Lessons from being a maid-of-honor

I came up a week before the wedding because I wanted to be as much of a help as I could be to Keturah. Since I live in South Carolina, I have been limited in how much I could help with in the months leading up to the wedding. I did come up for my week of Spring Break in April to throw her a bridal shower and help with wedding planning. But the week of the wedding is especially crucial in all the last minute things that have to be done. When she picked me up on Friday, she was sharing with me how it was just hitting her that up till now she has been able to put things off till the next week if it didn't get done as planned. Now, this is the only week left. It all has to be done this week. We have been doing well in keeping on schedule for what we have needed to get accomplished, but there is much more to do. The biggest part right now for her is finishing up packing to move into Skip's house, as well as, packing for the honeymoon on a cruise to Alaska.

My place as her maid of honor this week is to do everything I can to help her in finishing up details for the big day. Everytime I consider any angle of things that I need to do or she needs to do, I keep coming back to my proper place of prefering what she needs to do above anything I may think of wanting to do. This week is about her and her wedding. I keep telling her that I am free at her disposal to do anything she wants me to do. I have made no other plans but to serve her this week. As I have thought about this whole scenerio, it has taught me a lesson about who Philippians 2 tells us we are to prefer in our lives. Jesus has been my perfect example of putting a side his own reputation and prefering others as better than Himself. He tells me that I am suppose to have this mind in me as it is also in Christ Jesus. But I don't live my life like that usually. Just before I left for MI, I was blatantly told this very fact. The night before I left, my sister Cherith pulled me aside and shared concerns that were bothering her about how bossy and selfish I have been in the last few weeks. I knew that I had been like that. We talked about how we both have been struggling with the same selfish problems. I admitted I was wrong and asked her forgivennes. I also told her I do desire to give that to God more and more so His Spirit will control my desires. But she also needed to see how she has been doing the same thing that she has been frustrated with me about. I pointed out to her that sometimes I might ask her to get me a drink of water because I am too lazy and selfish to do it myself. In turn, she tells me I should get it myself and is cocky about serving me. I told her that my motive for not getting my own drink of water is selfishness, and her motive for not wanting to serve me is selfishness. I did admitted that I have not made it easy for her to want to serve me because I am asking her to do something I don't want to do myself.

Since our talk, I have started reading the book Humility: True Greatness by C.J. Mahaney that Ricky gave me for my birthday (he knows I need to read it too). I called Cherith one day and told her we should both read it and be able to encourage each other in what He teaches us through it. So it has been good for me to live a week that is intended to be focused completely on someone else to realize I need to start practicing prefering others before myself everyday in my life. I am to reflect Jesus in my life, and this is exactly how he lived his life on earth. Life is not about me...even though I live like it is more times than I live like it isn't. Life is about God's glory. Part of reflecting God's glory and true character in my life is to live for others and not myself so that the world will see the way Jesus lived and died for me. Then when I tell them that He did that for them and Christians are suppose to be like Christ, they won't see a contradition to that truth in my life.