Humility is defined by Webster’s Dictionary as “the quality or condition of being humble; of modest opinion or estimate of one's own importance or rank”. In today’s society America humility and being humble is downplayed and often straight up ignored. Being an individual and being all you can be as a person negates any teaching a person has received regarding humility unless continually practiced. We as followers of Christ must all humble ourselves before God because of His instructions and benefits that are described in 1 Peter chapter five verses five through seven. The benefits God grants us for being engulfed in humility is that He grants grace to those in humility, He lifts off anxiety, and He will exalt His people in His timing. The book of 1st Peter was written by the Apostle Peter from Rome to dispersed Christians throughout what is currently known as Asia Minor. Having seen humility from the perfect example in Jesus, Peter is able to make these claims with firmness and authority.
The first benefit of humbling oneself before God is that He grants grace to those in humility. Look at Joseph back in the book of Genesis. Joseph was the favorite of Israel over all of the rest of Jacob’s sons. This brought jealousy to Joseph’s brothers who despised him and wanted him dead but ended up selling him into slavery. Now Joseph had little in his control and had to stay humble as a slave, but through his humility and trusting in God, he ascended all the way up to the second most powerful person in the nation of Egypt, behind only the Pharaoh. Romans 13:1 says to stay subject to governing authority because they are put in place by God and He is the one who gives authority. At times it will be hard to submit and live in submission humbly when you don’t agree or things they say or asking in supporting them but it must be done, for God commands.
The second benefit of humbling oneself before God is that He will lift off your anxiety. Many people, being prideful in nature, hold on to things much longer than they should. Small daily tasks that don’t seem of much importance in the overall scheme of things end up being taken care of from the person’s side of things because they feel as though they can handle and take care of them. These then begin to pile up on each other until all of the small things turn into this huge ordeal that is overwhelming and THEN they bring it before God because they were proven wrong with their ability to take care of things themselves. Take a stick for example. Not very big and if lit on fire it will go out fairly quickly and with minimal flame or heat. But stack a lot of sticks in a pile that are lit and you get a huge fire. It’s only once this out of control fire is light that we call on God, our firefighter/Savior, to put out the fire and calm things down. The truth though is that before we even light that first stick we need to have God (firefighter) there with us to control the flames and keep everything from going out of control. In Matthew 11:28 God is calling us, wanting us to go to Him and give up the burdens and stresses of this life and give them to him, but to do this we must make ourselves submissive to God and come before Him with knee bent, humble in His presence.
The third benefit is that God will exalt his people in His timing. We must understand with this that God’s plan and timing is perfect. No ifs, ands, or buts. Even those in tuned to God’s plan and will in their lives must understand God’s timing, which can be quite different from the timing the individual envisions. In Peter’s second letter he says this, “But do not forget one thing, my dear friends! There is no difference in the Lord's sight between one day and a thousand years; to him the two are the same” (2 Peter 3:8). Humbling before God in His timing will allow Him to use you in the greatest way possible to affect his Kingdom. It also says in Deuteronomy 32:4 that the Lord is perfect and just in all his ways. These assurances are to be kept close to the heart and not easily forgotten when times become troubled or unexpected. In Philippians 2 Paul shows Christ’s example of humility throughout his entire lifetime with coming to the world in human flesh, and going through trials resulting in death though that’s not entirely what he wanted (Matthew 26:39). While in the moment Christ was suffering, he knew the plan God had for him and that he needed to go through with it for all of mankind.
Therefore, we all must humble ourselves before God because of the benefits Peter describes in his first letter, specifically chapter five verses five through seven. The benefits God grants us for being humble is that He grants grace to those in humility, He lifts off anxiety, and that He will exalt His people in His timing. We must continue in the footsteps of Christ and remain humble in all situations no matter the circumstance. This may be in regards to a family member, significant other, or employer. This is as simple as listening to their instructions or requests and following through with a servant heart knowing it is what must be done.
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