5-Minute Trekker's JournalSample

IN EVERY CORNER OF THE WORLD

A father often will express pride in his son or daughter, and a worker will be proud of a task well done, but this is not the pride of "a haughty spirit," nor is it the pride that "goes before destruction." The seeds of the pride that kills can be found in the earliest chapters of Genesis, where the serpent persuades Eve to defy God's warning not to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. The serpent tells her that if she eats of this tree, she "will be like God" (Genesis 3:5). Both Adam and Eve make themselves number one by defying God. By wanting to be like God, they deny their own human nature as created by God and fall into the self-consciousness of self-love.

The pattern was set at the very beginning of human history: with man's disastrous tendency to deny God by exalting self. The so-called agnostics may not be certain about the existence of God, but they sure put a huge emphasis on themselves. They repeat the self-destructive mistake of our earliest ancestors.

When you defy God, you deny God and thereby make yourself into a false god to fill the void. It is hard to miss this, for evidence abounds on every street in every city in every corner of the world.

Journal your thoughts and feelings on today's readings.

Spend time in prayer about what you wrote down.