Skip to main content

Humble Yourself Before His Word

God demands humility of us and he will go to great lengths to teach us humility. Why? Because our sin nature, or the remnants of it, seek to fuel our pride. The sinful self will constantly tell us that we do not need God, that we are good enough - better in fact, than those around us, and smart - possessing the best knowledge. Just like Adam and Eve, we have eaten of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and we think that we are "like God."

Nowhere is this more evident than in our reading of the Bible. We have our minds fixed before we even open it's pages. Then, when and if we do decide to read the it - we comb through it looking for evidence that supports our own opinions. Because we think that God is surely like us. Surely he thinks like we think and surely he would act as we act. And this is pride, thinking that God is like us.

In Psalm 50 we read:

"For you hate discipline, and you cast my words behind you...These things you have done, and I kept silence; You thought that I was just like you; I will reprove you..." (NASB)

We must come to God's Word, the Bible, in a humble and lowly way - ready to receive his instruction. God is not like us, but we must become like him and that means letting His word teach us who God is and what we are to think about him and the world in which we live. We must humble ourselves if we are to ever draw near to God.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

The Generation of Mark 13:30

At the beginning of Mark chapter thirteen Jesus is leaving the temple area and one of his disciples points out the grandure of the temple buildings. Jesus' remark to that disciple concerns the fact that these buildings will one day be torn down. The disciples question Him further as to the times of these events, and so begins an extended teaching from Jesus on the end times.As Jesus' remarks are drawing to a close, He makes this comment in Mark 13:30: "Truly I say to you, this generation will not pass away until all these things take place." (NASB) So the reader is left to wonder the meaning of this statement. Either our understanding of generation is wrong, or we are understanding what Jesus meant by "these things" wrong. I think there are at least two solutions. The word for generation (genea: Greek) could mean, as some side column reference Bibles note, "the human race". This is possible, since the events have not all happened and the human race

Taming The Flesh Through Suffering

There are at least a dozen books in my pastoral library that deal with battling lust. It is true that this is a huge issue for men and a great source of stumbling to many men and many pastors for that matter - so on one hand I am glad they are there and I am grateful for the insight they have given to me. But I was really struck by a verse of Scripture this morning from 1 Peter 4:1b-2. "for whoever has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin, so as to live for the rest of the time in the flesh no longer for human passions, but for the will of God." Simply put, I believe Peter is telling us that those who are suffering for Christ's sake have their mind on Christ and suffering and not on the passions of the flesh. The reason so many men battle with lust and fleshly temptations (and I include myself in that group) is that our minds are far from the things of Christ. Suffering in the flesh is the direct opposite of indulging the flesh. The man who is getting lashes on his b

Is That A Bible I See Before Me?

The Weakness of Islamic Evangelism Lately I have been struck by the testimony of those who have suffered at the hands of kidnappers in Iraq. One issue that comes to the front of my mind is Islamic evangelism. Christian Science Monitor reporter Jill Carroll spoke to ABC News of her captors holding her at gunpoint and forcing her to read the Koran, which she did. After several days they asked why she had not yet converted to their beliefs. Explaining that she needed more time she continued to read. Again the question came to her about conversion. Finally and saddest of all, she told them that she would convert because she feared for her life. But this leaves us with a strange view of the Koran and the way that Islam chooses to do their evangelism. If the Koran were powerful in and of itself, those who seek to convert Christians to Islamic beliefs would not need to use guns in the process. That is, you should automatically appeal to your most powerful source. The fact that they use guns s