Good morning, Resonate. How are you guys doing? Good to see you. This is exciting.
Baptisms, you've heard about it already. I want to say happy Mother's Day to all
the mothers in the room. I wish I could be with my mom today, but she'll have to
see the video later. But shout out to you mothers. That is an awesome thing
you've done in this world. So let me start just by saying that I
know I want to stay up front to the thing I'm talking about this morning is
a bit of a touchy subject because it impacts us all and we all deal with it
and it's sometimes uncomfortable for us to engage with. But I think it's
valuable that we talk about this and engage with this topic and I think God has
something really helpful for us to say this morning. So you're gonna catch on
soon to what we're talking about, but let me start with a story about a guy
named Kanye West. Maybe you've heard of him. He's pretty popular as I hear. I'm
not much... I'm not real in on the rap game as you can probably tell by the way
I dress, but Kanye is pretty popular apparently and he's a big deal. You
probably remember the time he got up on stage and stole the mic from Taylor Swift
and said, hey I'm gonna let you finish, but Beyonce was one of the best videos
of all time as if we needed a reminder that Beyonce is awesome, right? So
Kanye is kind of known for being out there, being a little bit crazy and up
in your face, and last year he released an album called Yeezus, which is a play
on his nickname Yeezy and Jesus, right? It's pretty easy to see how he got there.
He compared himself to Jesus and he came up with Yeezus and on the album there's
a song called I Am a God and I was listening to or reading an article this
last week about this this song and people's reactions to it and people
were all up in arms about it, especially Christian community when they
started going, okay who does this guy think he is? Who does he think he is?
Comparing himself to God and so as I'm reading this article I'll just read an
excerpt from it for you and yeah we'll just we'll just start there. Kanye in
response to the critics said this, when someone says something like I am a
God, people say stuff like who does he think he is? West revealed in a recent
interview with BBC, I just told you who I thought I was, a God. I Am a God is a
song featured on his recent album Yeezus. The voiceist rapper revealed that the
song's inspiration came about when he was denied access to some shows at last
year's Paris Fashion Week and he says this, so the next day I went into the
studio with Daft Punk and I wrote I Am a God because it's like yo nobody can tell
me where I can and can't go, that's my best Kanye impression, that's all you're
gonna get. Nobody can tell me where I can and can't go, West previously told W
magazine, man I'm the number one living and breathing rock star, I am Axel
Rose, I am Jim Morrison, I am Jimmy Hendrix, man the pride and arrogance of
that guy, right? I read this and I just got angry inside, I went how, who does he
think he is to talk like that, to compare himself to God and then say I'm
this guy and this guy and this guy, some of those guys are far better than him in
my opinion but but he's he's saying look I'm the best and you can't tell me who
I, where I can and can't go, you can't tell me what to do because I'm Kanye,
right? And I don't know about you but man that just made me a little angry
inside, I started feeling this like this sense of how dare you speak like that,
who do you think you are? I know you're you're popular but you're just a dude, you
can't cause yourself to have breath, you can't cause your heart to beat
any more than the rest of us, who do you think you are? And if we're not
careful, I started to reflect on this some more and I felt like the Holy Spirit
revealed to me, the reason I was so upset with Kanye is because I have that same
issue in my heart, maybe not to the same degree but pride and arrogance is
something that is deep within us all and and we're all a little bit Kanye, right?
Some of us maybe struggle with this more than other, Kanye may show it more
outwardly because he has a stage from which he can preach his pride, I
recognize I'm standing on a stage, I'll get to my pride in a second, so but but
we all struggle with pride, we all deal with this and and I think that it's
important that we be honest with ourselves this morning as we engage with
the scripture and see what God has to say about pride. So before we move on, let
me illustrate from my own life an issue, my pride issue and and give you maybe a
little bit more relatable picture of pride. Imagine me at about age 17, 18, in
high school on the tennis team, I played tennis, I played all the individual
sports in high school because I was never good enough for the team sports and
anyway, that was my excuse for my general athletics. So I played tennis and you can
imagine me out there on the court and and I thought I was so awesome and so good
that I had not just any old Wilson racket from Gartz Sports, I had a hundred
and forty dollar Babylon racket which is like what the pros use basically it's
stupid that I bought that and Babylon shoes and and I was in the game I was
ready to go and you're probably thinking man if he has that kind of gear he was
probably like one or two varsity right playing at state level and all that. No,
I was number one or two but on JV that's that's how good I was and so I got my
gear out there, I got my headband on, I'm ready for practice and this guy comes up
to me and I don't even know how we got into this this conversation but this is a
guy who I just did not like, him and I just butted heads all the time probably
because we had the same issues just from different angles but he comes up to me
and I don't know how we got in this but he goes hey I just want you to know that
you're really arrogant and you're really prideful and it drives me crazy and I'm
like whoa who who do you think you are? You're arrogant, you're prideful. That was
my response right to him calling me arrogant was you're the arrogant one
who do you think you are to call me arrogant and there's a third guy staying
off the side going man both these guys are so arrogant that's just ridiculous
but my point is I hated in him what what he hated in me which was pride right we
all deal with this and we're all blind to it so let's let's move on what is this
morning what is pride what is humility and what does God have to say about our
pride I hope you are beginning to feel the the awareness that we all struggle
with this so let's get into our text this morning first Peter 5 5 and 6 you
can turn in your Bibles or on your app or we'll have it on the screen as well
for you so it says this in first Peter 5 verse 5 in the same way you who are
younger Peter is addressing the church leaders and some of the younger people
who are who are in the church who are thinking about being leaders and what
God calls his leaders to he calls his people to and and so that's kind of the
context here but but Peter is saying to the the church he's saying in the same
way you who are younger submit yourselves to your elders all of you
clothe yourselves with humility toward one another because God opposes the
proud but gives grace to the humble humble yourselves therefore under God's
mighty hand that he may lift you up in due time man this I love this text here's
three things that we need to focus on throughout the morning as we move on
from this text three things that come out of the text that we have to focus on
that will will build this whole understanding of pride and humility on
number one God actively opposes the proud it doesn't say God God passively
sits back and says yeah you can keep your pride you can elevate yourself you
can you can make yourself God like Kanye does and I'm cool with that it says
God actively opposes the proud he hates pride and it might sound strong to say
that God hates something that but but what pride does to us and what it does
in our it's our response to God in a way that he never intended us to live it's
us saying I'm gonna elevate myself I'm gonna ignore you God I'm gonna make
something of myself and God hates that because he's God and we're not right so
he hates pride he actively opposes it we'll see more of this later but number
two God actively gives grace to the humble so as much as God opposes pride
he gives grace to humility as much as he hates pride he loves humility he
promises over and over throughout scripture to give grace to those who
humble themselves to lift them up so they don't have to worry about lifting
themselves up God actively gives grace to the humble number three humility is
not a feeling it's an action Peter says clothe yourselves with humility you don't
wake up in the morning and go I'm gonna think a lot about clothing myself today
or I'm gonna I hope I feel clothed at some point today right because you'd
walk out the door and you'd have that really humbling moment when you arrive
to school with no pants so Peter says clothe yourselves with humility it's an
action it's not a feeling and I think we get tripped up there a lot of times so
let's keep moving those three things God actively opposes the proud God
actively gives grace to the humble and the humility is not a feeling it's an
action so then what is what is pride what does that look like let me let me
illustrate from the scripture from a couple different scriptures how God
views pride and what it does and how he responds to it and clarify this for us
a little bit more I'm gonna go really fast through these so don't worry about
taking notes we'll just rattle them off and try to listen Proverbs 16 18 pride
goes before destruction and a haughty spirit before the fall Proverbs 11 to
when pride comes then comes dishonor but with hump but with the humble is
wisdom Proverbs 16 5 the Lord detests all the proud of heart be sure of this
they will not go unpunished Proverbs 8 13 pride and arrogance and the way of
evil and perverted speech I hate Isaiah 66 to but this is the one to whom I will
look he who is humble and contrite in spirit and trembles at my word and Luke
14 11 Jesus says everyone who exalts himself will be humbled and everyone who
humbles himself will be exalted and so over and over in scripture we see God
demonstrate his hate for pride and his love for humility and he any promises
that the proud will be punished and put low and the humble will be lifted up
and exalted and so there's this dichotomy throughout scripture where God
shows that he hates pride loves humility and there's promises both ways
there's there's the promise of lowering from God and humbling from God and
exalting from God when you're humble so as I was preparing for this I read over
a book I'd read a couple years ago called humility by a guy named CJ Mahaney
and I really recommend this book it's small and take you like two hours to read
because it's so good you can't put it down but this thing this book like
changed my life a couple years ago and then as I started reading again I
realized I need my life changed again but humility in humility CJ Mahaney
defines pride as the following he says pride is when sinful human beings
aspire to the status and position of God and refuse to refuse to acknowledge
their dependence on him so pride is when sinful human beings aspire to the
status and position of God and refuse to acknowledge their dependence on him but
that seems like somewhere we wouldn't want to be right as believers as followers
of Jesus we don't ever want to say I'm willingly
dis-acknowledging my need for God I'm willingly lifting myself to the
status of God so how does this happen how do we end up in a place where our
pride is is is messing us up and all up in our lives and in ruining things it's
really it's really subtle I think I think it's a lot more subtle than we
realize so look with me if at you if you will at the pathway of pride it's as
simple as beginning with taking our focus off of God it's as simple as saying
daily like daily subtly taking our focus off of God and others and turning it
inward so we take our focus off of our set off of God and others and put it on
ourselves and all we do all we see in our lives is ourselves and when we look
inward all the time and only think of ourselves and only think how others view
us and and only look inward two things happen one of two things happen one
either you look inward and what you see you don't like and you don't you don't
think you're awesome you think I can't do that right I can't I suck at that I'm
failing in this area in my life I'm never measuring up in this area in my life
and you and really you end up in a place of despair so so when we turn away from
God and others focus on ourselves sometimes that ends up in a place of
despair and we don't really like ourselves and and what's tricky is that
really that's just a sneaky kind of pride and we'll see that more later but
but that's that's one way that we go the other way is when we take our focus off
of God and others put it on ourselves we end up with all out straight up pride
like Kanye that's right where you think you're awesome that everyone else just
lives for to please you and praise you and and you think and this is
overstating because you don't really ever admit this but we all kind of deal
with this where we think man I'm just killing it right now I'm just winning
all the time hashtag winning all the time that's not the last hashtag you'll
hear in this so so that's two things what right take God focus off of God and
others focus on ourselves and he either ends in pride or despair which in the
end leads to humiliation God actively opposes the proud and he does that
through humiliating those who are proud and that sounds harsh but he actively
opposes pride and it is the very the most loving thing he can do for us when
we when we allow pride to root itself in our lives we what we're doing is we're
saying I don't need you God I can do this on my own I'm gonna lift myself up
I'm gonna make myself something of importance and God looks at that and
says no you can't be there that's not where I want you to be I'm gonna lower
you I'm gonna push you back down to a place where you can see me rightly you
see this all throughout the Scripture look and think about it in the garden
Adam and Eve they lifted themselves up they wanted to be like God and God
humbled them kicked them out of the garden separated them from him and took
away eternal life he humbled them so that they would look back to him you look
again at the Tower of Babel people wanted to be like God so they built a
tower so high to reach God and he humbled them crushed the tower put them in
their place and spread them all over the earth so they could understand each
other and have no no common language you see this in King Saul the story of King
Saul he he was a good king and he was submissive to the Lord and then he went
his own way and thought I'm the best I'm the king I can do this on my own and
God humbled him and gave the kingdom to David you see this it with the story of
Pharaoh in Egypt right he lifted himself up and compared himself to God and God
humbled him with the plagues and freeing the Israelites and making him low this is
God's response he brings those who are proud to a point of humiliation God will
crush whatever he has to crush in order to show our need show us our need for the
cross and his grace God will crush whatever he has to crush that's
humiliation it's it's us saying when we allow pride in our lives what we're
doing is we're saying I'm gonna forge ahead and make my own path God I don't
I don't need you I'm gonna forge ahead and make my own path I'm gonna lift
myself up and make myself great and God says no that's not what I design you for
I designed you to be in relationship with me to be on this narrow path so God
crushes us brings us back to the right path and that path always ends at the
foot of the cross he always humiliates us brings us to this path that ends at the
foot of the cross where we look up and see Jesus hanging there for our sins and
and we're in a point of dependence on him and worshiping him and he responds
with grace when we're humbled before him but but pride always ends in
humiliation so yeah so let me explain it this way CS Lewis says says that when
you lift yourself up you end up in this place where you're okay it says this
God is always above you right God's always above you and pride leads us to
this place where we're always looking down on others CS Lewis says a proud man
is always looking down on things and people and of course as long as you're
looking down you cannot see something that is above you so God pushes us back
down so we can look up and see his grace we can look up and see the love he
gives us instead of only seeing ourselves and looking down on others all
the time so maybe maybe your pride isn't isn't to the full extent that Kanye
deals with pride but but I don't want us to miss this and I know I'm hammering
pride a lot I think it's important that we that we get this before we move on to
what humility looks like so let me ask you guys a couple questions that I think
will help diagnose our pride for us because it's so tricky sometimes so let
me ask you a few questions and just process with me if these things ring
true in your life there's likely a pride attached to that so first question are
you easily offended I know I am do you feel underappreciated also struggle with
that one are you worried about how you appear to others do you fish for
compliments yep do you notice pride in others back to my tennis story I noticed
pride in that guy I hated it because I had it too do you get frustrated when
others are the center of attention yep so here's the deal we all struggle with
pride you may not be Kanye and you may not have this self-centered I'm the
I'm awesome kind of pride in your life but it works itself out one way or the
other I need to I need us to look at one more thing about pride before we move
on because this is this is probably the kind of pride that most of us in the
church deal with as Christians we tend to to fall not into this overt I'm the
best kind of pride but but a more subtle kind of pride that just is really
really sneaky a kind of false humility so let me illustrate it for you with a
little story imagine you go to a party on Friday night which you probably will
to celebrate finals being done right and there's a couple of different kinds of
people at this party and they all struggle with false humility so the
first kind of person is the humble bragger maybe you don't know what a
humble brag is let me define it for you from Urban Dictionary which I don't
recommend for many things but this time it worked out so Urban Dictionary says
that a humble brag is subtly letting others know about how fantastic your
life is while undercutting it with a bit of self-effacing humor or low as me
gloss and I think as I was thinking about this a lot of times this comes out
on social media right so you may see a post on Facebook this week even with
finals that says something like this totally just bombed the final math is
hard sad face that would actually be a sad face and they wouldn't write it out
you guys are on Facebook and then the next very next thing would say Hawaii in
two days totally bombed the final but I'm going to Hawaii my life is awesome
hashtag blessed hashtag all I do is win right that's a humble brag don't be that
guy or even better this is you know just to go to the extreme Meryl Streep at
the Oscars right she's only one of the greatest actresses alive right she's
awesome that Julia movie about the baking lady I don't remember what it was
called she's awesome though she's a great actress anyway she's at the Oscars
she's winning an Oscar and she says she said something like okay when I call it
when they called my name I had this feeling I could hear all of America
going oh no why her again and and we're all sitting in the crowd like you're
winning an Oscar just accept it humbly and say thank you for the eighth time
because you're so awesome she's crazy so I this picture of the humble brag is my
life sucks but I'm kind of awesome too and I'm not gonna say that outright but
it's this false humility that I think a lot of us fall into the the second guy
you're gonna meet at this party is the life of the party guy right this person
is they never really talk about themselves but they all they do is
everything everything they do is trying to gather attention to themselves so
they may not talk about themselves but their jokes and silliness are always
garnering the attention and love of others and and sometimes to be the life
of the party isn't isn't prideful sometimes you're just that guy and
that's awesome praise the Lord that he gave you that gift but but a lot of
times it's it's a sneaky false humility where you go I'm I want all your attention
because I think that I'm worthy of it so I'm gonna be the life of the party so
you love me and it's just a sneaky kind of pride and lastly at this party you're
probably gonna meet I think this is this is really key for us believers I
think we in the in the name of humility we fall into this all too often the woe
is me person now this person would say this one's a little bit more serious
it's a little more serious than the humble bragger this person would say
there's no way I'm prideful I don't even like myself after the time I'm so
self-conscious I doubt everything I do and I think I think nobody likes me most
the time this one's tricky because really what that is is a sneaky form of
pride some I'm not saying that all bad feelings about ourselves are pride but
I think a lot of the times when we when we speak negatively about ourselves as
often as we tend to it's really a subtle form of pride where we go I have an
expectation of myself that my pride has set and I didn't meet that expectation
so I'm gonna talk bad about myself I'm gonna feel bad about myself I mean where
most of the time where do those bad feelings about yourself come from do
they do they come from legitimately disappointing someone or God and and
receiving negative feedback from them or are they simply the fact that you've
only disappointed yourself you've only disappointed you've only failed to meet
the expectation your pride has set for you I think that's the that that's
actually the case I know this is true in my life this last week as the
semester's coming to close I've thought about this year how my leadership was
how how this year went with the UI site and starting all of that and I started
to feel really down on myself I started to feel like this could have been better
I wish I did that different I failed in this area and none of that came from
genuinely feeling like God was saying I disapprove or genuinely feeling like
someone else was saying I disapprove you don't measure up all I wasn't measuring
up to was this expectation my pride had set and I didn't meet it and so I was
feeling bad about myself because because I didn't measure up to an expectation I
said it's a sneaky form of pride where we feel bad about ourselves not because
of anything any genuine disapproval but because we didn't measure up to our
pride and our pride was offended so these are these are just a few forms of
false humility but it's all pride it may not be the outright full-on Kanye West
pride but but there's pride in our lives so what do we do about this
before we move on to defining humility I need us to understand that our pride
comes out of a natural desire to be lifted up God gave you the desire to be
loved and valued by him God created you with this sense of I want your
approval I want to be loved I want to be valued by you God as my creator who
knows me and loves me I want to feel that that validation I want to feel that
approval from you he created you with that desire and pride is us taking that
desire and twisting it and making and filling that need ourselves and saying
I'm gonna lift myself up I'm gonna make myself great instead of allowing God to
lift us up like he promises in verse 5 he says he'll lift up the humble right and
so you have that desire that's natural that's good and humility comes when we
allow God to do the lifting up instead of lifting ourselves up so humility then
is the intentional lowering of yourself in light of God's holiness and our
sinfulness so when we intentionally lower ourselves we recognize who God is
and we recognize who we are we recognize our need for him our dependence on him
and we lower ourselves and say I trust you I need you I depend on you
humility trust that God's approval is enough and that he will lift us up
according to his perfect timing and will it trusts that we don't need to lift
ourselves up because he's going to already humility is living your life
before an audience of one it's saying I don't need the approval of others I
don't need their praise I don't need to lift myself up and make myself awesome
because I know I'm living for God and I know that his approval is enough
humility trust God to lift us up so as we had the pathway of pride we have a
pathway of humility it's it's almost the exact opposite of the pathway of pride
it goes a little something like this and starts with the focus taking the focus
off of yourself putting the focus back on God and others which leads to enjoying
God and others when the fault when you're not focusing on yourself all the
time it opens up your eyes it lifts up your head to be able to see God rightly
and enjoy his love and enjoy his grace and enjoy who he is and learning about
him and enjoying and worshiping him and it allows you to enjoy others it allows
you to humbly serve others and enjoy the benefit that you are to them the
blessing you are to them and when you enjoy others there you're going to
receive thankfulness from them right it's not wrong to please other people and
enjoy pleasing them but but that that turns whack when you start going oh
I'm awesome because I did that but enjoying others is a good thing so when
we take the focus off of ourselves and put it back on God and others we enjoy
God and others which leads not to humiliation but God's grace God gives
grace to the humble right so he lifts us up and he gives us grace and he fills
us with his fills our lives with his presence he promises to lift up those
who are humble again humility says I trust God to lift me up and when we're
humble God responds by saying man I love that I love that you're that you've
made yourself low intentionally because I want to lift you up I want to show
the world how how great you are and through me and how much I can do through
you and how awesome I am in your life he promises to lift us up he promises to
give us grace he loves humility as much as he hates pride he loves humility God
loves it and he promises to lift us up and give us grace he says that's
exactly what you made for you're allowing me to lift you up instead of
lifting yourself up and ignoring me so here are six practical ways to daily
humble yourself this is these things have been helpful in my own life and a
lot of my just stole from CJ Haney in his book it's really really good but man
there I promise you if you practice these things daily they will they will
grow you in humility and it's the most we can really ever say right I'm growing
in humility by God's grace we can never really say I'm humble because it's like
I'm humble here's how I did it boom fail done back in your pride so here's
here's six practical ways to daily grow in humility number one routinely
repent of sin to God and others when we recognize daily this that our need for
Jesus and we repent of our sin what it does is it lowers us and we were waiting
upon others to say I forgive you there's grace for that and we lower ourselves
before God and God says there's grace for that I love you let me lift you up
it routinely repent of sin to God and others recognize your dependence on God
this is as simple as waking up and saying thank you Jesus for this day thank
you that I woke up this morning thank you that I have another day to live amen
recognize your dependence on God daily invite correction maybe not daily
that's a lot but routinely invite correction and feedback and receive it
graciously this is this is huge there's nothing that will grow your humility
more than honestly saying hey give me your honest opinion of you and really
we were so bad at giving our honest opinion of others because the moment
they say that you go I don't really want to ask that question ever of you
because I'm afraid to know what you really think because it will offend my
pride right so there it is so humbling to invite correction or feedback and
receive it graciously be quick to forgive man this one is tough a lot of times I
think we fall into this trap where we don't really want to forgive because we
feel so hurt but when you when you still feel hurt and you forgive someone it is
so humbling to say I know that that what you did was wrong and I hope that you
know that but but I forgive you and we're good and I'm not gonna hold that
against you anymore I'm gonna forget that that happened or I'm at least gonna
choose not to remember it actively over and over so that that we live in this
tension so be quick to forgive it does wonders for your humility and your
relationships with others intentionally serve others man our church I think does
this so well I think there's so many things so many opportunities in our
church and resonate to serve others intentionally to go to them and say hey
how can I meet your needs how can I love you how can I be a godlike community
to you and intentionally serve you as a form of humbling myself as a form of
being a servant to you it's so helpful and lastly transfer the glory to God this
is something that a practice that I have tried to do over the years and haven't
done well recently and so I want to get back into it but transferring the glory
to God means ideally at the end of my day I before I go to sleep I just lay
there and I think about all the things that God did that day I think about all
the things that I want to take credit for and then transfer that glory to God
and say thank you God for using me in this way thank you for doing this
through me thank you for doing this outside of me outside of my control
something that I could never do on my own and transferring the glory to God and
just being thankful for what he's done in that day I think when we engage in
these practices of daily groin and humility we'll see crazy things happen
in our church I think that's what Peter's writing about he's writing about
how humility affects the church and our relationships humility has a profound
effect on your relationships both with God and others imagine how much conflict
would be resolved and reconciled if you were willing to say I'm sorry before the
other person to humble yourself even if you were if you believe you were most
wronged and just say I'm sorry for what I've done in this I'm sorry imagine the
grace that would flow into that conversation into that relationship when
we're willing when we're willing to humble ourselves I think God God would
pour his grace out on our church when we all engage in this and pursue humility
killing our pride as clearly as I can say it let me illustrate or explain these
two paths to you the pathway of pride and the pathway of humility the reality is
that one day we all will bow before Jesus in humility and so no matter what we
will bow before Jesus in humility God God responded to Jesus ultimate humility
by lifting him up and placing him in a place where every one of us will bow to
him he's been exalted ultimately supremely and so we will bow in humility
so either you willingly you and I willingly humble ourselves and
experience joy in humility or willfully grow in pride and experience
humiliation so we willingly humble ourselves and experience joy or we
willfully grow in pride experience humiliation I want I want to be a person
who Jesus who intentionally lowers themselves all the time so that I
experienced Jesus lifting me up over and over giving me grace over and over
saying I made you to I made you to do wonderful things I love you and I value
you let me let me show you how much I value you the beautiful thing about
this is that we don't serve a God who demands humility but never showed us
what that's like Jesus Jesus before he came to earth Jesus existed with the
Father in heaven and was surrounded by angels worshiping him day in and day out
24 seven they shouted his praises he was God on a throne he had everything he
had endless riches he had endless glory endless praise and he intentionally
humbled himself giving that up coming to earth becoming a man in human flesh
living a humble life as a Galilean peasant and then he goes intentionally
humbles himself again that I mean the night before he was crucified hours
before he was crucified he clothed himself in humility literally put on
clothes of a slave and washed the disciples feet and then went and died
for them and died for us in our place take away our sins he was ultimately
humiliated on the cross so that we don't have to be humiliated in our lives so
that we can experience God's grace and be lifted up as we intentionally humble
ourselves God God demonstrated humility for us in Jesus perfectly so our
response to him is to follow after him and his in his example to intentionally
clothe ourselves in humility and allow God to lift us up trusting that his grace
is enough that he will respond in grace that we don't have to lift ourselves up
we don't have to to fight for attention we don't have to jockey for position we
don't have to be the best we don't have to win all the time because Jesus will
lift us up man the most we can say is that we're pursuing humility by God's
grace but I am so excited for the day when we intentionally pursue humility
and God starts lifting us up and giving us grace all over our church let me pray
for us father I thank you that you demonstrated what it means to be humble
to us Jesus I thank you that you humbled yourself in such a way that you were
willing to die for us and be ultimately humiliated so that we can experience
grace so that when we humble ourselves you respond in grace I pray that we would
do that daily I pray that we would find ways that you would reveal pride in our
lives and that we would kill that pride by intentionally humbling ourselves
every day and may your grace rush into our relationships and rush into our
lives and rush into our church and lift us up so that you get the glory and we
get to simply enjoy you and others as you pour out your grace upon our lives
in Jesus' name amen
