- Do you own your possessions or do your possessions own you?
- Who controls your life and future? You or God?
- How truly free are you?
- You should diligently aim at being free within and having self-control in every place and in all your outward actions or activities. Everything should be under you, not you under them.
- How have you merited God's gift of grace to you? What accusation can you make against God? When something bad happens to you or someone you love, can you make an accusation against God?
- What if others are loved and not you? If they are liked and not you? If they are chosen and not you?
- I am nothing. I have nothing good of myself. In everything I fall short and tend always toward nothingness. [But] when you are pleased with yourself, you are displeasing to God.
Ch. 38: Managing externals well and having recourse to God in dangers. [Manage not only our interior life but also our exterior life.] You should diligently aim at being free within and having self-control in every place and in all your outward actions or activities. Everything should be under you, not you under them. That you may be the master and ruler of your actions. You should not be a slave or hireling, but rather a free and true Hebrew (Rom 8:21). Don't allow temporal things to so attract you that you find yourself clinging to them. Take refuge in the hidden room of your heart.
Ch. 39: A person should not be obsessive about his endeavors. [Don't be fixated about what you want to do.] Always entrust your cause to God, and He will take good care of everything in its proper time. My own thinking will not take me very far. A person's true progress consists in self-denial. A person who has denied himself is quite free and safe.
Ch. 40: Man has nothing good from himself and no reason to boast. I am nothing. I have nothing good of myself. In everything I fall short and tend always toward nothingness. I am more prone to failure than progress. I give thanks to You from Whom comes all my success. As for me I am vanity and nothingness before you, a weak and unsteady human being (Ps 39:5). When you are pleased with yourself, you are displeasing to God. Let me get no credit through human praise. [In justice without grace, God should abandon me.]
Ch. 41: Despising all temporary honor. [Every honor is a temporary honor.] We lie in blindness and vanity quickly seduces us. Because I have sinned against you often and gravely, I deserve to have every creature take up arms against me. What I am owed in justice is being defeated and despised. [Pray that others be preferred and I set aside. What if others are loved and I am not? That they are liked and I am not? That others are chosen and I am not?]
Ch. 42: Do not locate your peace in human beings. If you locate your peace in any person based on your feelings or a shared life, you will find yourself unsteady and without peace. When you look at creatures you lose sight of the Creator's gaze. Learn to conquer yourself in everything for the Creator's sake. If you love or focus on something in a disordered way, then no matter how small it is, it holds you back from what is highest and contaminates.
Allow our hearts to be convicted and also to be elevated, inspired and encouraged by God.
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