It’s All About Me
Posted on May 1, 2016 in Devotions
Author: Gio Lopez
I was often told entering college that this would be a time when my faith would be severely tested by temptations of parties, sex, drugs, and alcohol.
Now that I am finishing up my freshman year, I can attest to those warnings and wholeheartedly agree that all of the above are legitimate temptations even committed Christian students will encounter. However, there’s one temptation no one ever warned me about that trumps them all: pride.
Pride may be one of the most overlooked sins. I felt that as long as I wasn’t overly arrogant or boastful about my accomplishments I was fine. This changed when I heard from a sermon a very basic definition of pride: “I take priority.” By that definition, college then is a breeding ground for prideful self-obsession. I’m always consumed with my GPA, my resume, my workload, my social life, and my career. It’s all about me. Before I knew it, I found myself so preoccupied with my own plans that I missed out on what really mattered. My relationship with God took the back seat to my schoolwork and I overlooked the fact that thousands of individuals on my campus had never experienced the life-giving Gospel out of my selfish ambition for success.
I’ve come to learn that while on the surface self-priority seem harmless, it actually frighteningly suggests our lives come before Christ and before others. This directly contrasts Philippians 2:3, which says to “do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves”. So now God is teaching me to humble myself and to surrender my selfish and worldly goals to obey Him. After all, as Francis Chan states it, “nothing [we] do in this life will ever matter, unless it is about loving God and loving the people he has made.”
Posted on May 1, 2016 in Devotions
Author: Gio Lopez
I was often told entering college that this would be a time when my faith would be severely tested by temptations of parties, sex, drugs, and alcohol.Now that I am finishing up my freshman year, I can attest to those warnings and wholeheartedly agree that all of the above are legitimate temptations even committed Christian students will encounter. However, there’s one temptation no one ever warned me about that trumps them all: pride.
Pride may be one of the most overlooked sins. I felt that as long as I wasn’t overly arrogant or boastful about my accomplishments I was fine. This changed when I heard from a sermon a very basic definition of pride: “I take priority.” By that definition, college then is a breeding ground for prideful self-obsession. I’m always consumed with my GPA, my resume, my workload, my social life, and my career. It’s all about me. Before I knew it, I found myself so preoccupied with my own plans that I missed out on what really mattered. My relationship with God took the back seat to my schoolwork and I overlooked the fact that thousands of individuals on my campus had never experienced the life-giving Gospel out of my selfish ambition for success.
I’ve come to learn that while on the surface self-priority seem harmless, it actually frighteningly suggests our lives come before Christ and before others. This directly contrasts Philippians 2:3, which says to “do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves”. So now God is teaching me to humble myself and to surrender my selfish and worldly goals to obey Him. After all, as Francis Chan states it, “nothing [we] do in this life will ever matter, unless it is about loving God and loving the people he has made.”
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