A Big Deal

Throughout The Bible, God is urging people, literally and figuratively, to humble themselves and worship The Lord.  People who "don't know how to take a compliment" are perhaps more aware of the tendency to become "big headed" and stray from God.
God doesn't expect to be breathing down our necks watching over our shoulder all the time.  He knows we need that from Him, but He also knows we don't want that from Him and most of us never will.  Even in the Garden of Eden, God is not depicted that way.  God came to Adam and Eve while they were desperately trying to cover their nakedness to check on them and say "hi" but instead found them defiled by the poison of the fruit of the forbidden tree.
We need God to keep us from hurting one another, to keep us from depriving one another and being self serving.  "There are children starving in Africa" was once a famous saying given to people who threw food in the trash.  Some of that is due to government oppression and some of that is due to improper farming techniques but none of that is because someone bought a bowl of oatmeal from Starbucks and didn't finish it.  The reason people across the world continue starving is because people are selfish.  Yes, the United States and other governments that are modeled partly based on its at-the-time radical design do not mandate that The Uber Rich solve the world's problems.  The Beauty of BATMAN is not that The U.S. gov't mandated Bruce Wayne use his resources the way that he did.  The Beauty of BATMAN, and any story of a Good Samaritan that you see on the news from time to time, is that they CHOSE to do the right thing.  It's absolutely meaningless if government mandates it.  Christianity is not mandated by the US gov't because God does not want people forced into His kingdom.  God's fellowship is indeed contageous for those who have exposure to it, but there will always be those who simply refuse to partake in it and they are given a time to reconsider their decision.
Humility is not the same thing as low self esteem, but I'd argue that it's better to have a low self image than to boast about your strengths because God is sovereign and he can take away whatever accomplishments we credit ourselves with just as easily as he can dispense them.
As I noted in an earlier blog post, us with much gifted are expected to pay it forward.  I don't think I posted it in that wording, which is a paraphrase of the summary of one of Jesus' parable teachings.  I think that blog post was in regard to a parallel to The wisdom that God granted King Solomon and The knowledge that has been granted to what is now known as The Modern World.  But the point I make here is that you can't give too much.  If you accidentally overgive to God and slip on your mortgage payment, what seems like disaster may rear its head, but will ultimately transform itsself into a blessing.  The ultimate blessing however is far beyond the walls of a six story home with marble flooring and the day to day life that lives within it, with or without your continual presence.
The land will not always be a source of thorns and thistles.  It will not always demand our sweat and blood.  We will not always feel compelled to cry every so often.  You can choose to wait for proof that such Hope exists or you can take the route that C.S. Lewis and Lee Strobel did and come to the conclusions they reached and find true peace in this life as well and in turn find a way to make this world a little brighter for others too.