Editorials

We last looked at the way the spirit of pride can creep into our hearts and lives through the gate of insults, but there is another entranceway often left opened and unguarded through which that spirit travels quite often. That is the gate of compliments.

We have to be very careful with the way we receive compliments. In the way we often take insults personally, to our own demise, we can also take compliments too personally as well. When one is complimented about their skills in basketball or singing or physical attractiveness, or preaching (etc.), the temptation is to allow the seeds of pride to be planted in the heart. A cure for this type of pride is similar to the cure for the pride of insults—don’t take it too personally.

”When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put all childish ways behind me.” ( 1Co.13:11 ) As a child,I can remember times when laughing uncontrollably with my family or friends, was as natural as breathing. But when I began to be a man, I put childish ways behind me and started using alcohol & drugs - to make me laugh uncontrollably.

It came to a point, in my life, that whenever I wanted to laugh and have fun and enjoy myself, I had to get high or drunk first! Going to a movie or party or concert or family gathering or date required the prerequisite of getting high.

How would you feel if you saw a man accidentally spill a glass of water in a crowded restaurant and his wife turn to him and explode: "You are an absolute idiot!" Now, same exact scenario, only this time you are the man in front of that crowded restaurant being called "an absolute idiot!" Now how do you feel?
          For most people the first scenario seems bad, but the second much worse. It is embarrassing, offensive and angering beyond words. But why? Is it not the same offense? Are they not equally as bad? Equally wrong? So why the difference in response and feeling? It is because we have an unreasonable and disproportionate emotional attachment to ourselves compared to that for others. Think about it.

I've heard that one definition of insanity is: “Doing the same thing and expecting different results.” Well, if that's correct, then there's a lot of insanity going on out there! Count me as certifiable! How many times have I told myself or others, that I would remember something important and yet, neglect to write it down?

Then, of course, comes the moment of truth when that very information is needed and I'm caught like a deer in the headlights! Duh! How many times has that happened to me? Too many! Insanity! God says it this way, “As a dog returns to its vomit, so a fool repeats his folly.” Proverbs 26:11