I can’t believe how good I feel since my colleagues prayed for me yesterday. I literally feel like a new person. I woke up this morning feeling just as good as when I went to bed last night – rested, clear and ready to take on the day.
Today I read this from the The Dangerous Duty of Delight:
The nature and depth of human pride are illuminated by comparing boasting to self-pity. Both are manifestations of pride. Boasting is the response of pride to success. Self-pity is the response of pride to suffering. Boasting sounds self-sufficient. Self-pity sounds self-sacrificing.
The reason self-pity does not look like pride is that it appears to be needy. But the need arises from a wounded ego. It doesn’t come from a sense of unworthiness, but from a sense of unregonized worthiness. It is the response of unapplauded pride.
Lord knows I am guilty of both forms of pride.
For Piper, the means of breaking this pride is being able to delight, or take pleasure, in the duty rather than just doing it out of obligation. If we give or serve because it gives us joy instead of because we have to, then the stranglehold of pride is broken.
My prayer for today:
Father, may I take pleasure in serving you.
May I delight in giving it away.
May I find great joy in sacrifice.
Strip away my pride and fill me with your pleasure.
