Day 12 – Fault finder

“He who despises his neighbor lacks sense, but a man of understanding keeps silent. He who goes about as a gossip reveals secrets, but he who is trustworthy and faithful keeps a matter hidden.” Proverbs 11:12-13

How easily we bring to light the faults in others, thinking we are doing good and we are more advanced and more righteous for it, only to find out that the reality is that in doing so, we are trying to deflect the attention away from our own faults by placing the attention on somebody else. This attitude soon brings us to a place where our minds are so focused on what others are doing, that we miss out on what God has for us and when we at last realise what we have been keeping ourselves busy with, we have wasted a lot of time and energy on nothing of substance. We are called to be fearless, and this fearlessness includes not being afraid of staying before the mirror of God’s holiness and confronting our own shortcomings instead of trying to hide from them because what is brought to light will be dealt with in love and change and what a great relief and joy it is when we stand on the other side, made new!

Prayer: Mighty Saviour, we so easily turn our minds away from ourselves, so that we do not have to look in the mirror and see our own weak and fault-ridden self, but then we remember that You do not see us like we do, You look at us through Your blood and restoration, seeing the finished product we are working towards. May we allow You to change our focus, so that we can reach that place of seeing only the wonderful new creation we are working towards in ourselves. In Jesus’s name. Amen.

Written by Anna-Mart Nel for www.womenoftheword.co.za