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| Humility
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“Oh Lord,
it’s hard to be humble - when you’re perfect in every
way.”
So goes the lyrics from a tongue-in-cheek song by Mac Davis
that was a hit in 1980. Humility. Something we all lack from
time to time. A lack of humility has caused numerous problems
in personal relationships. It causes untold difficulties in
business and politics. Wars have been started and fought
because of a lack of humility. Many a man’s downfall can be
attributed to his lack of humility. “Pride goes before
destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall” (Prov.
16:18).
Humility is a
characteristic that for many of us is difficult to attain.
It’s something that people fail to see the absolute
importance of. And yet, it’s one of the most notable
characteristics of Christ - one that we are enjoined to have
in order to be Christ-like. Why is humility important? How
does humility make us better?
Humility
will help us in our service to others. It’s almost
impossible to serve others without humility. Oh sure, you can
do things for people and go through the motions of service,
but without humility, it’s not really service. How many
times have you been to a restaurant and had a “server”
that didn’t know the meaning of service? The problem is the
lack of attention or care the server is placing on the
customer. The customer is not as important as he/she is.
She’s had a bad day and it’s obvious - she doesn’t care
how her attitude affects you. She doesn’t think of your
needs.
But humility
puts the other person first. It thinks of the other person’s
interest ahead of your own. “Let nothing be done through
selfish ambition or conceit, but in lowliness of mind let each
esteem others better than himself” (Phil. 2:3).
Jesus is given
as the ultimate example of humility in Phil. 2:5ff. He had
every right and privilege but was willing to give all of that
up in order to serve his own creation. That’s humility.
That’s looking out for our interests, even though we
didn’t deserve it. If Jesus did that for everyone, then
shouldn’t we show humility and look for ways to serve our
fellow man for whom Christ died?
Humility
will help us put everything in proper perspective.
Pride, the opposite of humility, says “I’m perfect in
every way.” Pride is the reason for the saying, “Those
people who think they know everything are a great annoyance to
those of us who do.” And that’s true. Those of us
think we’re always right have a problem with humility. The
truth is, we’ve all been wrong before, and when it comes to
Christianity, we’ve really been wrong. We’re all sinners
(Rom. 3:23) who need the grace of God, and we must be willing
to admit this fact if we’re to have fellowship with God (1
John 1:8). Nobody is any better than anyone else. No one
deserves salvation more than anyone else. Not one of us can
count on our own works to get us to heaven.
And so, we need
to be careful when judging other people and their supposed
lack of spiritual maturity. Instead of looking condescendingly
upon them with a lack of humility on our part, we need to
realize that we all have a long way to go. While it’s
important to help our brothers and sisters grow in the
knowledge and grace of our Lord, we are not the standard -
Jesus is! It’s easy to be prideful when we compare ourselves
with someone who is not as mature as us. It’s much more
difficult to compare ourselves with the perfect, sinless
Jesus. That takes humility.
Humility
will help us in our obedience to God. At the heart of
every sin is selfishness. The sins we commit are not done
thinking of other people or of God and His will. They’re
committed because of our own selfish desires (James 1:14-15).
Ultimately, it’s a battle of the wills. Our will vs. God’s
will. Pride says, “I’m going to do what I want to
do.” Humility says, “nevertheless, not as I will,
but as You will” (Matt. 26:39). Once again, Jesus is
our ultimate example of humility. He did not desire to endure
the pain and anguish of the hour of trial. He didn’t want to
experience the suffering and the separation from His Father.
But He was willing to submit Himself to the will of His
Father.
So it should be
with us. Our Father, who created us and has every right to
expect us to follow His law, deserves our obedience. It’s
not a strange thing to expect our earthly children to be
humble and submit to their earthly father. Why should it be
strange to expect the same humility and obedience to our
heavenly Father?
When we humble
ourselves to His will, obedience naturally follows. And you
know what? It’s much easier at that point. I didn’t say
it’s easy - I said it’s much easier. There’s no doubt
about it - it’s difficult to give up what we want to do many
times. But if we first learn humility, then everything else
starts to fall into place.
Instead of
singing, “Oh Lord, it’s hard to be humble - when
you’re perfect in every way,” let’s sing, “Make
me a servant, just like your Son,” and, “Make me
a servant; take all my pride, for I would be lowly, humble
inside.” Humility. It’s where it all starts.
Marshall Reid
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Copyright (C)
2009
Southside Church of Christ
All rights reserved.
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