Like this:

Too often I’m tempted to “power UP” and try to prove my point in a “discussion” or to “win” in some matter that I care about.  But I was convicted again this week that the way of Christ is just the opposite … to “power DOWN!”

Here was the entry from my personal journal yesterday:

I need to power down!

I’m tempted to “power up” – when people challenge my leadership, when my family members push back on an idea I have, or when the worldly mindset of this culture offends me.  I want to “prove” my point or use my influence to “win” the argument.

But the way of Jesus was not to power up – quite the opposite, his approach in the Garden of Gethsemane was not to fight, but the serve!  I’m more like Judas – who wanted to pick a fight and add to the treasury of the ministry!  But that didn’t go the way Judas thought it would.  I would be better off to be more like Jesus!

“Don’t be selfish; don’t live to make a good impression on others. Be humble, thinking of others as better than yourself.  Don’t think only about your own affairs, but be interested in others, too, and what they are doing.

Your attitude should be the same that Christ Jesus had.  Though he was God, he did not demand and cling to his rights as God.  He made himself nothing; he took the humble position of a slave and appeared in human form.” – Philippians 2:3-7 (NIV)

Jesus didn’t look like a winner – but he was!

I want to look more like Jesus!

 

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