God who lifts man high also brings him down. In His word, God has given us the formula to unlock the windows of heaven and how to revel in His blessings. But He’s also often cautioned us about the risk of forgetting the source of our blessings. To help whip us in line is partly why God uses silent/wilderness seasons to refine us like gold, to re-calibrate our focus to Him when we lose track, or to prepare us for the next level of our walk with Him (e.g. Moses, Joseph, David, Job, Paul, Jesus etc.).
Psalms 1:1-3 has the “secret sauce”: it states clearly the reward of obedience to Christ, meditating day and night on His word, and more importantly, distinguishing oneself from the world’s ways, passions and interests. But there are stories after stories of people who, when they received the blessings, soon forgot their source and thus came to no great end.
- Uzziah is a clear example of this. He obeyed God and was faithful. As long as He trusted wholly in God, the Lord made Him prosperous and famous. In Malachi 3:12, we also find that attached to faithfulness in tithes and offerings is the blessing of fame (…”all the nations will call you blessed…”), and many others. But Uzziah started depending on himself and became so proud that he saw himself grand enough to burn the incense on the altar by himself – a role strictly preserved for the priests. God’s judgement was instant – he was struck with leprosy and died a leper.
- Saul too fell into this pride trap while being impatient in waiting for Samuel and God tore the kingdom of Israel away from him. (NB: In these instances, both men didn’t suddenly attain pride, but it grew on them over a long period of denying the convictions of the Holy Spirit and testing God’s long suffering).
The Christian life requires growing from faith to faith (Rom 1:17), growing eternally in deeper and deeper experiences of walking with God. It requires a daily walk, progressive humility, tapping constantly into the source of all strength. We are not to walk with God for a time, and then part from His company to walk in the ways of the world/flesh, taking His grace for granted. There must be a firm continuance, a perseverance in acts of faith. We are to praise God; to show forth His glory through our righteous character. No one of us will gain the victory without persevering, untiring effort, proportionate to the value of the object which we seek i.e. eternal life. So help us God. 🙏🏾
The Langford Files 