bad, was highly circumstantial. In a non-biblical worldview, there was no big picture, and everything was just— was subject to the changing circumstances of life, and the solutions to problems were short-sighted, to say the least. But unfortunately, as much as I could see the errors inherent in this non-biblical worldview, instead of feeling grateful for having the hope I have in Christ, I felt like I was a weirdo and felt isolated because I was different from the others. Don't get me wrong, it was a good time, it was a good dinner, but I walked away from it drained because of the difference between my family and I. Which brings up my tendency to isolate. I am somewhat of a people pleaser, so rather than have difficult interactions with people, or if I feel my expectations are not being met, instead of causing trouble I'll leave the situation and go somewhere to be by myself. This, of course, is not skillful and is rooted in Satan's original sin of pride. When we make much of ourselves, when we focus on me, anything that doesn't agree with us or meet the expectations of what, quote unquote, I think should happen will cause offense and separate us from God's will that tells us to forgive, love, and serve others. So we have to remember that and take corrective actions when we see that we are separator— separating ourselves from the company of others. Unfortunately, this can— it can be easier said than done. Well, just last night I reunited with my wife, but either due to the stress of the day or the fact that I found her in the midst of activity or was at a loss as what to do with myself, I foolishly declared my wife to be the enemy, uh, to my health goals because she was baking foods I am actively avoiding. What I intended to be a joke turned into a mini conflict as I realized, capital I, I meant it. My pride accused her of being against me, and in the moment I couldn't back away from it. My pride put me in opposition to the one I vowed to love for the rest of my life. So the old coping mechanism of isolating myself kicked into operation, and I found myself sitting alone in my office watching videos because I didn't know how to re-enter into the mix as my wife was in a— was a flurry of activity and my stepdaughter kept kept her in conversation until it was time to go to bed. I wish my— I wished her good night, but the harmony in our relationship was not right. My offense of my wife's divided attention caused me to isolate and now will cause me to humble myself and seek forgiveness to reestablish the harmony of our relationship. And what's to blame? Pride. I subconsciously went into my countryside home with expectations that weren't met. And I allowed them to cause a disturbance in our lives because it was all about me. I didn't think it was, but apparently it was. I have to seek forgiveness to make things right again. As humbling as this latest episode is, I hope that it will help me to realize that as much as I have learned and as much as I have changed from who I was in the past, the selfish I me can still take center stage to cause problems. This is probably the most daunting task for people when they come to faith in Christ, to become other-focused, to change our priorities from the me-centered universe to one where we love God first and others second rather than please ourselves. Oof. I tend to learn from trials and errors, so I have learned a lot. And I guess I will chalk up last night's fiasco as another lesson to learn from on the path to being the person God created me to be. So, try to learn from my mistakes if you can. Try not to focus too much on yourself or allow the responses of others to determine the circumstances of peace in your life. As much as we need to forgive others, for they know not what they do, We also have to be aware of what's going on in us, what expectations we are setting up that can cause us to revert to unskillful ways of coping and leave us feeling isolated and in need of reconciliation with those we love. So keep walking and talking with God. His path is the way of love, humility, and forgiveness, and if we manage our expectations to not, to not think too highly of ourselves and to to obey the command to love others, we will spend a lot less time seeking forgiveness and a lot less time alone. Today's Bible verse comes to us from the New Living Translation Bible Promise Book for Men. This morning's meditation verse is— and I'm not kidding— Proverbs 16:18, and it says, Pride goes before destruction and haughtiness before a fall. Today's verse reminds us that pride goes before destruction and that a haughty attitude can lead to failures. Haughty is defined as arrogantly superior or disdainful, and it is a word that is not used often but describes pride perfectly. Feeling superior requires us to elevate ourselves, be it because of our looks, talents, intellect, or supposed spiritual understanding. We can be haughty when we feel we have something that other people don't have, or that we have more of it than others. This arrogant view of our superiority requires a comparative analysis that results in our separating ourselves from others by declaring ourselves different from others. Our being not the same can go either way too. We can see ourselves as better or worse than others by But our holding on to that difference is pride, and it leads to destruction. Pride will separate us from others here on earth, and if we are not careful, it will lead to our ultimate destruction for all of eternity, as it could separate us from the Lord. Pride says you, you don't need anyone. Pride says you don't need to be forgiven. Pride says you don't need a savior. On the earth, our pride will result in our failure one way or another. Either our pride will be exposed as false when we fail to succeed in some way, or it will separate us from the company of others. In heaven, it will result in our just punishment in hell. So let's learn from today's verse and follow the Apostle Paul's advice in Romans 12:3 and not think too highly of ourselves by adopting an attitude of humility to avoid the falls and destruction that come from pride. As always, I invite all to go to mtforchrist.org, where I always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to assist my brothers and sisters in Christ with their walk. Uh, today we begin sharing from Dietrich Bonhoeffer's Discipleship, also known as The Cost of Discipleship. I'm doing a class on the book, so I figured I might as well share it on the blog. And the only difficulty I'll have in doing that is the way I share it. We'll have to figure that out as we go, but some of the sharing might be, you know, there's not a lot of chapter divisions within the chapter. It's just a big block of text, and so in some cases, so I was very hesitant to share it, but if I'm going to share any resource, why not Diedrich Bonhoeffer's Discipleship? So we're going to share that starting today with the preface, which I'm not even sure— unfortunately, I don't have my original copy of my— of The Cost of Discipleship. I have my e-version, and I'm not sure if the preface is in my paper copy, so One way or the other, that's what we're sharing today in the blog. And I might have to read it because, uh, I'm focusing on chapters in my, in my class. And, uh, I would imagine it's just an overview of what, what's to be presented, but, uh, it made me wonder, uh, you know, what, what's in it. Um, so I'll be reading it this morning, I think, uh, to, to know what I'm sharing. Um, I know I'm sharing from one of Christianity's modern-day classics, and, you know, I really couldn't go wrong with that. So as always, I encourage people to go out and actually buy the resources we share, you know, to support— well, I guess the author's estate in this case— but, you know, to have them on hand for your own use, and you can share it with somebody else. And that's it. Today's blog post might have been a bit personal, um, and, and humbling, quite frankly. But, um, that's it. We report everything we get in this walk, um, because the last thing I, I want to do is present the, um, the Christian path of discipleship as, uh, some sort of road to perfection. Um, it's, uh, it is a road of progress but we'll never be perfect as Jesus was perfect in love or in deed. So we have to somehow come to grips with that, that as a Christian we're not going to be perfect, we're not going to be sinless, and there'll be things that are good that we fail to do, but we're going to follow this path anyway, you know. I tried, I tried the world's way and it didn't work. And I'm trying to purge a lot of that out of my life. And when I walk according to the Lord's ways, um, I feel a lot more peace and joy, uh, than I did from doing things the world's way. So we'll continue, we'll continue to learn, we'll continue to grow, and apparently we'll continue to make mistakes. But, um, we'll seek forgiveness when we do that, and we encourage you to do the same. Uh, well, it's Saturday. Um, I actually have the day off, um, others, and really have no plans, so we'll see. I plan to ask forgiveness for my wife first and foremost for my stupidity and my immaturity. We'll do that first and And then, uh, then, then we'll see where it goes. Um, but let's pray. Lord God, Heavenly Father, thank you for another day in your kingdom. Lord, we thank you for the trials and errors of our lives that show us how, how we're not perfect and how we need, we need you to live. And we need your, you know, we need to examine your ways and we need to examine our hearts to, uh, to see what we need to change to, to be more like you, to experience the peace of the Lord and to be able to share it with the world so we can love one another and, um, and give you glory through our changed lives, Lord. So we just, uh, we thank you for all the people listening today, Lord. We're humbled that even anyone would download our podcast. Now, that's not pride, you know, "Oh, poor me," but no, I'm very appreciative of people who pursue the Lord and have discovered the podcast and are gaining encouragement from it. So, Lord, we pray for them today, anyone listening. Um, that they would be blessed, Lord, that you would come alongside their prayer request, that you give them a revelation of what's going on in their lives so they can turn and, and be, uh, you know, to, to gain victory, to gain freedom, to walk more in your ways, Lord. Um, and of course, Lord, we always pray that you go before us to open our eyes to these things, to open our eyes to the beauty in the world and the, the purpose that we have. And Lord, we just pray for you to guide us into the way we should go today to best represent you here on the earth. Uh, Lord, we thank you, we praise you, we love you, and we pray all these things in the mighty name of Jesus. Amen.