Me, myself and I

"I........." How many times a day do we start our sentences with 'I' or construct strings of sentences with the word 'I' in it? It's hard to avoid it, I know. It's important that we use 'I' for several reasons such as giving someone your point of view or sharing the most riveting experience of something that happened to you. Then there are situations when we insert the 'I' unnecessarily. Someone is talking about their day (because you asked) and they pause for two seconds and you pick up where they left off. Observe:

You: Hey, Julie! How are you?
Julie: Great, fam. I just ran into my ex-boyfriend and he's not angry with me anymore. I was going to uh (pause)
You: Wait. What?! He said what? If I were you, I would have walked away right there. You know it wasn't your fault, so why does he think he has to forgive you?!Who does he think he is? I wish my ex-boyfriend would come up to me and say he's not mad. Let him be mad. I don't care!
Julie: (pause)......it's not about you.

This situation happened to me once. Really humbling and kinda awkward. My friend was right. It wasn't about me. Nor did he ask for my input. He was simply telling me a story that all I needed to do was listen.

(See how many times 'I' has been used by me?)

I'm trying to learn to think less of myself. Especially as a Christian. 2 Corinthians 2: 1-5 touches on the fact that what we have to say does not compare with what God has to say. The more we think that we are providing the greatest information or even good information, we should check ourselves. What is God saying? Seriously...

"When I came to you, brothers, I didn't no come with eloquence or superiors wisdom as I proclaimed to you the testimony about God." vs. 1 --Paul is saying that what he brought to the table, is nothing. He had to eloquence or superior wisdom. But what he testified to was what made the difference. When we start testifying about ourselves and looking inwardly, we can truly bring the Kingdom and look outwardly.

Take a step back. Read 1Cor. 2 for yourself. Recognize it's not about 'I'. Speak words that testify to God's person. 


Much love, peace, and outward-looking grease,
           Ife 'Quipayan' S. 


P.S. It's reading week and exams officially start on Thursday, but I have one everyday this week. Great. Only God can take me through....I should really stop focusing on what I can do and look to what God is capable of doing. Looking outward.