Tag: selfish

DAILY PRAYERS FOR GUYS

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To Avoid Favoritism

Dearest Jesus,
You warn us against favoritism, directing us to treat others equally. Multiples case studies in your Word underscore how much damage and dysfunction results in families and relationships when favoritism is involved. Nevertheless, it comes naturally for us to pay extra attention to those we favor. We give special treatment to those who are in a position to potentially return the favor in some way or another.

The truth is, when I behave in this way, I am not serving my neighbor, but myself. I am using others to selfishly gain personal gifts or advantages. Forgive me for my favoritism and make me aware whenever the temptation is there for me to fall into it again. You are the perfect example, as you had nothing to gain from putting us first. No reward or favor could ever be returned to you from fallen man, yet you gave yourself up for us anyway. You didn’t give to get anything in return, but rather so that in you, we could have everything we need. That’s not favoritism, but grace. May I reflect it in the way I treat others. 

In Jesus’ name I pray. Amen. 

DAILY PRAYERS FOR GUYS

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For Grace to Live Humbly

Loving Lord,
Ever since your image was lost in the Fall, we all come into this world with one thing on our mind: ourselves. Even believers, who have had your image restored through faith in Jesus, still battle selfishness daily. Only through your grace can we ever hope to win that battle.

Grace shows me what true humility looks like. Grace shows me a Savior who put sinners before himself. Grace shows me I have all the approval and affection I need from you, which could never be obtained through my own accolades or achievements. Grace equips and frees me to love others and concern myself with my neighbor’s needs and wants before my own. Grace forgives my many failed attempts at humility, and puts me back on the path toward it whenever necessary. Therefore, as I pursue humility, let me look no further than your grace. 

In Jesus’ name I pray. Amen. 

Free From Me

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(Galatians 5:1, 13-25)

All student loans have been cancelled. Any remaining car payments have been eliminated. All remaining criminal sentences have been commuted and records have been expunged. Great news! … that is, if any of those apply to us. But if none of them do, then it’s rather ho-hum news. Freedom only matters to those who need to be freed from something.

Paul talks a lot about freedom in the verses from Galatians 5. We know that we have freedom in Christ. But, what exactly is it we are free from? He mentions not being “burdened again by a yoke of slavery” (v.1). What exactly does Paul mean? The rest of Galatians makes it clear that the good news of the gospel means we have been freed from being enslaved by the law. In other words, we don’t get to heaven by keeping the rules. That means we aren’t bound to the unattainable standard of perfection in our lives. 

We want to make sure we know why that’s such a big deal. While the relationship we believers have with God’s law is always going to be conflicted, we need to know why. It’s easy and natural for us to find relief from knowing that our salvation isn’t found by keeping the law, because we all know that’s impossible. Very few of us stay up at night wondering if we’re good enough to get to heaven. We know keeping the law doesn’t save us; Jesus does. 

But we may not have the best understanding of why. See, it isn’t the law’s fault. We don’t find relief from salvation by works so appealing because the law itself is unbearable or problematic or too strict. God’s law is perfect. We have to understand that the real reason we naturally take issue with the law is on our end. It shows who we are. It shows that we – not the law itself – are the real problem. 

It’s like the insurance adjuster assessing the status of a car after it’s been in an accident. There’s the hope that the car can be fixed, that whatever damage was done can be replaced or repaired by a mechanic and we’re back up and running in no time and on the road again. But the law doesn’t reveal that about us. Instead, it shows that we’ve been written off as a total loss, just like that car that has been totaled and is beyond repair. No, our problem isn’t God’s law; our problem is that we’re broken beyond repair. We’re the problem.

We sometimes refer to our spiritual enemies as the “unholy trinity,” referring to the threats of Satan, the world, and our own sinful flesh. When Paul writes that we are free, he means we are free from being enslaved by these three enemies.

But of these three, which freedom do you appreciate the most? You might answer Satan. And indeed, he is a threat. But I wonder if that’s part of what makes him so effective. When our attention is on him, when we are concerned about the possible damage he can do to us, we let down our guard against the enemy inside us: our own sinful nature. And if we think of Satan, the world, and our own sinful flesh as allies coordinating attacks against us, they don’t really care who gets the credit – they just want to see us spiritually and eternally crash and burn.

For now, let’s give our attention to the very real threat of self, which the writer of Galatians is very well qualified to address, since he demonstrated a keen awareness of this struggle. He shared it in another of his letters to the Romans, where he wrote, “I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. For I know that good itself does not dwell in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing” (Romans 7:15-19). 

Why is self such a sneaky sinful threat? Let’s consider an example from the outdoors. Think about all the different kinds of bugs there are outside. Think of the bee. When a bee does its thing, you know it right away. It stings. Or a mosquito. It itches. So when you see or hear a bee or a mosquito nearby, you’re on the lookout.

Then there’s the tick. Ticks aren’t like bees and mosquitos. They don’t announce their presence. Ticks can be such a pain because you don’t even know they’re there until you spot them, and that may not happen until days later as they swell and become big enough to be seen with the naked eye. 

That’s your sinful flesh. The other stuff is easier to watch out for. Satan’s temptations. The world’s allures. We know what to watch out for. And, to some extent, because they are external temptations, we can still disassociate a bit from them. Because, while we may have a sinful desire for those things, it’s still just the desire that is the problem – not us, we convince ourselves. We’re still able to differentiate between right and wrong, and able to identify those wrong desires that we shouldn’t have, all the while still thinking pretty highly of ourselves when we succeed.

But that is exactly what Paul is warning against in these verses. Don’t believe the lie that you are basically a pretty good person who just has to wrestle with some wrong desires here and there. The truth is, you as a person are what’s wrong, and the reality is that if you ever have even a single good, right, pure, thought, it’s only because by faith, the Spirit has worked that into you. When we admit this, when we quit trying to downplay it or balk at our sinful nature, it starts to make sense why we struggle the way we do. 

It’s why marriage is so tough. When I work with couples in their marriage, do you know what the problem is 9 times out of 10? It’s the spouse. The husband or the wife lays out for me everything that is wrong with their spouse. You know what almost never happens when I’m working with couples in marriage? I can’t think of the last time a spouse wanted to talk to me because they were struggling with being the reason their marriage wasn’t better. They knew they were the problem. They knew they were selfish. Isn’t that odd? It’s a wonder any marriage works when most every spouse is convinced that their partner is the problem!

Paul provides two examples in the verses from Galatians which demonstrate we’re the problem. He warned, “But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh; rather, serve one another humbly in love. For the entire law is fulfilled in keeping this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” (Galatians 5:13-14). Have you ever wondered why the Bible directs us to love others as ourselves? Why would that be the metric, the standard? Why not, love your neighbor as your parents, or as your spouse? Because we are in love with ourselves, that’s why! We’re experts at loving ourselves! We think the world of ourselves! That’s what the sinful flesh does: it loves – and will fiercely defend and justify – self over everything and everyone else. 

It’s why we struggle so much even to serve others unselfishly. It isn’t about how much I do or how I serve someone else; rather, it’s how in my own mind I constantly keep tabs and am comparing all of the deposits that I have made in the relationship with how infrequently the other person has made any deposits and how often they seem to make withdrawals. See, I am not serving anyone else out of love for them, but out of love for me, and as I am constantly comparing, the other person always falls short. That’s what our sinful flesh does. That’s what is always at work within us. That’s the first example. 

To see Paul’s second example, take a focused look at the laundry list of sins Paul mentioned, starting in verse 19. “The acts of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God” (v.19-21).

By my count, the list mentions 15 different examples. But if we take away the external temptations that include sex and alcohol, do you notice anything about the remaining ten? Each one of them is 100% a “me” issue that is entirely my fault and no one else’s. Idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, discord, jealously, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions, and envy – there is no one to blame for each of those sins but me! In other words, while ultimately every sin we commit is our fault, two-thirds of Paul’s list is made up of sins that very directly expose my heart as the problem! You have no one to blame but yourself for the damage sin does in your life!

That’s why Paul’s struggle in Romans 7 was so frustrating for him; he knew he was the problem. And ultimately, that awareness led him to the only conclusion any of us can arrive at. Listen to the rest of his words from that section of Scripture: “So I find this law at work:  Although I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within me. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death? Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!” (Romans 7:21-24). There can only ever be one conclusion: thank you, Lord, for Jesus, and the deliverance he provides from myself!

And that is the freedom about which Paul is raving in these verses before us from Galatians. “It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery. You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free” (v.1,13). When Paul says that Christ has set us free for freedom, that freedom includes the freedom from your own selfish heart. On the cross, Jesus didn’t just pay for your sins; he introduced you to a world that is no longer governed by the dictatorship of your own selfish heart. That is true freedom – to be free from the deception of believing that my time, energy, and resources during my lifetime on earth are best utilized in service to self. That if I keep after it, eventually I will find utopia here on earth that finally has my perfectly designed life just the way I want it.

There is no such thing. It is a mirage, and the only reason I believe it is because I fall back to the lies of my own sinful flesh. Real freedom means I can stop chasing after that lie. Real freedom means so much more. 

When I understand the true freedom I have in Christ, then I also become aware that when I have an issue with serving someone, it is never truly about the other person, but about me. Because the other person has no bearing on the freedom I have in Christ. No matter how good or how horrible the other person is, my freedom allows me to find joy in the act of service.

That freedom craves the pursuit of Paul’s famous fruits of the Spirit: “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,  gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit” (v.22-25).

Look, no one would dare to claim that the acts of the sinful flesh Paul listed earlier is desirable or noble. No one. But everyone here this morning absolutely agrees that everything listed as the fruits of the Spirit are not only noble and worthy of pursuit, but a blessing to everyone anytime they are put into practice.

Dear friends, You. Have. Freedom. You are free to pursue this good and worthy fruit. You are free to put it into practice in service to your neighbor and to Jesus, no matter what. At all times. No matter the circumstances. Let us give our undivided attention to putting this fruit into practice and loving Jesus and our neighbor, since the freedom we have in Christ, the freedom from our own sinful flesh, means we have a heart that is filled up to the brim when loving our neighbor as ourself. We know what it’s like to love ourselves. But more importantly, we know how much more fulfilling it is to love our neighbor even more than ourselves. 

DAILY PRAYERS FOR GUYS

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To Fix My “Me First”

God of Grace,
Your grace is never without effect! It brought me out of darkness into your wonderful light. It has forever changed how I see myself and my time in this world. We are all born into this world with a “me first” mentality that puts self before everyone else. But your grace turns that “me first” mentality into a mantra for Christian living that is eager to take initiative in serving others.

Rather than looking for reasons I can’t or excuses to get me out of meeting someone else’s needs, I ask “Why not me?” If I can, when I can, lead me to proactively love others, not waiting to be asked or pausing in hopes that others step in first. Infuse me with the gospel and your grace to instill in me the drive to jump in and radically love others. Free me from the selfish “me first” and replace it with a selfless “me first” that finds great joy and fulfillment in loving others – for this is yet one more way I can express my love for you. 

In Jesus’ name I pray. Amen. 

His Humility, Our Hope

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(Philippians 2:5-11)

Experience has probably taught you why it’s unwise to grocery shop while you’re hungry. Your stomach will steer your purchases and convince you to fill your grocery cart with unnecessary items that were not on your list. When that happens, you’re far more likely to end up busting the grocery budget! Not only that, but if you happen to be doing the shopping according to a list that your spouse put together, sometimes we end up neglecting to grab a number of items on the list! Being so focused on satisfying a grumbling stomach leads to forgetting to fully carry out what we set out to do in the first place: bring home all the grocery items on the list. Hunger compels the starving shopper to focus on satisfying self.

If only the desire to satisfy self was limited to the grocery store on occasion! But we know better. The whole world view of our culture is to look at everything through a selfish lens. We have sold ourselves on the lie that tolerating anything and permitting everything is the absolute most loving thing one can do for his fellow man. While we celebrate such “progress” on the surface, framed as genuine concern for the welfare of others, what really drives such thinking is complete and utter selfishness.

Letting anything and everything go for others is really all about me. If I refuse to judge or condemn something in someone else – no matter how absurd or outlandish it may be – then I have just paved the way for me to serve myself in any way imaginable, fully expecting that others won’t condemn me just as I have chosen not to condemn them. We all mind our own business, and we call it tolerance for the greater good when in reality it is merely permission for me to serve myself.

It might sound like I am just ragging on our culture. It might sound like one of those “the world is really awful, but we Christians are really good, so be careful out there good Christians” messages. But it isn’t. It isn’t because you know better. We aren’t so naive as to pretend we want nothing of that sort of world, but know that our sinful selfish nature delights in being a part of such a self-serving world! From that first self-serving bite of fruit in Eden, our self-serving nature has been at war with the saint inside each of us, and that self-serving nature has gotten sneakier and sneakier at slipping his own self-serving purposes in here and there! So the world is only the problem as much as I am a part of the world – ripe with the same self-seeking desires.

Paul addressed it in the verses just before the ones in our Philippians Reading this morning. He wrote, “Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others” (2:3-4).

Considering the number of letters Paul authored in the New Testament, it’s fascinating that we find these words in his letter to the Philippians, referred to as the letter of joy due to the significant references to joy or rejoicing throughout the letter. It turns our idea of joy on its head, as our warped minds tend to think that joy is tied to getting what we want. But if that’s the case, then why would Paul stress the importance of seeking the interests of others and not self? If joy is found in service to self, then in this letter more than any other, we’d expect Paul to be writing, “Do whatever makes you happy. Life is too short. Don’t worry about other people who drag down your dreams and desires. Look out for number one and ignore the haters.” But in this letter of joy, Paul encourages the exact opposite! Don’t serve yourself; serve others. Then you’ll find joy!

So what follows in the verses from Philippians is no shock at all, for it falls in line beautifully with what the writer to the Hebrews wrote about Jesus, who “for the joy set before him  [he] endured the cross” (12:2). Joy drove Jesus to die, but that joy did not stem from self-serving motives at all; rather, his joy was tied directly to serving the interests of others, and that path collided at the cross. So his joy didn’t come from somehow circumventing the cross in service to self, but in enduring the cross in the best interest of you and me and every last sinner.

That was the ultimate expression of humility, which is what Paul described so magnificently in the verses of our text this morning: “Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God  something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death—even death on a cross! (Philippians 2:6-8).

What a breath of fresh air we see in Jesus! Paul encouraged us to do something radical, something that we’ve never seen nor been able to carry out when he wrote that we are to put the kibosh on selfish ambition and look to the interests of others. This is an entirely foreign concept to us, so we would have no idea what it looks like – were it not for Jesus Christ, who literally demonstrated humility perfectly for us!

That theme of humility was certainly evident from the Savior whose entire life and ministry were about serving other people. That humility was reflected in his humble entrance into Jerusalem on the back of a donkey to fulfill Scripture. That humility would be highlighted later that same week on the day we call Good Friday, when the very One who created life would sacrifice his own – for the interest of others. Never will we behold a greater example of humility, not only because Jesus was willing to sink to the lowest depths of death by crucifixion – the innocent dying a criminal’s death for a world of criminals who actually deserved it! But what makes his humility so exemplary was knowing the heights of heaven from which he came to stoop so low to such a death!

When we consider the words of Paul here in Philippians 2, 6-11, can you imagine how very real the temptation must have been for Jesus to flip these verses upside down? He surely could have exalted himself first as he entered Jerusalem. He could have demanded on Palm Sunday that every knee bow and every tongue confess him as Lord and Savior. He would have had every right to humble the crowds and exalt himself first and only after that die a death of humility. 

After all, that’s so often how our acts of humility are carried out, aren’t they? Sure, we’ll clean this or wash that, we’ll carry out this or that act of service, but not without making sure that at least someone else knows about it. How ironic is it that we want to be exalted even for our humility?!? Our pride demands that we are noticed, and it will grab hold of anything it can get its hands on to exalt self – even humility!

How often when we are engaged in conversation are we simply listening long enough to make sure the topic of conversation comes back to us and something we’ve done or someone we’ve known? And even on the other end of the spectrum, when we claim that we don’t want to be acknowledged, we make sure that others know that we don’t want to be acknowledged – so our pride is satisfied by knowing that others know we don’t want to be known! What great and amazing humility we have! Ah, quite the opposite: what damning pride lurks in each of us, which explains why humility and the interests of others are so unnatural for us!

So be comforted that the One individual who walked this planet and actually had every right to exalt himself chose to do exactly the opposite. His perfectly obedient humility could satisfy our Holy Father in a way that our pride-filled humility never could! Jesus both perfected humility for us and paid for our lack of it, for our sinful pride, for our propensity to care about ourselves far more than anyone else. It was as if Jesus not only perfectly obeyed the speed limit every time he drove, but he also paid for every one of our speeding tickets (and just to point out how natural our pride is, how many of you just filled up with pride inside because you’ve never gotten a speeding ticket?). 

So let me be clear. During Holy Week, on Palm Sunday, your Savior’s perfect humility attained for you before God what your pride never could. The price paid on the cross was the price paid for your pride. God doesn’t see us for what we are on our own, but rather through faith in Jesus he sees what his Son was for us. We are free. Pride has been forgiven. Humble obedience has been offered up and accepted by the Father through the Son. 

Now we are free to go back to Paul’s encouragement that preceded these powerful verses. We can revisit his encouragement and as forgiven saints, no longer condemned for pride, and strive to show it. We can find genuine joy in seeking to carry out what Paul calls us to: “Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others” (2:3-4). We can prick the balloon of pride as often as we need to and deflate ourselves, not hoping to earn something by it, but because we’ve already received everything through Jesus – forgiveness, salvation, eternal life, and freedom from bondage to our pride. 

And the more we empty ourselves of ourselves, the more room there is for Jesus to fill us up. And the more filled up with Jesus we are, the more natural it becomes to set aside selfish ambition. The more realistic it is to value others above ourselves. The easier it becomes to look to the interests of others. When we have deflated ourselves and come back down to earth, we see the cross from a different perspective – not a high altitude view looking down on it, but up close and personal, looking up to it, so that more of Jesus fills my frame of view and I see the cross as not just one event for a lot of people, but THE event necessary for me.

Notice how small something looks from an airplane. That’s how Jesus looks to us when pride is allowed to reside inside. But on the ground, things are much larger. As the pride is let out, we come back down to earth and see things differently. I can make out more clearly not just a Saviour, but my Savior. This shifts our view from “Yes, he’s the Savior of all, and me, too,” to “Yes, he’s my Savior first and foremost, but also the Savior for all.” 

This leads to evangelism so that we can address the foremost need others have. After all, the second half of these verses will be true – all will know who he is. Let us use this week, this time that we have on earth, to do all we can so that others confess him by faith rather than by force on the last day, when even unbelievers will experience the regret of knowing they rejected the Savior.

If you shop while you’re hungry, your stomach will steer your purchases and you might ignore the list. So eat first, so that your own self-interest doesn’t get in the way. When you are full, then you can focus on the list. When we are filled up with Jesus, then we can focus on the other stuff. Fill up with as much Jesus as you can during Holy Week and Easter season and always, and be ready to find the true joy that will follow.