Last night at Starbucks, just kind of rehearsing our lives with one another, I shared a story with a group of folks that I thought might be relevant with where we are going on Saturday Night.
When I entered into the military I had an identity crisis. In college I was a "known" person. I was known for my personality and for my accomplishments. When I entered into the military that was shattered. I was thrust into a group of people; no one knew anything of who I was or what I had done. And guess what, no one cared. I was just a lowly newbie...just like everyone else. Well, to be honest that didn't set well with my overinflated sense of self-importance.
So, in my first house (OK-this is really embarrasing), I had an office in which I placed on the wall every award and accolade that I had from college. Every time I walked in my office I was able to remind myself, "You're good enough, you're smart enough and doggoneit people like you." I told you this was embarrassing. My life was filled with pride and self-importance.
Can I just tell you, there is no room for the Holy Spirit in a life filled with all that self-centeredness? Eventually I realized that the stuff had to come off the wall. I had to empty my walls and my life of my own insecurity. Now that stuff is packed up in a box underneath our house in a cubby hole. Only a life emptied of self can be filled with the Holy Spirit.
To live a Spirit-filled, Spirit empowered life begins as we divest ourselves of our pride, ambition, self-loathing, bitterness, pain, and all other forms of "self-worship." God cannot breathe the Spirit into us if our spiritual lungs are already full. So going into this weekend I ask you...
What's still hanging on your walls?
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