Jenn: Greatness

I go through seasons of being a little too proud of who I am, what I have accomplished and how I look.  There are days when I think more of myself than I ought.  Take for instance my job -- I have an amazing role at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and have worked there for almost six years.  But the truth of the matter is I can take little credit for this job.  I applied to the role under a listing that stated the company was confidential and just happened to call the phone number associated with the posting, asking brazenly if I could come in for an interview.  It was luck they said yes as I had menial formal administrative and project management training.  But alas, I got the job, got promoted a few times and can catch myself feeling pretty darn proud about the whole thing.  In this way, I build up a big idol in the shape of myself and I catch myself worshiping it, not God, the Father who gave me these gifts.

And then there are times I find myself worshiping a teeny tiny statue of myself -- obsessing a little too much about my post-partum skin issues, the wrong thing I said to a friend and the ways I’m falling short of the wife and mom that God has made me to be.  But just this past month, the Lord has begun to teach me that self-loathing is just another form of self-absorption. The focus is still me, me, me, whether it’s a big statue of me or a little one. 

Beth Moore speaks to this topic in her Daniel study, reminding me of the truth that “constantly thinking little of ourselves is still thinking constantly of ourselves.” It’s easier for me to identify when I’m thinking more highly of myself than I ought but less obvious to remember that God isn’t most glorified when we are most nullified. We as humans weren’t to be worshiped, whether we’ve created a big or small image of ourselves:

“Sing to the Lord, all the earth!
    Tell of his salvation from day to day.
24 Declare his glory among the nations,
    his marvelous works among all the peoples!
25 For great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised,
    and he is to be feared above all gods.
26 For all the gods of the peoples are worthless idols,
    but the Lord made the heavens.

1 Chronicles 23-26