Lego My Ego

On Sunday June 25th, 1876 in a remote region of what is now Montana, General George Armstrong Custer looked down upon a large village of Sioux Indians. A few days earlier when he left Fort Lincoln he was advised to take a gatling gun and 2 cannons with him to engage the Indians. But he was General Custer, and this was the elite 7th Calvary.

So at 3:05pm on a hot Sunday afternoon, Custer and his elite looked down on a large Indian village and what appeared to be very few men. What he didn’t realize is that the 100 or so warriors of this village had joined an alliance of thousands led by none other then Crazy Horse himself. They were waiting just over the next ridge.

On the way to the battlefield his trusted Indian scouts came back with the report. The few hundred warriors he saw were actually thousands he didn’t see. Custer undaunted simply replied, “HOGWASH.”

Custer pointed his sword towards the village and said, “We caught them napping boys. Attack!”

Less than 2 hours later a terrified and badly wounded remnant of 42 soldiers took a defensive posture to try fight off the relentless attack. Using dead horses as breast works a few watch helplessly as their fellow soldiers were killed and mutilated by their hated Indian enemy. In the midst of blood, brains, gun smoke and war hoops, the 42 (including Custer), were stripped naked and mutilated without mercy at a place forever known as “Little Big Horn.”

Nobody can understand the terror that these last few survivors felt. All because of the EGO of one man.

Webster defines the word ego as “an exaggerated sense of self-importance.” The Bible defines it as a recipe for certain destruction. Isaiah 5:21 says, “Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes, and prudent in their own sight!”

The Bible is full of people with unbelievable egos. Pharaoh for example had people full time that did nothing but made sure that no one looked at him in the face. If they found anyone looking at him they would burn their eyes out with red-hot pokers.

Imagine then the audacity as God sent a nobody by the name of Moses to stand in Pharaoh’s courtroom, point his finger in Pharaoh’s face and say, “God says, ‘Let my people Go!”

Our lives are full of people with unbelievable egos. Since we can’t change the hearts of anybody around us, we might do well to just work on our own. Walking humbly is absolutely essential to longevity.

Have you noticed that lazy people have great egos? King Solomon wrote in Proverbs 26:16 “The lazy man is wiser in his own eyes than seven men who can answer sensibly.”

Ego is all about self-preservation. Ego and faith do not mix. You can’t be full of ego and have a heart for other people. You can’t be really happy and selfish at the same time. So the next time an exaggerated sense of self-importance comes flying out of your toaster, make yourself let go of that ego.

Proverbs 16:18 “Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall.”