Thoughts On Humility

Dear Friends,

For today I decided to send out some “thoughts” relating to a virtue that is rapidly disappearing from our culture – humility. That may be unavoidable in a self-centered society where many people think humility is self-detrimental, or leads to being a doormat, so they reject it. Others think it means putting yourself down, or they mistake false humility for the real thing, and thus rightfully reject it – since false humility is a form of self-righteousness and thus repulsive. Still others have truly tried to be humble, not realizing that by doing so you need to focus on you – the very thing that will ensure it never happens!

So today I am putting in a plug for the restoration of true humility – especially in the Church – since without humility it is not possible to be like Christ, of whom we are told, He was “Gentle and humble of heart” (Matthew 11:29). Enjoy.

HUMILITY
"Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, in humility consider others better than yourselves."
Apostle Paul, Philippians 2:2

“The prideful person who is full of himself will never be full of the Holy Spirit.” J.F.E.

“Humility is not another word for hypocrisy. It is not pretending to be other than we are, but honestly acknowledging the truth about what we are.” John Stott

“There is good news, and better news: The good news is that there is a Messiah, the better news is that He is not you.”

“Lord, where I am wrong, make me willing to change; where I am right, make me easy to live with.” Chaplain Rich Young

“A mistake that makes you humble is better than an achievement that makes you arrogant.” Anonymous

“The church is never more in danger than when it sees itself simply as the solution-bearer and forgets that every day it too must say, “Lord, have mercy on me, a sinner.” N.T. Wright

“Are you willing to be made glad that you were wrong when you thought others were?” George MacDonald

“He who thinks he’s the most humble can know that he’s not.” J. F. E.

“The saints who are highest in God’s sight are the least in their own.” Thomas à Kempis

“Humility is a matter of an honest self-appraisal.”

“It is no great thing to be humble when you are brought low; but to be humble when you are praised is a great and rare achievement.” Bernard of Clairvaux

“True humility is, in a way, a very real despair – a despair of myself in order that I may hope entirely in God.”
Thomas Merton

“Nothing sets a person so much out of the devil’s reach as humility.” Jonathan Edwards

“God’s salvation is not for the worthy but for the humble—those who admit they are not worthy.” Tim Keller

“Moses spent forty years thinking he was somebody; then he spent forty years on the back side of the desert realizing he was nobody; and finally he spent the last forty years learning what God can do with a nobody.” D.L. Moody

“If I ever reach Heaven I expect to find three wonders there: First, to meet some I had not thought to see there. Second, to miss some I had expected to see there. Third, and the greatest wonder of all, to find myself there.” John Newton

“Before Jesus, almost no pagan author had used “humble” as a compliment… yet the Messiah who showed up wore a different kind of glory, the glory of humility.” Phillip Yancey

“A proud person going to God admitting they are proud and pursuing humility by nothing but the grace of God, is about good as we’re ever going to do at being humble.”

“At every stage of our Christian discipleship, pride is our greatest enemy and humility our greatest friend.” John Stott

“Choose to be humbled more by the unimaginable greatness and incomparable perfection of God, than by your own wretchedness and imperfection.”
Thomas Merton

“The ultimate expression of humility is not thinking poorly of yourself, it is not thinking of yourself at all.”

“It is always the secure who are humble.” G. K. Chesterton

“We all know that the 'divine glory of the ego' is socially a great nuisance. We all actually value our friends for modesty, freshness, and simplicity of heart. Whatever the reason may be, we all do warmly respect humility – when it’s in other people.” G. K. Chesterton

“Our humility before God has no value, except that it prepares us to reveal the humility of Jesus to our fellow men.”
Andrew Murray

“The truth is this: Pride must die in you or nothing of heaven can live in you. Under the banner of the truth, give yourself up to the meek and humble spirit of the holy Jesus… So much as you have of pride within you, you have of the fallen angel alive in you; so much as you have of true humility, so much you have of the Lamb of God within you.”
Andrew Murray

Living in His All-sufficient Grace, Pastor Jeff