THERE'S A THIN LINE BETWEEN SELF-RIGHTEOUSNESS AND FAITH - PART 2

…I wake up not feeling the Holy Spirit around me or the excitement that I had grown so familiar with. It became a chore to get out of bed – I would wake up and just lay there! 

No hope, no joy, nothing! It was quiet; I was emotionally and physically weak and empty!! I felt like I was being mocked… “Open your mouth and start declaring now”, “You think you have arrived”, I thought you were dancing MC Hammer” …

Then I did what I knew best to do, went on my knees and instead of praying, I gave in to crying!! (As most of us would)… I knelt down, cried and thought about everything that I knew was going wrong in my life. (As you can imagine it wasn’t a pretty sight).

It is amazing how the human mind can work out so many emotions in a matter of seconds or minutes, depending on how deep the emotions run… Now, let me tell you something about Hadassah… she can cry for Africa!!

 I am working on it – I have recently come to realise that my tears really do not change anything, they only make me feel sorry for myself and make me feel even worse… I digress (Topic for another day!).

So I’m crying and displaying all kinds of facial expressions that I knew I could only do in the privacy of where I was, knowing that God could see me. Then I heard “Start singing, start thanking God”… You know when someone stops you mid-crying and you look at them like they have horns growing on their head.

Bottom line, I did not feel like singing, but a song came from nowhere, so I started singing;

“Yes You are The Lord

Most High

Yes You are The Lord

Most High” (I will probably upload a video of this song someday)

I sang this so many times until other songs kept coming and I was in full worship! The tears had stopped at this point and I could hear my voice smiling back at me – I was completely broken!  

Then it dawned on me – I thought my lips were the tool to the answered prayers, I thought it was all it took to get what I wanted – Speak the word and see it happen, forgetting that it is The God of The Word that makes it happen! He is not my errand boy, He is not a Genie, He is not my “Yes Madam”.

He is The King of kings, The Lord of lords, The Righteous one!

My self-righteousness or very vain words with plenty, plenty grammar amidst pitiful tears would not cut it.

Then I realised that the joy left me because I placed all my focus on the blessing than The “Blesser”(Not a word, but you get my drift). I was wishing my heart’s desires to come true so bad that it became a god in my heart without me realising (You shall serve no other god beside The Lord your God! Exodus 20:3)

He broke me – It is not by my power, it is not by your might, it is by The Spirit of The Lord who was sent to you after Christ descended and ascended to His throne.

We sometimes get so comfortable when God begins to bless us with one small thing that we begin to focus on it, magnify it and minimize The Giver.

So this was me being scolded and reprimanded by The Holy Spirit – Warning me that there is indeed a very thin line between Self-righteousness and Faith. Let your joy remain in Him regardless of what He blesses you with. You have the tendency to depend on yourself rather than God and the lines are easily crossed.

Lesson learnt, hard pill to swallow…

“He is still God – Don’t take your eyes off Him. He still has the best for you! While you wait, trust Him and don’t let go – It is not over, you are still on your way…. “

Hadassah.A

Definitions

*Self-righteousness:

1. Smugly or unduly sure of one's own righteousness.

2. Exhibiting smug or unwarranted confidence in one's own righteousness