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Man desiring to be powerful, looking to God for help.

Be Powerful Without Being Self-absorbed

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Reading time: 4 minutes

The quickest way to be powerful is to develop healthy doses of humility and confidence. If you lean too far in one direction then life becomes unbalanced and can lead to a world of hurt and trouble. But, healthy humility and confidence result in joy.

How does joy related to power? To answer this, I first want you to consider the following four possible combinations of humility and confidence:

  • Self-loathing: a false humility without much if any confidence means harmfully low self-worth. This person actively rejects the truth about who God is and who He made them to be.
  • Self-deprecating: a helpful amount of humility without enough confidence leads to questionable self-worth. This person is healthy when they have a lighthearted ability to laugh at their mistakes. However, their negative self-expression can also come from a poisoned self-image.
  • Self-confident: a helpful dose of humility and confidence means self-care without arrogance. This person lets God be God while also feeling good about who they are.
  • Self-absorbed: too little humility with too much confidence results in an inflated sense of importance. This person becomes overcompensates for their low self-worth by focusing too much on trying to feel powerful. Increasing focus on self becomes a dead-end at self-loathing. An unhealthy preoccupation with self misses out on what God has to offer.

People become self-absorbed when they look only within themselves to heal their brokenness. In futility, people try to pull themselves up by their own bootstraps. But, the power that originates anywhere except from God promises only the illusion of confidence.

For example, if self becomes everything and God is minimized, then God isn’t in His rightful position in our lives. We’re not really going to succeed – maybe we’ll succeed with financially or something – but overall for God’s kingdom and his purposes we won’t be succeeding.

Be Humble So You Can Be Powerful

The world says you must be strong and independent to be powerful. But an “I can do it all by myself” attitude fails to activate God’s power.

Do you want to be full of your own power or full of God's power? You can be humble, confident, and full of God's power. Why settle for only what you can muster without God? Share on X

God says to be powerful, you must be weak enough to accept His help. A healthy weakness is a vulnerable dependence. Depending upon God activates His power.

Each time he said, “My grace is all you need. My power works best in weakness.” So now I am glad to boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ can work through me.

2 Corinthians 12:9 NLT

Be Confident So You Can Be Powerful

If you focus too much on God, if that’s possible, and minimize yourself then you can develop self-loathing where you don’t feel like you’re much of anything. Self-loathing is simply another form of arrogance that blocks God out of your life.

God’s power isn’t going to shine through you then. You need to have a right view of yourself so that God’s power will rest on you and work through you.

Be Joyful So You Can Be Powerful

The joy of the Lord is your strength (Nehemiah 8:10). How can you experience joy if you carry the heavy load of bitterness toward your own spirit?

Passively waiting for God to make you powerful doesn’t work. To be full of power, you must actively allow God to fill you, which also means keeping yourself empty of substitute fillings. Being filled with the Spirit means having great joy in God.

So be very careful how you live, not being like those with no understanding, but live honorably with true wisdom, for we are living in evil times. Take full advantage of every day as you spend your life for his purposes. And don’t live foolishly for then you will have discernment to fully understand God’s will. And don’t get drunk with wine, which is rebellion; instead be filled with the fullness of the Holy Spirit.

Ephesians 5:15-18 TPT

How Can We Be Powerful And Not Self-absorbed? How Can We Be Confident While Also Humble?

If we want to be powerful, we must be joyful. If we want to be joyful, we can’t live rebelliously independent from God. We must stop living with the habits of self-deprecation and self-absorption. The antidote for poisoning shame is to look to God for help.

Those who look to him for help will be radiant with joy; no shadow of shame will darken their faces.

Psalm 34:5 NLT

So we should go for everything. We should do all that we can – shoot from the moon so to speak – but also keep that in check by accepting whatever God provides or doesn’t provide in our lives.

He may have a different plan than the one on our minds, and it may take some time to figure out what that is, but it doesn’t mean we should just be sidelined and sitting back and waiting for something to happen either.

We should take the truths in the Bible that God has given us and run with them as best as we can. But ultimately it is up to God to author our success.

The inspiration for this post came from a conversation I had with Kidron Tirey.

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Why Two Identities Struggle to Resolve Conflict

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Reading time: 4 minutes

In my previous post, How Two Identities Become One, I compared relationships to roads. Roads are helpful but they require significant effort to build and maintain. Potholes and dead ends threaten to prevent you from arriving at your destination: connection and closeness.

On the road, potholes represent the fear of intimacy. Destructive conflict is a result of the inability to tolerate intimacy. And what is intimacy, really? Intimacy is nothing else but reality: the way things really are — flaws and all.

How much do you want to know the way things really are? God knows you perfectly. Do you want to know others and yourself perfectly? Reality is scary sometimes. Being authentic requires dropping your guard. Are connection and closeness worth the risk?

If the risk is too great, you can opt for denial and attempt to maintain the status quo (avoid conflict). If you want true intimacy, you can accept the condition of the road and plan a road construction project (embrace conflict).

Denial Makes for a Long, Bumpy Ride

Denial is like driving without your lights on at night. You can’t see the road. But sometimes you don’t want to see.

If you came face-to-face with the brokenness of your fiance and you realized your mate-to-be can’t meet your deepest longings, would you still want to get married? What if I told you the purpose of marriage isn’t to meet your deepest longings? God is merciful here in that de-emphasizing some of your potential mate’s faults allows you to appreciate their positive qualities and pursue marriage.

However, a flat-out denial of your or your mate’s immaturity will weaken your marriage in the long run. You can use denial to obscure a painful reality. Denial helps you cope with the disappointment of discovering flaws only by keeping alive a false hope.

Conflict will come, however, when you realize your mate isn’t capable of what you hope for the most. If you feel entitled, as in your mate owes you, then you’ll probably pick a fight. Fighting allows you to keep the hope alive that your mate can meet your needs. Else, why bother to fight if the situation is hopeless?

When you can’t accept reality one option is to blame your partner for the condition of the road. Conflict becomes a perpetual attempt to avoid facing the death of hope. You reason:

If I try again a different way, even if I create bad conflict, I keep hope alive. They could meet my need if they wanted.

You remain in denial that the other person can’t or won’t fix their road.

Acceptance Allows Detours of Opportunity

In this context, a fear of intimacy is a fear of unfulfillment.

I’ve been hoping all my life to finally make a connection and experience that I’m loved, needed, and wanted. I can’t handle not experiencing this with my mate.

Sometimes there is no fix. Or, at least, no immediate fix. The best solution, healthy grief, allows for the acceptance of true intimacy.

What I want isn’t going to happen. That really sucks! But I’ll be okay.

Putting aside your denial and moving toward acceptance is a tough, but mature, move. It puts a roadblock in the path of your hopes.

Yet, the blocking of one path allows you to see other paths you couldn’t see until now. That “I’ll be okay” can transform future conflict from bad to good. You’re no longer an unreasonable negotiator. You’re emotionally able to consider alternative solutions.

Wait. You mean there’s more than one way for me to experience peace and fulfillment?

Now you’re ready to see your partner in a more realistic light. A mature person wants to see reality more than they want instant fulfillment. Ironically, once this happens, a deeper fulfillment is possible. You’re no longer held hostage because you’re believing there’s only one solution to your pain problem.

Intimacy which results in seeing the limits of the relationship doesn’t have to lead down a path to a dead end. You can see the potential and put up a road construction sign and begin work to fill the potholes and expand the road in the direction God provides:

  • You can start pursuing self-intimacy (knowing yourself), instead of focusing so much on changing your partner.
  • You can feel good about yourself, even if your relationship is limited.
  • You can accept yourself and the needs you have, even if they aren’t currently being met how you want.
  • You have more reason to negotiate because you have more acceptable outcomes.
  • You move beyond destructive conflict because you accept true intimacy.
  • Acceptance allows you to appreciate your mate for who they are, not who you want them to be.

After you’re able to manage your fear of intimacy, you’re ready to resolve conflict. Next week, I’ll discuss cleaving together by defining a set of team values and negotiating decisions.

Are You Addicted to God?

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Reading time: 3 minutes

What is your ‘why’ that drives you out of bed every morning? If you’re relying on something other than God and His calling, you’re missing out on God’s best.

I spent the first twenty years of my life on the outside looking for some sense of meaning. I was desperate to find something more powerful than the emptiness of day-to-day life. When I became a Christian at twenty, I finally found my answer.

You can do better than what the world has to offer. You can start each day with motivation that originates from deep within you.

You can do better than caffeine

Caffeine stimulates, but it doesn’t connect you to your Creator.

Everyone has a purpose. Some people are aware of their calling. But too few invest the continuous effort required to reject the lies the world offers and grow into their God-given identity. Play the long game.

Playing the long game means looking at life with long-range vision. What is happening today is never the end, but only the beginning. Each day has its purpose but also builds towards a bigger plan tomorrow.

You can do better than boring

Life is boring without God. But God’s plan unfolds in new ways every second of the day.

God didn’t waste a second of Jesus’s life. He had a purpose and a strategy for everything He accomplished. Jesus lived up to His identity and fulfilled His deepest longing. Now He calls you to find your passion and advance God’s kingdom.

To advance God’s kingdom, you must be connected to Jesus. Apart from Him, you can’t accomplish anything of spiritual worth (John 15:5). When you are enlightened by God’s Spirit, you have the power to advance God’s purposes.

You can do better than random

Life is mysterious. God doesn’t reveal everything about His plans, but He wants you to seek and find spiritual insight.

God knew you before you were born. You have a destiny to pursue. Your identity doesn’t change, but how you see yourself changes over your lifetime. Pursue your identity and enjoy abundant life.

Abundant life comes from participating with God in His work. You can’t have life to the fullest without participating in spiritual growth. God’s plan for your life involves your spiritual growth and helping others with their spiritual growth.

You can do better than worrying

Short-term solutions provide a false hope. Then, you’re back to worrying about where to find your next fix.

God is the perfect fit for the receptors in your brain. He’s better than drugs or medicine. When you’re connected to Him, you experience a transcendent peace. God wired you to connect with Him.

Don’t be afraid to ask God to speak encouragement to you. I don’t always feel great about life. There are plenty of distractions. When you feel discouraged, that’s a perfect time to revisit your ‘why’. Ask God why you should continue when life isn’t going the way you hoped it would.

You can have passion for living and become unstoppable

Being addicted to God means you have at least tasted that God is good (Psalm 34:8). Life can be challenging. You won’t be able to do everything right all the time. But in your heart you know you can return to God’s goodness. Once you’ve tasted God, you realize nothing else comes close to satisfying like He does.

Are you waking up to who God is? Can you see His reality?

You are unstoppable because you have access to God at all times. God’s kingdom is real and your participation counts.

Tomorrow morning when you wake up, think about what motivates you to keep doing what you need to do. Can you sense what is at stake if you give up?

Many things satisfy earthy desires. These aren’t necessarily wrong. But…

You can do better.

God, awaken our spiritual senses to You. Reveal more of who you are. Help us not forget there’s more to this life than we can see.

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Never Give Up

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Reading time: 3 minutes

Have you ever been tempted to give up? Maybe you’ve encountered failure after failure or disappointment after disappointment. No matter what you do or how hard you try, your efforts don’t bring the results you hope for.

But guess what? Past results don’t predict future results with any certainty – not when God is involved. Abraham and Sarah were too old to have a child, but God made it happen according to His promise.

Moses led the Israelites out of Egypt but they didn’t reach the promised land for 40 years. God fulfilled His promise when Joshua took over after Moses passed away. Yet, consider that the Israelites were enslaved for 400 years prior to God starting the delivery process. That’s multiple generations of suffering. That’s plenty of time to give up and some of them did grumble and give up, but you don’t have to.

Giving up is pretty much the same as giving in to the enemy. When Christians are tired and discouraged we can easily stop fighting for what is good.

God is never too late. What hasn’t happened yet, isn’t yet required. God holds every decision in His control.

Are you questioning whether God will allow your dream to be fulfilled? If your dream is godly, then I have a better question for you. How will you pass the time until God ordains your dream to bear fruit? What is the least amount of fear you can live with while you wait? Are you under crushing fear because you doubt God knows how to run the universe (or your life).

When negative events come out of nowhere, it’s easy to anticipate more negatives. Why? Because no one likes surprise losses. If you expect something negative, then you have some semblance of control over it. But if a negative occurs unpredictably, you no longer feel safe. If a negative event happens randomly, what will prevent another one from happening again, and then again?

The problem with this line of thinking is it leaves God out of the equation completely. Just because God doesn’t prevent something bad the first time, doesn’t mean He will continue to let you suffer (1 Peter 5:10).

If you lose heart, you’ve lost everything. You can always recover, but to do so requires that you reignite your faith. You may not have realized your dream in your expected timeframe, but God has the power to complete the impossible. What is impossible for man, is yet possible for God.

What can we conclude then? God’s timing is more important than our timing. When we are believers, we know God cares for us, so we also know whatever happens, no matter how difficult, we can never lose a dream that God can’t find and restore.

Our lives are significant, so we must always work for, and ask for, good things. However, we must also be prepared to accept delays and setbacks. As we grow in faith, we grow in acceptance of what God provides. He provides the right amount – not too much and not too little.*

Your efforts count. Never give up. You can make a difference in other’s lives that has eternal significance. Don’t give up doing good.

And let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up.

Galatians 6:9

No matter what happens, never forget that you and God are on the same team. God and you ultimately have the same goal. You perform good works that will advance God’s kingdom (Ephesians 2:10).

* If you would like to explore this idea further, read my book, To Identity and Beyond.
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The Paradox of Humility

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Reading time: 2 minutes

No one can claim they are the humblest person in the world with much credibility. But those of us who struggle with self-worth know that confidence is equally elusive.

Somehow though, confidence and humility are the same thing. If you are confident (but not arrogant), you’ll also be humble. And if you’re humble (but not engaging in false humility), you’ll also be confident.

Doesn’t that seem strange that appropriate confidence, the kind God wants us to have, is also a way to express humility? I mean strange in the sense that confident probably isn’t the first word that comes to mind when you think of humility. But how could it be any other way?

God who is all powerful clothed Himself with humanity. If there is a paradox, Jesus represents it perfectly.

To be strong doesn’t mean to be closed or unreachable. God’s strength is approachable. Jesus’s birth offers us the greatest hope possible.

We are creatures of habit. Once we know how to do something, we go on autopilot.

If you’ve ever experienced a negative, false belief about yourself, you know firsthand the intense struggle that is required to put off the false and put on the truth.

You can’t have confidence and humility without also having peace and joy.

Then Jesus said, “Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you. Let me teach you, because I am humble and gentle at heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy to bear, and the burden I give you is light.”

Matthew 11:28-30 NLT

In your quest to become more confident and humble, remember that it feels like peace, joy, and rest. I bless you now with rest for your soul. Amen.

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Surviving On The Fringe

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Reading time: 3 minutes

Are you on the fringe? Fringe means “to be on the outskirts.” That can be good or bad depending upon what it at the center.

Last week I wrote about feeling on the outskirts of God and what He is doing in the world. But what if we flip that around and define fringe as being on the outskirts of what the world is doing? Then being on the fringe would be a good thing.

Jesus lived on the fringe while He was on earth. The leaders at the time expected Him to join them in their agenda. But Jesus certainly lived as if not engrossed in the world:

What I mean, brothers and sisters, is that the time is short. From now on those who have wives should live as if they do not; those who mourn, as if they did not; those who are happy, as if they were not; those who buy something, as if it were not theirs to keep; those who use the things of the world, as if not engrossed in them. For this world in its present form is passing away.

1 Corinthians 7:29-31 NIV

If you find yourself depressed and anxious about what is happening in the world, maybe you are too deeply engrossed? What is too engrossed? This means living as if this life is all there is. If it were all there is, you’d have to put your full hope in it. You’d have no other choice.

If you are holding too tightly to this world, you’re going to feel discouraged. You’re going to be worried because this world in its present form is passing away. But, there is another option besides hoping in this world.

If you are in Christ, you are a new creation (2 Corinthians 5:17). God has separated you out from this world. He’s brought you to the fringe. He’s sent you into the world to help it, not to be engrossed in it (1).

Don’t love the world or anything that belongs to the world. If you love the world, you cannot love the Father. Our foolish pride comes from this world, and so do our selfish desires and our desire to have everything we see. None of this comes from the Father. The world and the desires it causes are disappearing. But if we obey God, we will live forever.

1 John 2:15-17 CEV

Jesus had no place to lay His head (Luke 9:58). Of course, this doesn’t mean that He never slept lying down. It means He didn’t ever settle down as if this was His permanent home.

Sure – it’s okay to own a home and live in it. More important that where you live is how attached you are to your life in this world. It’s impossible to be completely satisfied with this world. If you try to find your life somewhere in the world, you will feel empty and disappointed.

But if you join Jesus at the fringe, you will find your life and you’ll be in good company. You can be on the fringe and not feel lonely.

If you’ve been engrossed in the world, it takes time to detach from it. At some point you have to let go of the world.

Have you ever lost something and become focused on finding it? What if you can’t find it? Eventually you have to move on. If you spend your life consumed with what you’ve lost, your life will be compromised. It won’t be all it could be.

Imagine what it feels like to let go of what you’ve lost and move on. That’s what you need to do with the world. The world isn’t as great as you thought it was. That’s good or bad depending upon how you look at it. If you can give up on finding your ultimate happiness in it, you’ll end up content and peaceful.

(1) https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/lets-revise-the-popular-phrase-in-but-not-of
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