Saturday, April 07, 2012

By pride comes nothing but strife...

...But with the well-advised is wisdom.

That's from Proverbs 13:10, and it seems very applicable to us this week. We have had a bit of a rough week, and as I touched on in my previous post, pride causes one to be easily provoked. Strife does indeed come, and we cannot expect much of anything different than that, if we persist in pride. That would be walking in the flesh and expecting the fruit of the Spirit to harvest! One of the chief outcomes of pride is strife, although it breeds plenty of other evils as well.

What is the contrast here in this proverb? The opposite of pride and strife is to be well-advised and to have wisdom. So, the opposite of pride is humility, and that is the way of wisdom! If pride is not well-advised, then it must be ill-advised! Our experience this week bore that out.

Pride not only makes me difficult to have a conversation with, it makes it difficult to have a relationship with. And it makes it a challenge to make any progress in a hard conversation about marriage issues, for sure!

Something else I realized during the last few days is that both Cherie and I want the same things, and stumble over the same things -- just that they are different aspects of those same things. I want to be accepted. So does she. I struggle to accept her when she does not accept me, and vice-versa. In other words, "I want to be loved, and loved the way I want, because I deserve it!" That is selfish, and the opposite of true love. Real love is unselfish; giving; not counting the cost; not expecting something in return; not demanding respect, but giving respect; honoring rather than dishonoring; building up and not tearing down; being vulnerable and not defending/protecting; reaching out with confidence rather than retreating in fear -- and I'm sure many other things that I haven't learned yet or am forgetting!

As a husband, I need to take the lead in humility, love, and faith. How easy it is to set the tone for life by being proud, self-seeking, and untrusting. Shame on me!

Although I tend to think of my major sins of lust and lying being the bombs that nearly destroyed our marriage, I am beginning to see that PRIDE is not only at the heart of both, but at the heart of so many other aspects of relationship issues. So help me, oh God, to humble myself!

No comments: