Day 17 | February Devotional from Psalms - "The Blessings of Confidence in God. The Peril of Self-Confidence."

Sunday, February 17, 2019 Bryan Hudson 0 Comments




Psalms 71:5 For you have been my hope, Sovereign LORD, my confidence since my youth.

Confidence is an important part of life and an important part of your life. Confidence is part of your way forward and upward. We all have our understanding of confidence.

There are basically two kinds of confidence: 1) Confidence in the Lord and in what he has given you. 2) Self-confidence.

The first kind of confidence makes you strong and allows room to make you stronger. The second kind of confidence is limiting because it depends on what you think of yourself. Self-confidence gets mixed up with self-esteem.

True confidence comes from skill. Skill comes from training and repetition. The advantage we have in Christ is that we always trust in a power greater than ourselves. Like Paul said, “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” (Philippians 4:13) 

What we cannot say is, “I can do all things through myself.” Here's a fictional scenario:

Imagine both pilots on a flight becoming incapacitated and the head steward making this announcement: “We have an emergency! Both of our pilots are unconscious, can anyone here fly an airplane?”  Someone raises his hand and says, “I can do it! I don't have pilot training, but I have confidence!” 

Proverbs 14:16b says, "...A fool rages and is self-confident."

That kind of confidence is just happy talk. You never need someone who only has self-confidence. You need someone who has confidence in skills that they actually possess. As believers, we need confidence in the strength of God through Christ. Strength is not a mindset, it is actual ability.


Reflection Question: In what ways do you need to move away from self-confidence to confidence in God and in actual skills?

Today’s action item based on insight: