This evening I was struck by a story of a young mother who, while pregnant, found that she had bone cancer. And in deciding to wait to start chemotherapy until she had given birth to her baby, her cancer spread and became terminal. However, she had been encouraged to start the chemotherapy and thus would have ended her daughter’s life. Here was this young lady, facing the reality of her own near mortality, and choosing instead to selflessly choose her daughter’s life above her own.
As I watched this story, however, I was challenged by my own actions. And it now makes me consider, how often is my heart actually inclined to put someone else above myself? How often do I pridefully hold to my own way in the midst of communication with my fiance? Do I serve those I come into contact with at school, putting them before me? And if the Lord should allow that I have a family, will I cultivate an attitude of selflessness and a self-giving sacrifice for them?
Therefore, oftentimes I am faced with the reality of my own pride and selfishness. I am confronted, in a similar way that Jerry Bridges describes, with my own sin (36). What I ought to be doing when feeling under the weight of my own sin is to live in the forgiveness of the Gospel moment-by-moment (Bridges 34-38). And with that, I need to be clinging to the truth of Romans 8:1 that I am no longer under "condemnation" but am "in Christ Jesus" (qtd in Bridges 38).
Oh, to be filled with and spurred on by the glorious truths of the Gospel on a daily basis when seeing the ugliness of my selfishness! And what a wonderful earthly example this mother was of the Christ-like heart attitude that I must have.
Bridges, Jerry. Respectable Sins: Confronting the Sins we Tolerate. NavPress: Colorado Springs, 2007. Print.
