Humility

Well, greetings to all this evening in the precious name of Jesus. It's a blessing to be here. Um, it was a blessing to hear about your trip to Sac Guatemala or Guatemala, and the care that the orphans are getting, that's a blessing. Then this evening we had a time for the children's lesson or for the children right in the service here. I remember years ago somebody complaining, you know, about the idea in a sacred service you pause and have time for the children, and my response was, "Well, Jesus had time for the children." So to me that's very Christ-like, and I've always embraced the idea of, uh, doing a children's lesson.

Well, a couple weeks ago, one evening my phone rang, and I to-took the call. It was Elon Weaver, and, um, it was a blessing to get a call from him. I felt honored that he called me. Well, it, it didn't take long till he asked me if I would do a favor, if he could ask a favor of me, and I guess a little caution for each of you b you know, of course I wanna do a favor for Elon Weaver, you know, a kind brother, but it doesn't matter how kind a brother is, just a little caution, uh, before you make too big of a commitment. First ask maybe what the favor is.

Well, then he went on to say, "Would you humble yourself and come and have a message at church Sunday evening?" Well, for me, I don't I'm not sure what his thought process was about humbling himself. I, I guess he's probably known me for close to 20 years, but there's a struggle that I have you may have not known, what, uh, a personal struggle, and I don't just talk to everybody about it, but I struggle with stage fright. So I appreciate your prayers.

And, and another, uh, hurdle I've had in life that I have battled with was I didn't do well in school. Um, my older sisters taught us younger siblings in school, and the truth of the matter is we didn't wanna be taught by them, and they didn't wanna teach us. So you have chaos at hand, and I since then have apologized to my older sisters, uh, for things we've done, and I've also had regrets that I didn't get a better education.

So stage fright, doing bad in school, are two weaknesses that I have and struggles that I have in life, uh, but I've had to face those struggles and, um, humbly crucify self and, um, yeah, and, and I wanna come as a humble servant to all of you here tonight.

Um, and what I would like to talk about tonight is humil- humility, and humility is a really big word, I guess, or a big subject. Humility has a way of feeding into every aspect of our life, doesn't it? It really whether we're a humble person or a pride person, it's like the two opposites. Like, um, the idea of being around a humble person to me sounds like an a-a-appealing thought, but the idea of being around a proud person sounds repulsive, doesn't it?

Um, but humility and pride can I don't know, maybe surface themselves. Like, proud people maybe can learn how to still cope in life and not drive everybody away from them. But, um, but just over the years, uh, allowing that work of humility to work in myself and all that, I, I, I guess it just has meant more and more to me over the years.

I'd like to read a p-poem here. Uh, the title is, "I'm Broken to Be More." It's no doubt that to feel pain is mandatory, but to feel the suffering is not only an option but also a choice. In heartbreak, suffering, and pain, remember that being broken is humility. So I choose to be broken in humility.

It takes a broken soil to give a crop of life. Don't worry nor remain in despair while going through breakings. Instead of crying for a lighter load, just ask for a stronger back to carry the load. So I choose to be broken in humility.

It takes humility to accept that your heart has been broken, just as it takes broken clouds to give rain and bring a new hope to the huge masses. So I choose to be broken in humility. Indeed, broken grains give bread.

Broken bread gives strength. Likewise, God uses broken people to make great things. So I choose to be broken in humility. Uh, I, I like this. I mean, we see the idea of, uh, we all like rain. If we wouldn't have rain, we wouldn't have moisture in the soil. So the idea of a broken cloud giving us rain and blessing us so richly with that moisture, and the idea of a grain, uh, grain being, um, broken grain giving bread, um, so we have food to eat, and then broken bread giving us nourishment and strength. Um, so God chooses also to use broken people to do great things. So that's, I guess, my heart through life. Life has its struggles.

Life has its challenges. Uh, but to take a h-humble approach in life, um, has become more and more meaningful to me over the years. Uh, maybe just a little story here of something I've encountered. Um, I would I would say it was a number of a few years into our marriage, my wife one time asked me she said, "May I ask you a question?"

And yes, sure. Then she asked me, "Why is it after a conflict that, um, she ha always has to be the first one to apologize bef like, say sorry before I say I'm sorry?" And, you know, I, I, I didn't feel like I was doing anything intentional, and it was working, you know, things were working in our marriage.

Obviously, it needs some improvement, the way it sounded. Um, so as she asked when she asked me that question, it's like something I hadn't even thought about, but it's like the lights came on for me, and I knew there was a root of pride in me, not to even that I even had thought about it, but a root of pride that always had her first show humility to me before I would say show humility back to her and say that I'm sorry.

But I accepted it and, um, had opportunities since then, and I gladly took opportunities to first go to her and say I'm sorry. Um, and to me that I, I, I found joy in that. See, the life of humility is a life of joy. It's, it's, it's a joy and a freedom to walk in humility. Pride has a way of binding us up, bringing us into captivity, and making life miserable. But to me, that was a special time in my life, so simple but so special to, to make that choice of making a step towards humility. It, it enhanced it enhanced our marriage, brought us closer together, and it's just the two opposites of pride and humility.

Pride separates people. Humility brings people together, whether it's in marriage, whether it's in church relationships.

Then in, uh, John 12:24, I have some verses just wrote down here. "Most surely I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it produces much grain or much fruit much food. He who loves his life will lose it, and he who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life." Um, these verses are very special to me, uh, picturing myself or us as that grain of wheat falling to the ground and it breaking open, dying, how it brings forth fruit. It brings forth nourishment. It brings forth life to many people and blesses many. But the idea of that grain of wheat, like myself, loving my life, like protecting myself, you know, somebody treats me unkindly, I just built that show around me, and, and there's pride, and, and therefore I can't bear fruit.

I can't bless others. Um, but we're, we're told if we love our life, we will lose it. And yeah, it's just a-exciting thought of us as God's people becoming being those the fruitful people that bless many. In James 4:6, God resists the proud or God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.

Uh, the thought of being resisted by God or opposed by God, to me, it's a frightening thought. It's a scary thought. Um, I don't for me personally, I don't want that. But the thought of, uh, God's grace upon my life or God's blessing upon my life, to me, that's, that's exciting. That's appealing. That's what I want for myself and all of us as far as that goes.

Um, then I wanna read some in Philippians chapter 2, starting in verse 3. I, I wanna read some verses down through there. Um, "Let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit," or we could read it like, "Let nothing be done through strife, personal glory, or through selfishness, but in lowliness of mind, let each esteem others better than himself. Let each of you look out not only for his own interests but also for the interests of others." And to me, that's a beautiful picture, uh, as far as having that lowly mind of lowliness or mind of a humble mind and the, the idea of me esteeming others better than myself and being interested in what others are interested in rather than always be interested in what I'm interested in.

Uh, as that works out in our communities, I, I see that as a beautiful, beautiful picture there. And then if we go down to verse 5, talking about the humility of Christ there, "Let this mind be in you," or we could read it like, "Let this same attitude be in you, or let this same humble mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God but made himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bond servant and coming into likeness of men," or we could read it like, "Make but made himself of, uh, or he stripped himself of his, uh, those privileges to be equal with God and took on the form of a slave, uh, and gave himself for the human family."

Um, what a what a blessing. Verse 8, "And being found in the appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross or the extreme death of the cross with a slow, painful death." So there we have Christ, the perfect picture of humility, being equal with God, God, and just humble kept humbling himself, clear down to even the way he died, that extreme, painful, slow death on the cross. He totally gave himself for us. In verse 9, um, what happens then, "Therefore God also has highly exalted him and given him the name which is above every name." So here he humbles himself. Now his name is above every name. "That at the name of Jesus, every knee should bow of those in heaven and of those on earth and of tho-those under the earth.

That every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father." What a what a beautiful picture of Jesus humbling himself, you know, the whole way through, down through it, and God just exalting him and giving him the name that is above every name. "And every tongue will confess that he is Lord for the glory of God." Now verse 12, uh, coming back to us again, um, "Therefore, my beloved, as, as you have al-always obeyed, not as in my presence only but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear untrembling. For it is God who works in you both to will and to do to will and to do for his good pleasure."

So as I think about ourselves, I know in myself, uh, even though God has dealt with me has dealt with pride in myself, I know as long as I live, there, there's gonna be more things to deal with, whether it's pride or selfishness and the idea of that salvation working in us, working, working it out in us with fear untrembling and, and the idea that we put our faith in God and it's God's grace and God's blessing that allows us to be salvaged and, and deal with those things that are carnal and not righteous in us. But may, may that may, may there be a fear and a trembling and yeah, just realizing the need, needs that we have in our lives and hearts.

Then verse 14, "Do all things without complaining and disputing that you may become blameless and harmless children of God without fault in the midst of this crooked and perverse generation among whom you shine as lights in, in, in, in the world." So I, I'm getting this beautiful picture of Christ's redemption, uh, salvaging us, uh, and, and God's people becoming this beautiful picture being salvaged, you know, walking in humility, um, being this light to the world in this dark, perverse generation that we're in. And, um, you know, thinking about everything that's happening in the world, uh, you know, a lot of corruption, uh, people becoming more secular, church attendance declining, um, people inventing all kinds of ideas, you know, you know, even ideas of not, not getting married, staying single, the loneliness in this world, the depression that's on the rise, suicide that's on the rise, just a lot of darkness in our land, and it seems like it's, it's gotten worse, um, over the last number of years.

Um, a lot of despair. But I would say this is one of my little pet talks. You can exhort me if you want. Uh, but probably what bothers me about as much as anything is when I talk about some of these things, the feedback I get from, you know, Christian people, you know, almost like loss of hope. Like, nobody wants to hear today, you know, hear the gospel, you know, and people just wanna take their own route. But as I think about this beautiful like if we lose hope as God's people in this world, who's gonna bring hope to the loss and dying? I guess is my question.

I suppose God could use a donkey, you know, again, but his desire is to use us to be this light to this dark, depressed, broken world that we live in. Um, so it's a cry in my heart. I, I guess I get kinda excited about the thought of the possibilities. We, we, we haven't exhausted the possibilities of how God can use us, uh, to reach this loss and dying world. And I guess the whole picture of humility, being this light, it, it, it'll be a testimony. As the world gets darker, we'll shine brighter, and I'm, I'm optimistic that, um, yeah, the, the, the abilities or the hope that we can bring to this world is there, and we, we should not lose hope.

We should have courage and, and, um, um, yeah, be that light and not, not definitely not give up. Um, so a couple more verses I'm gonna read here. I wrote them down, um, to go along with humility. Luke 14:11, "For whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and he, he who humbles himself will be exalted." And we saw that perfect picture of Christ humbling himself and God exalting him.

Uh, beautiful. Then in Micah 6:8, "He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. What does the Lord require of you? To act justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God." Beautiful verse. And I'd like to read another poem here.

Um, "Jesus, the humble Savior." Jesus is the humble Savior sent from God above who laid aside his garments to show us how to love. He girded himself with a towel and washed his disciples' feet to set the example of humility and to always take the back seat. Jesus told us that we should also do the same as he too served as he too served one another cheerfully, so happy we would be. Then John 13:17, "If you know these things, happy are ye if you do them." So that's pretty much what I had to share tonight and I guess some things on my heart that I've been working on and pondering on and my desire for all of us together to, uh, um, yeah, be a be a blessing to each other and to be a blessing to the world we live in and to be a light and assault.

So God bless each one of you. Thanks for having me.