Do you ever have one of those days when you don't have an organized set of thoughts to write but you just write something down anyway? Well, today is one of those days. Hopefully you can take something valuable away from all of this.

It is not godly or humble to deflect compliments directed at you and say, "God did it." Yes, it's important to praise and give thanks to God for enabling you to accomplish what you have, but it is not sinful or prideful to accept a compliment from someone or to recognize your own contribution. Having a humble attitude means having a true understanding of who you really are. That involves being aware of your strengths and weaknesses.

Downplaying your strengths or exaggerating your weaknesses is not humility. Insecurity can oftentimes stem from a failure to recognize one's own weaknesses. Fearing what one might discover can be attributed to being too focused on one's weaknesses to appreciate one's strengths. Being sensitive to both is crucial to developing a healthy view of oneself.

How we pray reveals what we believe about God, ourselves, and how He orders the universe. You could almost say that prayer is in the domain of practical theology. This could be understood as the practical outworkings of one's theological beliefs about a variety of issues in the circumstances of one's life.

For example, you might pray for agnostic to come to Christ. Based on your evangelistic endeavors you tell him of his responsibility to repent of his lifestyle and submit to the will of God, as opposed to praying for God to use your attempts to persuade him of the gospel through evidence (not that the two above approaches are mutually exclusive). Is God interested in persuading the unbeliever as a way to draw them to Himself? Your answer could potentially impact this person in how you pray for his salvation.

How you go about disagreeing with someone could potentially say a considerable deal about your character for a few reasons. One, it can show whether you have discerned the issue as a complex matter or perhaps too simplistically. Suppose you believe the earth is only six thousand years old and are speaking with someone who, as a committed Christian believes the earth is much older than that and express your disagreement by saying, "You just haven't read Genesis 1 and 2!"

If there are hermeneutical arguments that biblical scholars use for Genesis 1 and 2 while disagreeing on whether it teaches young or old earth, the issue could be much more complicated than simply telling someone they should "read what the Bible says." A failure to recognize a complex divisive topic can cause conversations to shut down in a hurry.

Second, whether you carefully consider what the other person says as opposed to constantly looking for an opportunity to quickly respond with rejoinders, or dismiss what he or she says is also an indicator of your character. Perhaps you are overly confident in what you believe and have perhaps exaggerated how well supported your sources are. I will admit that I can do this in regard to certain matters. Having thoughtful critics is a good thing to have because it keeps me in check.

In short, being humble means you have an accurate self-understanding: knowing and acknowledging your strengths and weaknesses. Sometimes you might have to evaluate what your beliefs about God and yourself are and see if they properly align with Scripture. Reason and your experiences in light of how you pray are the results or lack thereof that have come about.

Lastly, sometimes it is good to step back and ask yourself whether you listen well to people you disagree with and whether you are committed to truth, or simply guarding your beliefs from evaluation. It is much easier said than done, but it is something that all believers must do regardless of how difficult it can oftentimes be.