Pride and Protection

Confession time. Today, for the first time in a couple of weeks, I have been able to do my daily devotional time first. FIRST!! Before my shower, before my breakfast, before work. First. Although I had not been missing a day in God's Word, I had been squeezing it in at random times throughout the day and it has just not been the same. So...I come to my blog refreshed and ready to start the day.

Back to Ezekiel...

PROTECTION

I read Ezekiel 25-28 this morning and as the title says, it really was about pride and protection. Let me explain quickly. In Ezekiel 25, God is speaking through our friend Zeke about vengeance on the nations of Ammon, Moab, Edom and Phillistia because of their poor treatment of Israel and Judah. To me, this is a perfect picture of the new testament verse in Romans 12:19 that says that vengeance is God's, not ours to take. More than the vengeance though, I am reminded by this chapter that even though God gets irritated with me from time to time, He still wants to protect me from harm, like He does with Israel and Judah. Perfect love from the perfect Father!

PRIDE

Now to the pride. This would have to come up again. When I read through chapter 28, it almost makes me think that it is too scary to be a leader because of both the responsibility over what God has given me as well as the responsibility over myself to keep relying on God else I become proud. Being successful is more dangerous to us than I think most of us realize.

I don't believe that God condemns success. Actually, I believe that He wants good things to happen for us. The key is remembering who allowed us to succeed in the first place! The prince of Tyre was an awesome ruler (Ez 28:12-15) until he because consumed with materialism (28:16) and became full of himself. (Ez 28: 1-5). As a result, our fair and perfect God who just wants people to know who He is, had no choice but to take down that prince.

Things to think about:
What kind of "prince" am I?
If I am successful, do I give credit where real credit is due?