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www.truthworks.com          8 MAY 03          devotion archive

HUMILITY

I tell you the Truth,

Sorry for the lack of devotions in the past few weeks.  I’ve been limited on my time lately and my email service had a hard crash and was down for a few days.

As you may or may not know, I always take a summer break from writing devotions.  These devotions were originally written to reach college students, so I try to stick to their schedules.  This will be the last devotion for this school year.

It’s strangely been a comfort to share with you during the past several months as I’ve had to deal with situations that seem to have stretched me at times.  It’s been good to hear from the countless people that have shared similar situations, offered prayers and given me encouragement.

And if you’re in the Beckley, WV area this summer, I’ll be leading the youth on Wednesday nights at Memorial Baptist for most of the summer, so please come by and spend some time with us.  Youth starts around 6:45 each Wednesday night.  Wednesday night’s rock!

Thanks again for your encouragement, support and prayers.  I love you guys!  See you all in the fall!  By the way, since November 1, 2002, Truth Works has delivered 18,995 email devotions (including this one) to people around the world.  Wow.  God is so faithful and awesome.

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humble

hum·ble [ húmb’l ]
1. modest: 
modest and unassuming in attitude and behavior
2. respectful: feeling or showing respect and deference toward other people
3. lowly: relatively low in rank and without pretensions  -of humble origins

1. make somebody feel less important: to make somebody feel less proud or convinced of his or her own importance
2. degrade: to lower somebody in rank or importance

[13th century. Via Old French (h)umble  from Latin humilis lowly (source of English humiliate), from humus earth; the underlying idea is close to the ground.]

I always like to leave you with something I find important to myself in my year-ending devotion.  Of all the attributes we as Christians are to express, humility is by far the hardest, most difficult area to conquer.  Carnal man is not a humble creature.  If anything, we are prideful, self-indulged and lack the very essence of humility.

But to ignore humility is a dangerous path to take.  As a child of God, I will either be humble or be humbled.

Luke 18:
14"I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted."

It makes no sense to the world that the humble person will be exalted.  It makes no sense that the first shall be last.  It’s just foolish thinking to the world.

But regardless of the world, God proved to us that humility is not only something that we need to seek and hold, but something that He expressed Himself through His own actions.

Philippians 2:
3
Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. 4Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.
5Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus:
    6Who, being in very nature God,
       did not consider equality with God something to be grasped,
    7but made himself nothing,
       taking the very nature of a servant,
       being made in human likeness.
    8And being found in appearance as a man,
       he humbled himself
       and became obedient to death--
          even death on a cross!

While God has no reason to be humble, He humbled Himself.  At the same time, man has no reason whatsoever to exalt himself, yet we do it all the time.

Jesus Christ was a humble servant leader.  That statement seems so ambiguous – to be a servant leader.  But that’s exactly what His actions amount to.  He became nothing in order to lead mankind out of death.

Notice in the definition above that humility comes from the word humas or earth or dirt.  Humility is not weakness.  It’s simply putting ourselves in the position of being lower than others in order that we might serve them properly.

Seek humbleness.  Do not seek to glorify yourself by your actions.  Don’t do things in order for others to stand back and be amazed at you.  Consider yourself a servant to others, so that God might be glorified in what you do.

The old saying says, “It’s hard to be humble when you’re so good at what you do.”  For that reason, we need to keep in mind that we don’t do what we do on our own.  There is a creator, a higher power that supplies all our needs.

I remind you that humility is not easy.  It goes against what most of us have been taught.  It makes little sense.

Have a great summer!  Seek His face.  Serve others.  Be humble.

Your Servant,

Randy Hunt


randy@truthworks.com
2TIM 1:7

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Copyright © 2003 Truth Works Publishing. All rights reserved.

Unless otherwise specified, all scripture quotations taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION. NIV.
Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Publishing House.
All rights reserved.

   

 


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