Adjectives
Posted in English, gifts, Nick's Posts, Pride 0 comments
Adjectives are words that describe something. A person can be old or young, short or tall,
nice or mean, silly or serious, etc.
Objects can be red, orange, yellow, green, blue, or purple, and they can
be square, circular, or triangular.
When we look at the adjectives that describe people, we find
that many of them are subjective; they only work when the person being
described can be compared to other people.
When you call a person tall, you’re not truly saying that they are tall;
you are saying that they are tall compared to others. If they were not taller than others, you
would not describe them as tall. This is
the case of many (but not all) of the adjectives that we use to describe
ourselves.
There are a few points I want to make with this.
Firstly, God gives everyone gifts and He delights in
variety. If you want to know of several
ways that God delights in you, simply compile a list of adjectives about
yourself. Some people are funny, witty, and
popular. Others may be shy, smart, and
introverted. These traits are neither
good nor bad. God uses all of them and He
delights in all of them.
Picture a scale with one trait on one end and its opposite
on the other end (i.e. short/tall, serious/silly,
introverted/extroverted). God didn’t
make us all the same. That would be
boring and we’d probably drive each other crazy. God took all of those scales and he chose
what would make up you – the unique combination that would make you special.
We sometimes look at these traits that God has given us and
assign values to them. Maybe we think it’s
better to be tall than short or better to be popular than shy. But God doesn’t view it that way. He doesn’t make anything second rate. To illustrate my point, consider Down
Syndrome. Many people consider Down
Syndrome to be some horrible disease, but you know what? I don’t know that I have ever seen a person
with Down Syndrome who was not smiling.
I wish to God that I was that happy.
What a blessing.
My second point is this: since adjectives are used to
compare ourselves to others, we need to be cautious that we do not become
prideful. We all have some trait or
skill that exceeds other people. If you
want to keep your pride in check, just change who you’re comparing yourself to. Instead of comparing yourself to others,
compare yourself to God. Now what
adjectives can be used to describe you?
Certainly nothing flattering.
Lastly, there are some adjectives that don’t require
comparisons. You can describe a tomato
as red without comparing it to a carrot.
When these adjectives are used with people, they describe our shared
humanity. We have all been sad, afraid,
worried, and defeated and we have all been happy, courageous, calm, and
victorious. We need to never forget that
we are all God’s children. We are all
sinful and need Jesus Christ.
Who knew that there was so much we could learn from a single
type of word?
