Wednesday, June 24

Am I critical?

This morning we attended our very last chapel for this semester. Guessing that awesome things were going to happen, I went with expectation in my heart.
Being one of the behind the scenes' leader taught me to be a humble leader. I struggled with this in the beginning as I wanted people to know about my position and that I was there and they needed to acknowledge my presence.
Over the few months God kept poking into my business so that I wouldn't become proud and arrogant and often had to give me a little pinch or a big slap on the bum because I am so stubborn. He often helped me with words for an email, how to encourage someone and how to look beyond myself and see others from more of His perspective. It was a tough season and I learned that I had lot to learn.
In it all, He constantly told me to remain humble and keep submitting everything to Him cause He would be bless it, and show me the way.
After I met up with my team, I went in for the worship. It was this new guy leading worship, he usually does bass guitar but I guess they decided to change things around. I stood through the whole worship service astonished at the horrible quality of the worship team. I was criticizing everything and yes there were mistakes. The reason why I gave myself permission to criticize was because the worship team was filled with talented musicians and vocalists and there was no reason why the worship music should be so poor.
After chapel, I asked God to forgive me for how I dealt with this.
And He asked to look up the word 'humility' in the TNIV bible and I found these scriptures, that stood out strikingly...

Phil 2: 3,4 "Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves. not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others.

James 3:13 "Who is wise and understanding among you? Let them show it by their good life, by deeds done in the humility that comes from wisdom."

I apologized again to God and knew that I needed to humble myself. And He started revealing His word for me personally. He explained how being a "behind the scenes" leader would lead me to be a good leader on platform where people would notice me.
He told me how I had to criticize them not to tell them and make them feel bad or in particular to judge them but because I needed to understand and apply it in my future ministry and wherever He would place. I had to see it in a certain way so that I would be effective at where I will be placed. I had things to learn and He was teaching me.
He was allowing me to grow in wisdom and to act in humility when it would be my turn.
Being critical or giving criticism shouldn't always be seen as a negative thing. I think criticism makes us better at what we do, helps us to come up with new strategies, new ideas, new churches, youth groups, creative teams that will enhance our lives as Christians.
I believe God gave us a mind to be able to analyze and criticize so that we would be do better and so that we would be creative like Him and not be satisfied with where we are and what we have done.

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