Humility
Matthew 23:12, “And whoever exalts himself shall be humbled, and whoever humbles himself shall be exalted.”
Humility is probably the hardest character trait that God teaches for us to grasp. Humility is a slap in the face to us because we think that it goes against everything that we have ever learned or been taught.
We live in a dog eat dog world, and we believe that the only way that we can get on top is to make others look worse than us. Nine times out of ten we don’t care if we do better work than others as long as we look like we do better.
Somehow this idea of being better and looking better than others has gotten confused in our mind with the idea of humility. In reality they have nothing in common. Doing good work and taking pride in how you appear to others is something that God ordained. God’s work is perfect! (Deuteronomy 32:4) Therefore, since we are His representatives we should try, and do as well as we can. A line from one of my favorite movies comes to my mind. I like Mel Gibson movies, they are very MANLY, and the line comes from his movie, “The Patriot”. British General Cornwallis was talking to the bad guy (can’t remember his name?) but Cornwallis said, “You work for me, and the manner in which you do your job reflects on me.” As Christians, we work for God, and how we do our jobs reflects on Him. In other words, people will often see in our work how good our relationship is with God, and consider how seriously they should take God.
I got off track for a second; let me get back to humility. Humility is not trying to make yourself look bad, nor is it not acknowledging good works; it is simply saying that despite that particular good that you did there are ways that it could be better. It’s admitting that what you did, as good as it was, is not perfect, and that someone else may have been able to do it better than you did.
There are two key aspects to humility, genuine heartfelt humility. One that I discussed above is admitting that you’re not perfect; you make mistakes. A good friend of mine told me recently while we were discussing the mistakes I’ve made in the past. Everybody makes mistakes, but it’s not about the mistakes we’ve made; it’s about what we do after we make the mistakes. I believe that fits right here because that’s, I believe, the key to humility. Understanding that we’re not going to get it right all the time, but still doing what we need to do in order for God to get the glory. Because the truly humble person realizes that it’s not about them, but it’s about God; and letting Him get the praise.
The second key aspect to humility is letting others shine instead of you, and being happy for them when they do shine. This is very hard for us, as human beings. Whether we admit it or not we are all, naturally “Spotlight hogs”. We enjoy the Spotlight; we like having nice things said about us, and there’s nothing wrong with that. The problem comes in when we cannot share the Spotlight with others. We sometimes act like two year old children, and say mine, mine; mine while true humility says you take this one you deserve it more than I do. Like I said before, it’s not about us looking good, but it’s about God; and if He shines brighter through someone else for the moment then that’s all we should care about.
I invite you to look for ways that you can serve others, and let the Spotlight fall on them. I guarantee you that a sense of pride will hit you like you’ve never felt before.
“Mental toughness is humility because it behooves all of us to remember that simplicity is the sign of greatness and meekness is the sign of true strength.” ~ Vince Lombardi
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http://thebiblerevival.com/clipart/1890holmanbible/bw/jesuswashingpeter’sfeet.jpg
Yes, You Can Ministry 
