Thursday, April 27, 2006

Queen Guinevere tries to teach Lancelot a lesson in
'umility and gets caught in a terrible trap. Humility,
what a powerful word. Life can be very humbling and
can seem most unfair to our kids. Maybe that's because
it is rather unfair most of the time. To teach our
children to stand up and fight for what is right and
yet to have the humility of heart to accept what is
often doled out unfairly is quite a balancing act.

Tyler, our 16 year old, can spot an unfair situation a
mile off. His baseball team, especially, is filled with it.
He's not even concerned with fairness to himself, but
unfair treatment of others. He is irritated to the deep
parts of his soul by a coach who gives favors to one or
two. Sometimes those favors have come Ty's way, but
his sense of fairness runs so strong that he won't take
advantage of them.

It is hard. Hard to be gracious in a situation where we,
from our "mature" perspective, agree with our son 100%.
(I'm not just being an overly sensitive mom. Tyler gets
to play the every game the whole game. It is the attitude
the coach has towards the players that is at issue here.)
What Kent has told Tyler over and over is, "Don't be
surprised when you have a coach that is unfair, just be
grateful when you come up with one that is good." He also
tells our oldest that about his supervisors at work. "If you
get a supervisor that knows what he is doing, and that keeps
a good tab on what the workers are up to, then be surprised
and thank God for it."

It's a good time for me to remind the boys that certain battles
are worth a good fight and others aren't. And it is a good time
to look for the grace that can build humility in our lives, a
humility that is pleasing to our Father.

But He gives more grace. Therefore He says:
God resists the proud,
But gives grace to the humble. James 4:6


Surely He scorns the scornful,
But gives grace to the humble. Proverbs 3:34

We will ask God to keep us from being like the men in
Psalm 17:10

They have closed up their fat hearts;
With their mouths they speak proudly.

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