self-LESS

I came across a beautiful encouragement that is a must read written by Charles R. Swindoll.  See below:

SELFlessNESS 

“Douglas Southhall Freeman ends his four-volume work on Robert E. Lee with a touching scene. General Lee was wrinkled and gray and stooped over-very close to death-when a young mother came to see him with her infant cradled in her arms. When Lee reached out for her baby, she responded by placing the infant in Lee’s still-strong arms. The great general looked deeply into the child’s eyes and then slowly turned to the mother and said, “Teach him he must deny himself.”

The path to greatness in the kingdom of God will lead you through the valley of selflessness. Christlike humility will emerge on its own.” 

I could only imagine what the general was thinking when he looked deeply into the child's eyes...he must have quickly relived all of his life experiences. Perhaps all of his successes and all of his failures he accounted to when he either denied himself or when he did not deny himself. Perhaps what motivated this general's advice was remembering the pain from his failures. Nevertheless, whichever the case, at the end of this great general's life, this pearl came from his heart, “Teach him he must deny himself.”

“If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me. For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will save it.” Luke 9:23-24