Humble Thoughts, part 3
If you haven’t read the first two posts in this series, I invite you to do so now.
How can you become humble?
To begin with, I should reframe the question as “How can you humble yourself?” The emphasis in Scripture is on humbling oneself (an action to be performed) rather than on becoming humble (a trait to be acquired). There are things that you must do in order to become humble.
A good starting point is to examine your motivation. God commands, “Humble yourselves in the presence of the Lord” (James 4:10a NASV). Jesus said, “If you love Me, you will keep My commandments” (John 14:15). So, your love for God motivates you to humble yourself. But notice that James continues, “and He will exalt you.” (James 4:10b). There is a promise attached to the command. The hope of reward also motivates you. Once you have dealt with your motivation, I would suggest you take the following three steps.
1. Pray for God’s grace to humble yourself. Notice that I did not say to ask Him to humble you. Trust me, you do not want God to humble you! But you do need His enabling grace as you undertake the process of humbling yourself.
2. Take your focus off of yourself and put it on to God and others. This is actually one of the characteristics that distinguishes not only humility from pride but also true humility from false humility. C. S. Lewis put it this way, “Humility is not thinking less of yourself, it is thinking of yourself less.” Even a poor self-image or self-doubt is focused on the self, and in its own way can be a form of pride! This is why you feel self-conscious when you are trying to be humble.
3. Follow Paul’s advice: “Do not be haughty in mind, but associate with the lowly” (Romans 12:16). If nothing else, this will reveal whether or not you think you are better than they are! You will probably even find that they are better than you thought they were. In any case, there is nothing like rubbing shoulders with such people to keep you grounded in your common humanity with its multifaceted strengths and weaknesses. We are all fellow travelers.
I could go on to speak of serving others, confessing your faults to others, and other acts of humbling yourself, but if you start with the above suggestions, you will be off to a good start. May our humble Savior direct you in the journey.