Devotional: The Comparison Game

Galatians 6: 3 For if anyone thinks he is something when he is nothing, he deceives himself. 4 But each one must examine his own work, and then he will have reason for boasting in regard to himself alone, and not in regard to another.

I watched a video this morning on comparing oneself to others and the pit falls of doing that.  It reminded me of the verse above. 

While the video had to do with comparing yourself to others and then getting down in the dumps because your life and accomplishments are not equal to or better than theirs or their life is better than yours, the Scripture above is talking about comparing yourself to others and looking at how poorly they are doing in order to pull yourself up by your own bootstraps to establish your own righteousness and/or superiority over them.

As a home-school alumni mom, I look at other people's kids and compare where they are to where mine are and I am tempted to get down in the dumps because my kids don't measure up to what the Jones' kids are doing. This is wrong!  Their kids are different.  They have their own issues that I probably wouldn't want and don't know about.  My kids are right where God wants them at this moment in time.  God knows what he is doing.  So I don't need to get down in the dumps thinking I am a home-school failure.

Then I sometimes swing the other way and compare myself with those who are not strong spiritually or don't hold the same moral values that I do and it's easy to puff myself up and point the finger (figuratively, cause it's not nice to point!) and tell myself how much better I am then they.

Either case is not good.  The balance is off.  I'm either putting myself up too high or pulling myself down too low.  Both gives me an improper view of myself, causes undue stress and is dishonoring to the God who made me. 

The solution is in the meme above.  I need to look into Scripture and compare myself with that.  I need to find where I need improvement, thank God for helping me in areas that I measure up and leave the comparison with others game out of it.

How about you?  Are you struggling with the comparison game?  Don't look out horizontally at others.  Look vertically to God and to His Word.