My Belt

I felt very pleased with myself.  I have not been trying to lose weight, but my pants were getting a little looser.  I’ve been working on a pergola on Mowbray Mt. sweating a lot and my pants keep slipping down.  Not a good thing when I’m climbing up and down a ladder hoisting up one end of a 2X8 beam.  I tried to tighten my belt up one hole, but it was just too tight to work (and breathe).  So, last night, I got out my leather punch and made a hole half-way between where my pants sag and where I can’t breathe.  When I tried the new belt hole, it felt good.  Really good.  But as I was punching the hole, I noticed that my solid leather work belt was all wet with sweat.  And, since it had been wet for a couple of days, it had stretched.  My old 38” belt had stretched to 38 1/2” and the new hole that I had made was at the new 38” location.  I was so disappointed that I had not lost any weight.  Hey, if I had used the scales to check my weight instead of my belt, I would have known the truth, because the scales are more accurate than the belt.  Let me make an application: there are times that I feel pretty good about myself.  Someone brags about me and my head swells with pride.  But if I compare myself with the Bible - God’s standard - I’m not all that good.  Isaiah summed things up accurately in Isaiah 64:6, “But we are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags; and we all do fade as a leaf; and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away.”  Others may think that Gerald is a good man, but God knows my heart.  God knows the truth.  Hey, how about you?  Do you use the wrong measuring tool to calibrate your goodness?  Are you using the stretchy belt of human comparison instead of the accurate scale of the Word of God?  Take a moment to come clean before God … and have a good day today.