.....And you probably know the rest of the song.
I was the King of Vanity. Ask anyone who really knows me. In fact, I think a lot of those people think I haven’t yet passed that mantle over to anyone yet.
That’s ok. After looking like the first (ok, second) pregnant man because of ascites with an aura of yellow around me who can’t stop itching and excusing myself to hit the bathroom every 5 minutes because of diuretics – I’ve eaten my share of humble pie.
Selflessness. I think it’s the one thing that has stood out to me more than anything else so far in this process. It’s been threaded through every post and I didn’t even notice. Ryan’s life and sacrifice. Letting go of guilt. Hospital halls. Psalm 133.
If you can spot selfishness, you have a head start on life. You can snuff it out. Then you’re at that ethereal place where you realize YOU have to figuratively end so that faith can take over. You have reached the end of yourself. And that’s right where God likes to enter the scene.
2 Corinthians 12:9 – But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.
Selfless living. I don’t think it’s hard as we make it out to be. Think about it for a second. When I think of the times that I’ve felt sublimely content, it wasn’t when I bought that new whatever or got that promotion or won that thingamajig. It was the time I helped that person in the smallest way unbeknownst to them. It was the time I reached out to a friend when they needed me, and when I bailed out my brother or saved my sister’s bacon. OK that last part about brother and sister was actually the reverse – I was being bailed and it was my bacon – but you get the point. There was a split second moment where things just felt right – like things just snapped into place.
Yet I’ve spent the majority of my time for those fleeting yeah-it-feels-good-but –not –for-long moments. So I chased that fleeting moment with another (fill in blank with appropriate response):
This is my chance to really make it stick, now that I have all of you holding me accountable. I’m making every day’s goal to live selflessly.
OK after reading that, it sounds pathetically trite. But I don’t care. To live it is something altogether different.