June 9: Of Humility, Stubbornness and Expert Consultation

1 Kins 5:1-6:38

Acts 7:1-29

Psalm 127:1-5

Proverbs 16:28-30

"Unless the Lord builds the house, the builders labor in vain."

Bad enough there are many things I know I do NOT know, worse that I am so bad at asking for, and taking, instruction.  If you are like me, there are many places in your life where you suffer from an overly generous estimate of your knowledge, your wisdom, your understanding, your abilities. 

One of the best examples: after 13 years in a career in finance, I thought I was doing extremely well.  Good job, responsive clients, good pay, as late as March of 2008.  I thought there was just one way to go, and it was going to be good.  

By December that year, I was out of a job, amidst a crisis that made one doubt whether jobs in finance would come back.  Not what I had planned, not what I had wanted.  

It turns out, though, it was EXACTLY what I needed.  And not just me - but the family I'd neglected, the children who'd grown up pretty much without me, the wife who'd raised the kids almost entirely on her own.  If I'd been permitted to choose the path of my life, I would have chosen more of the same - and it would have been devastatingly wrong.  I would have worked my (rather generously proportioned) hindquarters off, but I would have labored in vain.  Praise God He knew better.  Praise God He built the house despite me.

You'd think that, after being made aware of all that, I would have learned my lesson.  But the heart is stubborn, and change is difficult, and so I still find myself trying to build without asking for guidance and direction.  

Father, before You build my life, rebuild my heart.  Show me what I must do to change, so that I turn to You for the guidance I need so that the life I build, the life I help build for my family - none of that is in vain.