Recently, I had lunch with an insightful friend. She has a theory that the thing you lacked most when you were young, God often gives you when you are a mature Christian.
I told her I thought this theory was very biblical. After all, God called Abraham the father of nations, yet for a very long time, Abraham wasn’t a father. When he did become a father, the Lord made it clear that it was only by the hand of God that Issac arrived.
God called Gideon a great warrior and humble little Gideon eventually became that, but when Gideon was young, he was a shaky-kneed wimp from a shaky-kneed clan.
David, the lowly shepherd boy, God pegged a king long before David ascended the throne.
“So what was the thing you lacked most when you were young that God has now given you?” asked my friend as we talked.
Munching on a sandwich, I had to think about this for awhile.
“Humility,” I finally answered.
“Really? That’s not a fun one.” My friend searched my face. She’s an intent listener, one of those people you find yourself spilling your guts to, which I did over our three hour lunch. Under her gentle gaze, I shifted in my seat, feeling a bit vulnerable as an ache built in my chest. Memories of my youth washed over me that didn’t make me smile.
“I was a prideful child,” I admitted with a particular memory haunting me.
I couldn’t have been more than seven years old. Down the road from us lived a poor Hispanic couple with a single-wide trailer full of children. Sometimes those poor kids would come over to play. We lived on the top of a hill in a nice house with ponies in our pasture. On this particular day, I was sitting in a chair in our breezeway holding a bag of Doritos. Like a queen keeping court, I was presenting the chips one at a time and very slowly to these hungry kids as I ate my fill at leisure. I can’t remember exactly how this took place, why I was the keeper of the Doritos and not my older brother Patrick, I don’t even remember my brother being there, too bad because he was far more compassionate than me as a child, but I think I might even have been making these kids do tricks like dogs for the chips.
My dad caught me doing this and gave the chips to the children, who happily left with my Doritos bag. I then got a belt beating and refused to cry.
My dad was a proud man. He believed in the belt, but he also believed in me, his little red-haired daughter with a will as strong as his own. One of the first virtues I recall learning in our family was that we were a proud breed. My dad ranked pride right up there with honesty, so instead of making excuses when in trouble, I confessed my sin, often without remorse, and faced the belt with a stony heart.
In high school, I read a novel called The Proud Breed. I loved this book. The couple in this love story helped tame California in the 1800s. The main characters were so prideful they nearly destroyed each other, but in the end, their fiery love conquered all. I hungered for this kind of romance in my own life.
The weekend Scott and I married, a battle raged in me. In the Catholic Church where we wed, a gentle Irish priest insisted I take the vow to obey my husband. How I hated this ancient oppression of women and did not want to agree to this order. In the end, I relented and repeated the vow because I knew Scott didn’t expect me to obey him once we wed. My new husband was as prideful as I was, and we were already well on our way to destroying each other.
Surprisingly, after three turbulent years of dating, our first seven years or so of marriage sailed along with minor storms. We had two daughters and I wrote three novels that have never seen the light of day. Scott became an Army helicopter pilot and I landed a New York literary agent. My books didn’t sell to publishers, but one was optioned for a movie and I traveled to Hollywood to meet the producer. I was in my late twenties and thought I would have no problem presenting that bestseller to society by the time I hit thirty. Oh, the pride of life I lived by…
Then, after turning thirty having just given birth to a son, my life began to fall apart. I developed panic attacks and breast lumps that appeared to be cancer. My pilot husband was never home. Our precious, but colicky son grew into a sickly two-year-old. After several week long hospital stays in the pediatric unit praying to the saints for our son to join the ranks of the healthy, then facing several surgeries myself to remove lumps in the end, thankfully benign, my pride took a serious beating. So did my writing career. So did my marriage. So did my heart.
When humility finally reigned in my life, salvation followed. Grace flowed. My career came to a standstill, but my marriage sweetened.
Spending my thirties pregnant with three more sons a forthright friend just labeled as hellions has humbled me more.
Pregnant again at forty-two with still no published novel, though I’ve earnestly written several more, keeps haughtiness at bay. My dad now calls me the old woman in the shoe. If you don’t recognize this saying, you should brush up on your fairy tales.
Plus, twenty years of potty-training will humble a person. Poop directors are a lowly breed.
It wasn’t until I became a Christian that I discovered pride was bad. In fact, it was pride that got Lucifer thrown out of heaven, which led to the Adam and Eve apple fiasco, which brought about the fall of humankind.
Proverbs 16:18 says, “Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall.” I just read this scripture this morning after sleepily opening my Bible to this page. I wasn’t searching for this verse. I was just praying a bit before rising and popped open my Bible at random hoping for a wink from God. The funny thing was that during my half asleep prayers before reaching for my Bible, I’d prayed about finishing this blog on pride.
So here’s my fun question to you, “What has God given you now that you most lacked as a child?”
Spend some time really thinking about this question, but a word of caution here: your answer may not be fun. Mine wasn’t. Yet, I wouldn’t trade the gift of humility for the moon. I hear God better in this humble state.