\u201cI shall not demean my own uniqueness by envy of others. I shall stop boring into myself to discover what psychological or social categories I might belong to. Mostly I shall simply forget about myself and do my work.\u201d\u00a0 (Clyde Kilby quoted in John Piper, The Hidden Smile of God<\/em>, 112)<\/p>\n A good friend passed this cutting quotation to me in the midst of a conversation, and I thought it too excellent to not share with friends.\u00a0 It seems a scripturally saturated thought, as it pushes we who are narcissistic, self-focused sinners outside of ourselves and forces us to concentrate on other people and on bigger, more significant matters of life.<\/p>\n This is the kind of quotation, I think, that should not cause us to attempt knee-jerk reactions to patterns of our lives but should instead prompt us to meditate on every aspect of our existence.\u00a0 It might even be worth printing out and putting up on one\u2019s mirror.\u00a0 Or one might write it on the first page of a journal.\u00a0 Whatever the case, this piercing word from an old English professor caused me to sit up straight.\u00a0 I\u2019m going to try to keep it in my mind for a long time, and use it to fight sin and silly thoughts and bad habits.\u00a0<\/p>\n God needs to reign in my mind and life; others need to occupy my attention; I need far less attention and praise than I give myself.\u00a0 This could apply to those who use Twitter, those who have never heard of Twitter, and everyone in between.\u00a0 Every Christian in every place could likely use a reminder that life is not about us, and thus we should not structure our lives as if it is.\u00a0 We should avoid things that tempt us to act as if this is so, and should devote ourselves to larger, more important things.<\/p>\n If we do so, we\u2019ll abase or lower ourselves and we\u2019ll lift Christ high.\u00a0 We\u2019ll worry less about our cars or clothes or Facebook pages or blogs or classes or hair growth or children, and we\u2019ll worry far, far more about making God great.\u00a0 That is no small thing (though we are).<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" \u201cI shall not demean my own uniqueness by envy of others. I shall stop boring into myself to discover what psychological or social categories I might belong to. Mostly I shall simply forget about myself and do my work.\u201d\u00a0 (Clyde Kilby quoted in John Piper, The Hidden Smile of God, 112) A good friend passed […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1217,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[906,1475,13180,2119,13302],"class_list":["post-1162","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-clyde-kilby","tag-hair-growth","tag-john-piper","tag-narcissism","tag-twitter"],"yoast_head":"\n