Pitiful Me
A mentor of mine has this amazing radar when it comes to picking up on me beating myself up, even when I'm unaware I am doing it. Of all the things that I struggle with, surely this should be at the bottom of the barrel when it comes to addressing issues in my life.
However, underlying is the issue of self-focus. Self-focus means there's a lack of God-centeredness, Cross-centeredness, & Christ-Centeredness. When you sin or are aware of your weaknesses, and you draw attention to 'how weak you are,' 'how pathetic you are,' there is a sense in which you feel safe from pride, quite humble. However, you are actually focusing on your self to such a degree, & are so self-centered that you are acting like your weakness has greater power than Christ. This is wicked. This underlying false humility is not magnifying the grace & power of Christ but is magnifying self, in all it's disgusting, putrid, humility.
In our weaknesses & in our failings we should be like Paul who wrote, "But he said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.' Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me" 2 Cor 12:9.
We should say with John Newton, "I am a great sinner, but Christ is a great Savior." And as this mentor of mine sent me this morning in an email, we should all have this attitude found in John Wesley's journal: "After my return home [after his conversion experience, which occurred even after he'd been preaching and leading], I was much buffeted with temptations, but cried out, and they fled away. They returned again and again. As often as they returned, I lifted up my eyes, and God sent me help from the sanctuary. And here I found the chief difference between this and my former state. I was striving, yea, fighting with all my might under the law, as well as under grace. But then I was sometimes, if not often, conquered. Now, I was always conqueror."
If we look to our performance instead of Christ in our weaknesses, how much more would we look to our performance as though it were apart from Christ in our victories & strengths. Maybe we should not expect to have victories or to gain strengths in Christ because if we in our weakness focus on self, how much more prone to focus on self would we be if He were using us for great things for His glory?
In your sin & in your greatness (which you surely understand is His greatness alone), look to Christ, the source & perfecter of our faith.
However, underlying is the issue of self-focus. Self-focus means there's a lack of God-centeredness, Cross-centeredness, & Christ-Centeredness. When you sin or are aware of your weaknesses, and you draw attention to 'how weak you are,' 'how pathetic you are,' there is a sense in which you feel safe from pride, quite humble. However, you are actually focusing on your self to such a degree, & are so self-centered that you are acting like your weakness has greater power than Christ. This is wicked. This underlying false humility is not magnifying the grace & power of Christ but is magnifying self, in all it's disgusting, putrid, humility.
In our weaknesses & in our failings we should be like Paul who wrote, "But he said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.' Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me" 2 Cor 12:9.
We should say with John Newton, "I am a great sinner, but Christ is a great Savior." And as this mentor of mine sent me this morning in an email, we should all have this attitude found in John Wesley's journal: "After my return home [after his conversion experience, which occurred even after he'd been preaching and leading], I was much buffeted with temptations, but cried out, and they fled away. They returned again and again. As often as they returned, I lifted up my eyes, and God sent me help from the sanctuary. And here I found the chief difference between this and my former state. I was striving, yea, fighting with all my might under the law, as well as under grace. But then I was sometimes, if not often, conquered. Now, I was always conqueror."
If we look to our performance instead of Christ in our weaknesses, how much more would we look to our performance as though it were apart from Christ in our victories & strengths. Maybe we should not expect to have victories or to gain strengths in Christ because if we in our weakness focus on self, how much more prone to focus on self would we be if He were using us for great things for His glory?
In your sin & in your greatness (which you surely understand is His greatness alone), look to Christ, the source & perfecter of our faith.
