The freedom of admitting you’re stupid

One danger in writing these daily blogs is that it is easy to take pot shots at people. But how do you do that if you realize that you're pretty messed up yourself? How do you criticize someone else's stupidity when your life is full of dumb pratfalls? Let me tell you, look at my life and you'll I've done my share of stupid things.

There was the time as a 22 year-old when I discovered that one of the Cambodian refugees in the camp in Thailand where I was working had stolen a chicken. I balled him out in front of his friends. That was the end of my ministry to him. Ugh.

Or there was the time when, as an elder in a joint elder-deacon meeting in Florida, I threw in my two bits about the difference between elders and deacons. "Deacons basically do all the grunt work," I declared. I apologized at the next meeting.

Or there were the times when, as a young husband, I argued with my wife when I should have shut up.

We are all flawed in our own idiosyncratic way. Many of us are haunted by our mistakes. Paradoxically, admitting them frees us. Humility can be a great weapon. The next time someone tells you, "Man, that was a really dumb thing you did!" Respond by joining their argument: "Hey, you don't know the half of it! Let me tell you about what else I did that was stupid."