About eight years ago, a friend had some pretty serious health concerns. He was hospitalized for a few days and I remember going to his room to pray that God would heal him. A thought came to mind recently after I saw this friend and noticed his good health. If an all-knowing Jesus had come into that hospital room eight years ago, he could have said, “Dana, the condition of the friend you are praying for is not as serious at it seems. He’s going to be OK, but I am going to tell you something about yourself. The pain you’ve been experiencing the past couple of months is not muscle pain. You have cancer and you’re soon going to begin a long battle with a life-threatening disease.”
One of the truths that should keep us humble on this earth is the fact that we really don’t know too much. This ought to affect the way we think, talk, and live. James warned about boasting, “Tomorrow we’ll do this or that.” We don’t know what tomorrow will bring, so we should say, “If it is the Lord’s will, we will do this or that.” Leaving God out of our discussions leads to bragging and James calls this evil.
To keep from making improper judgment, we must admit we don’t know the hearts or circumstances of others. A casual observer watching two men pray on the temple steps might have made this evaluation: Person A is religious; person B is not. Person A is a pillar of society; person B is a thief. Person A really knows how to pray; person B is floundering. But Jesus gave God’s evaluation: Person B went home justified; person A did not.
More humbling is the admission that we don’t even know our own selves as well as we think we do. As a sinful woman washed the feet of Jesus with tears and anointed her Savior with perfume, a religious man thought: “If this man were a prophet, he would know who is touching him and what kind of woman she is – that she is a sinner.” The truth was ‘this man’ was more than a prophet and the conclusion he shared with the Pharisee was stunning: “Simon, she loves me much more than you do.” (see Luke 7:36-50)
Would you rather walk in reality or in a façade? Would you rather know the truth or stay in the dark? Would you rather be confident in your own mind or be vulnerable before your Creator? Could God not bring each one of us revelation at any moment that would shake us to the core? Perhaps out of his mercy he keeps much from us, but the older I get the more I’d like to walk in reality. If things aren’t right on my team, I would rather problems be exposed than to coach in ignorance. If things aren’t right in my home, I’d rather know the truth so I could ask for God’s wisdom to be a better husband and father. And if things aren’t right in my heart, I want to be convicted so I can confess my sin, receive forgiveness, and walk in the Light. May this truth always keep us humble before our Heavenly Father: “Nothing in all creation is hidden from God’s sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account.”
“O Lord, you have searched me and you know me. You know when I sit down and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar. You discern my going out and my lying down; you are familiar with all my ways. Before a word is on my tongue you know it completely, O Lord… Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.” Psalm 139:1-4, 23-24