The Church of Eleven22 - S02E07 - Humility Toward One Another

Episode Date: May 24, 2021

This week Pastor Joby dives into what the Bible says about humility in Philippians 2:3 and 1 Peter 5. "If we've been infected with the gospel, one of the ways it plays itself out is the way we treat one another and are humble toward one another."

Welcome to deepen with Pastor Joby Martin. The Church of 1122 is a movement for all people to discover and deepen a relationship with Jesus Christ. And we're praying this message helps you deepen your relationship with him. Now let's dive in. Hey church family, welcome to the Deepen Devo. If you got your Bibles, we're going to end up in 1st Peter chapter 5. First Peter chapter 5. You know, this weekend we were in John chapter 3.

And once again, John the Baptist shows up. and in a pretty remarkable situation, just as a recap, Jesus has begun to baptize people in the Jordan and the followers of John the Baptist are jealous, insecure. And they go to John the Baptist and they go, hey man, Jesus is stealing all of our people. What are we going to do about this? And John the Baptist is basically, of course he is. Of course. Guys, this is what I have been talking about. that the point of my life is to point people to Jesus. And then he goes on to ultimately say, listen, it is not about me.

It's all about him. And then he says this line, which is really, really famous, he must increase and I must decrease. And again, I talked about it this weekend, but I think most of us that are Jesus followers, we're super cool with the he must increase part. I don't know how much time we spend on it, but we must decrease.

Because I think what we want is he must increase, and while you're increasing, how about increase me too? But that's not what John the Baptist says. He says, he must increase and I must decrease. Which leads me to one of the one another's that I'd like to share today. First Peter, chapter 5, verse 5 says this, clothe yourself with humility towards one another. clothe yourself with humility towards one another.

Now, I've often used this definition of humility, that humility is not thinking less of yourself, it's thinking of yourself less. And while I've always loved that definition, I think I heard Rick Warren say it the first time maybe. When I look at what John the Baptist said, it doesn't really jive with this definition of humility. Because John the Baptist is seeming to say the opposite.

He is saying, he must increase and I must decrease. And so here's what I know for humility to take root in your life is that you have to have an understanding of the gospel of Jesus Christ. You have to have an understanding that we brought nothing into our salvation except the sin that needed to be wiped away. You see, when we come to the cross of Jesus Christ and we surrender our lives to Christ, two things should simultaneously happen as we continuously deepen our relationship with Jesus Christ.

One is that our understanding of the glory of God, of the majesty of God, of the magnificence of God, our understanding must everly increase bigger and bigger and bigger that he is more beautiful than we ever knew. He is more wonderful than we ever knew, that his glory is more outstanding than we could ever imagine. and our understanding of his glory needs to increase. And then simultaneously, our understanding of our own sinfulness, our own depravity, our own ego, our own shallowness, our own pride, our understanding of what wretched, black-hearted sinners we are should also grow. And so the gap between the glory of God and our sinful situation gets bigger and bigger and bigger

and in so doing, the only thing that can continuously fill that gap is the cross of Jesus Christ. Now, the moment you put your faith in Jesus Christ, you were saved forever, you are being sanctified until the day you die, and one day I promise you will be glorified. But in the meantime, from this breath to that breath, one of the things that should happen in the life of the growing believer is a growing humility, a growing understanding of who you are, a growing understanding of who God is, a growing understanding of how incredible that gap is, which leads to a growing understanding of the ever-increasing gospel in your life to fill that gap. So I think this is where Peter is coming from in 1. Peter, Chapter 5, when he says that we are to clothe ourselves with humility towards one

another, that if we've been infected with the gospel, then one of the ways that it plays itself out is the way we treat one another and the way that we are humble towards one another. So go to First Peter chapter five, pick it up in verse five. And one of the things that Peter does here is Peter gives us like four or five ways in order to be humble. Because when you, when you are commanded to be humble or to clothe yourself in humility, the real question is, how? How do you do it? Because humility is not really a feeling. It's not a personality type. I think sometimes we, I think we equate humility with like a, just like a quiet life, you know, somebody that's not very loud. You're like, oh, they're so humble. And maybe they're not

humble at all. Maybe they're just grit with fear, so they never talk out loud. And sometimes we can see somebody that's loud and boisterous in the life of the party and think, well, that person's not humble at all because they're talking out loud all the time. So it's not a personality type. humility is more of, it's more of a posture. It's not something that you just feel. Humility is a posture that you take. And so, Peter says it this way. Likewise, you who are younger, be subject to the elders. So one thing Peter tells us in how to be humble is that a humble person submits to authority. That's right. a humble person submits to authority. And the reason as believers that we are called to submit to authority

is because we're image bearers of God, and God in and of himself is a perfectly submitted love relationship. God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, all submitting themselves to one another. And Jesus, the author and the perfector of our faith, he was submitted to the will of our Father. You see? Because it takes humility to be submitted to someone.

and it's not submission until you don't like it. Submission isn't submission until somebody in authority over you tells you to do something that you don't want to do. Because if you agree with it, it's just convenience. Listen, if the U.S. government passed the law right now and said, from this day forth, you will eat tacos on Tuesday. I would say, praise God. I would have no problem submitting to that authority because it does not take submission for me to eat tacos. I would eat tacos all the rest of the Tuesdays of my life is just convenient. But when somebody in authority over you tells you to do something that you may not necessarily want to do, then it takes a great humility to say, okay, I'm going to do it your way. Likewise, you who are younger, be subject to the elders.

And then he says, clothe yourselves, all of you, with humility towards one another. Now, think about when you get dressed, okay? When he says, clothe yourselves, if you were to change clothes, what do you have to do? I don't think about this too much, but just a little bit. You got to take off what you have on, and you got to put on something you don't have. This is what he is saying. If you are not a humble person, and by nature, I don't think any of us are, okay? It only happens when we're rooted in the good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Then there are some things we have to take off. We have to take off our ego. We have to take off our pride. we have to take off our, I've got this, the ideas that we think that we are a self-made man or woman. We have to take off those kinds of things, take off arrogance, and then we have to put on something that we do not currently have on. We have to put on submission. We have to put on a perspective that everything we have is a blood-bought grace gift from Jesus Christ. So he says, clothe yourself, all of you, with humility towards one another. Four, and then he's going to make

an incredible statement here, for God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble. Let me just ask you a question. Do you want God's opposition or grace? If you want God's opposition in your family, if you want God to be against you at work, if you want God's opposition at school, no problem, just be proud. That's right. Point every conversation to you. Make sure you get credit for everything you have done, and you will assuredly have God on the other side of you opposing you, or do you want God's grace in whatever endeavor you're stepping into?

At work, at home, at school? Well, if you want His grace, then position yourself in humility. Verse 6, he says, humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God. Okay, again, humble yourself. I think what he's saying here is that humility, it's not really, it's not an attitude as much as it is a posture. In Philippius chapter two, Paul is going to say that your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus, who being in very nature God did not consider equality with God, something to be grasped, but he stepped out of heaven, he became obedient, he dressed himself in human flesh,

and he was obedient even unto death. And right before Paul tells us that in Philippians 2, he tells us that we should consider others as better than ourselves. That's what our attitude should be. That's what our thought process should be. Now, he doesn't say that other people are better than you, but you should treat other people. In humility, you should treat other people as if they are a bigger deal than you, as if they are more important than you. And every single one of us have done this. Have you ever been to a wedding?

Yes. You get in line to shake the hands of the groom and the bride. right? That day, you treat them as if they're a bigger deal than you because that day they are. Humility is posturing yourself under the mighty hand of God and treating other people as if they are a bigger deal than you are. This is how we humble ourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God, so that at the proper time he may exalt you. So, first of all, you put on humility, you posture yourself in humility, you submit to other people. then in verse seven, he gives us the second way to be humble. He says, casting all your anxieties on him.

Casting all your anxieties on him. Sometimes the reason that we lack humility is because, instead of taking our anxieties and casting it upon them, we take our anxieties and we let them define us. Instead of trusting God, we put our faith in our trust in our circumstances. And when our circumstances aren't going well, then we think we've got to pull ourselves up by our bootstraps, become a self-made man, and we've got to do something to change it.

What Peter is saying is, when circumstances are tough, you grab those circumstances and you cast them on Him, on Jesus, because he cares for you. That security in Him leads towards humility to one another. That security in Him points us to humility towards one another. You know why? Because when you know that your Heavenly Father, got you. Then you don't have to be, you don't have to prove yourself to this world anymore.

And you don't have to be haughty. Hey world, look at me. But you can say, you can be humble and say, how good has God been to me. Then he goes on to say, another way to be humble is don't be ruled by your emotions, because your emotions will tend to put you at the center. He says, be sober-minded. He goes on to say, be watchful. That means pay attention. And so in regards to humility, I would say pay attention to your self-talk. Pay attention. When you're in a group, do you always feel like you have to one-up everybody's story? Do you always have to insert you into the situation?

When you're with other people, do you tend to celebrate what God is doing in their life? Or criticize everything about them? Pay attention. Why? Because your adversary of the devil prows around like a roaring lying, seeking someone to devour. And the Bible has already told us that if God opposes the proud, then guess what? Then the one that the enemy is going to devour is that proud one that says, forget you, I don't need you, I've got this. I've told you this a million times.

If you've ever watched Animal Planet and the lion is prowling around, the lion is always looking for the one that is outside of the herd, the weak one, the isolated one. And oftentimes pride leads to isolation because you can begin to think, I don't need any people in my life, I've got this. And that is nothing but pride talking. And pride leads to isolation, and isolation leads to you being picked off by a roaring lion. Do you have people in your life that can lean into you? and say, here you go, you need to clothe yourself in humility. You're making this about you.

You're speaking with a lot of ego and pride. Why don't you take off the ego and why don't you put on some humility? So, church, may you clothe yourself in humility towards one another. May you do whatever it takes to put pride away because God opposes the proud and he gives grace to the humble. Let's pray. Father in heaven, Lord, we thank you, and we praise you for the testimony of John the Baptist. God, we thank you for such a humility of a man that had a growing brand, had a growing platform, had all kind of people surrounding him, telling him he was the next thing.

And yet, all he wanted to do with his life is point people to Jesus. Lord, I pray that through the power of the Holy Spirit and the realization of the gospel truth in our life, that we could echo John's prayer. that He, Jesus, must increase and we must decrease. God, I pray that when we come in contact with people in our day-to-day lives, when they walk away, don't be talking about Jesus and not us. Lord, we thank you for your grace. We pray this in Jesus' sake.

Amen. Thank you for joining us for Deepen with Pastor Jobi Martin. If you're looking for additional resources to help you further deepen your relationship with Jesus Christ, visit co-e-22.com slash resources. We're praying this message you heard today helps you experience God in a unique and fresh way. And as always, be free.