Jeff Adams

I recently made a great discovery. Mp3 files work for audio as well as music. I knew that. But, I really didn’t understand the practical value of that truth. You see, I live precisely 4 minutes and 30 seconds from the office, assuming no traffic problems. I like the convenience, but the down side is I have no natural time to listen to tapes, music, sermons, radio, etc. When you’ve only got four and a half minutes, what’s the point? I have a gym routine: three days of karate each week and three days of weights with 3 miles on the elliptical machine and two miles on the wave machine. To keep my sanity during the miles I listen to music. But, I recently discovered audio books on mp3. Yeah, I knew they existed; I just thought I would hate them. I love them.

I’m listening to C. S. Lewis’ Mere Christianity after having read it about 30 years ago. It’s as though I never read it. I am loving this audio version, and it’s all fresh. In fact, I’m liking this more than when I read it the first time.

Here’s my paraphrase of the latest thing I heard that I missed the first time through Mere Christianity: Pride is always competitive. Pride is always about being better, having more, or being superior to someone else. Someone who is proud always has to be better, stronger, richer, or superior to others. Let’s say you won 25 billion dollars. If you are a proud person, you could never be satisfied with that as long as there was one other person on this planet with more money than you. You would always crave more. The competitive nature of pride demands it. Pride is never satisfied with having; pride is about being better or having more.

Here’s a question. With whom are we competing and why? Consider what Paul said. Godliness with contentment is great gain (1 Timothy 6:6). So, who wins?