ON HUMBLING OURSELVES BEFORE GOD – Charles Spurgeon
ON HUMBLING OURSELVES BEFORE GOD
“Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time.” 1 Peter 5:6.
Pride is so natural to fallen man that it springs up in his heart like weeds in a watered garden, or rushes by a flowing brook. It is an all-pervading sin, and smothers all things like dust on the roads, or flour in the mill. Its every touch is evil as the breath of the cholera-fiend, or the blast of the Sahara wind. Pride is as hard to get rid of as charlock weeds from the furrows, or the American blight from the apple trees. If killed, it revives; if buried, it bursts the tomb. You may hunt down this fox and think you have destroyed it, and lo, your very exultation is pride. None have more pride than those who dream that they have none. You may labor against vainglory till you conceive that you are humble, and the fond conceit of your humility will prove to be pride in full bloom. It imitates humility full well, and is then most truly pride. Pride is a sin with a thousand lives. It seems impossible to kill it; it flourishes on that which should be its poison, glorying in its shame. It is a sin with a thousand shapes; by perpetual change, it escapes capture. It seems impossible to hold it, the vapory demon slips from you, only to appear in another form and mock your fruitless pursuit. To die to pride and self, one would need to die himself. Pride was man’s first sin, and it will be his last. In the first sin that man ever committed, there was certainly a large mixture of pride, for he imagined that he knew better than his Maker, and even dreamed that his Maker feared that man might grow too great. It has been questioned whether pride was not the sin by which the angels fell when they lost their first estate. I will not go into any controversy upon that subject, but there was certainly pride in the sin of Satan and pride in the sin of Adam. This is the torch which kindled hell and set the world on fire. Pride is a ringleader and captain among iniquities. It attains unto the first three of Satan’s champions. It is a daring and God-defying sin, arraigning divine justice as Cain did, challenging Jehovah to combat as Pharaoh did, or making self into God, as Nebuchadnezzar did. It would murder God if it could, that it might fill His throne. While it is first to come, and first in horrible supremacy, it is also last to go. As Paul said, “The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death.” I think I might say that the last enemy but one is pride, for even at our deathbed pride will be found in attendance. In his last moments, John Knox had a sharp conflict with self-righteousness, though he had preached against it with all his might, and knew, with a clearness seldom given to men, that salvation is of the Lord alone. Even within an hour of glory, he had to make a stand against that vile thing, the pride of the human heart. Many others of the Lord’s valiant ones have been sorely assailed by the same crafty foe, which shoots with feathered flatteries, shafts of destruction. In the quietest minds, the deadly calm of self-conceit may be found. Our hearts are deceitful above all things, and in nothing less to be trusted than in this matter of pride. Even while we breathe out our souls unto God, it will attempt to puff us up—yes, it will puff up poor dying worms! Brothers and sisters, for certain, you and I are in danger of pride; possibly we are even now victims of it. Let us be on our guard, for it may be ruining us without our knowledge, even as the moth in secret eats up the garment, or as unseen rust cankers the hidden treasure. Let pride lodge where it may, it does its entertainer great mischief, for it bars out the favor of God, “God resists the proud.” It must be sent adrift before God can visit us with favor, for no grace comes to the proud, “but He gives grace unto the humble.” Humility is the grace that attracts more grace. As money makes money, so humility increases humility, and with it, every other spiritual gift. If you would have much grace, have much humility. God has assistance for the humble, but resistance for the proud. You know how He fought Pharaoh. What blows He struck at the haughty monarch! He would have him down from the pinnacle of defiance one way or another, and make him learn, in bitterness, the answer to his own insolent question, “Who is the Lord?” Remember how Nebuchadnezzar had to eat grass like an ox because he spoke with a haughty tongue? Wherever God sees pride lifting itself on high, He resolves to level it in the dust. He draws His bow, He fits His arrow to the string, and pride is the target that He shoots at. The more pride enters into the Christian’s heart, the less grace will enter there, and the more opposition from God will come there, for pride is never so hateful to God as when He sees it in His own people. If you see disease in a stranger you are very sorry, but if you discover its symptoms in your own child, your grief is much deeper. A viper is loathsome anywhere, but how it would make you start if you saw the head of one of those creatures peeping out from the bosom of a beloved friend! So pride is detestable anywhere, but it is worst in those whom the Lord loves best. If God sees pride in a David, He will smite him till he ceases from his high thoughts. Or if it is in a Hezekiah, He will abase him, and be sure that if the Lord sees pride in you, He will smite you. Yes, smite you again and again till you wait humbly at His feet. All this I have given by way of preface, but I think it is also an argument which may run before the words of the text, and strengthen them, “Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God.”
I. HUMILITY IN OUR CHURCH LIFE
I shall handle the text, not at any great length, but for practical purposes in three or four ways. May the Holy Spirit bless the discourse. First, our text is evidently intended to bear upon us in our church life. We will use it in that respect. Observe that Peter has been speaking to the elders and telling them how they should behave themselves in the flock over which they are set as overseers. Then he speaks to the younger members and says, “Submit yourselves unto the elder.” He says to all church members, “All of you be subject one to another, and be clothed with humility.” And it is in the same context that he writes, “Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God.” I am, as a member of a church, not to seek honor for myself, but I am to walk humbly. I am not to make it in any respect the objective of my Christian life to be esteemed among my fellow Christians so as to have influence over them, and to take the lead among them. I am to have far humbler motives than that. I am to think very little of myself, and to think so much of others that I admire all that I see of God’s grace in them, and am glad to learn from them as well as to help them in their progress to heaven. Each one of us should think little of himself and highly of his brethren. I cannot say that all of us as Christians are clothed with humility as we should be. I am afraid that from the preacher down to the most obscure member, we may, every one of us, listen with awe to the injunction, “Humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God,” and confess that we fall short of this command. Yet I may honestly add that in this church I have seen more submissiveness, and deference to others, and less of ambitious self-esteem than anywhere else in the world. I have spoken nothing less than bare justice when I have said this. Let the entire world know that as a pastor, I can, in this point, praise the people of my charge beyond any that I have ever heard of. I am not apt to judge too favorably. I speak as I have seen, and this is my honest testimony. We owe our union and prosperity under God to the readiness of most of the brethren to do anything and everything for Christ, without considering ourselves. Now, true humility in our church relationship will show itself in our being willing to undertake the very lowest offices for Christ. Some cannot do little things, they must be ordained to great offices, or they will sulk in indolence. Genuine humility makes a man think it a great honor to be a doorkeeper in the house of God, or to be allowed to speak a word to a little child about Jesus, or even to wash the saints’ feet. I am sure, brethren, that those who are not willing to fulfill the lesser offices will never be used by Christ to mind the greater duties. Humility is a qualification for greatness. Do you know how to be little? You are learning to be great. Can you submit? You are learning to rule. My symbolic sketch of a perfect Christian would be a king keeping the door, or a prince feeding lambs, or, better still, the Master washing His disciples’ feet. The next point of humility is, that we are conscious of our own incompetence to do anything right. He who can do all things without Christ will end in doing nothing. The man who can preach without divine aid cannot preach at all. The woman who can teach a Bible class cannot teach a Bible class. Human ability without the grace of God is only puffed-up inability. Those of you, who, apart from supernatural help, feel quite sufficient for any kind of holy service, are miserably deluded. Self-sufficiency is inefficiency. The fullness of self is a double emptiness. He that has no sense of his weakness has a weakness in his sense. I believe, brothers and sisters, that any man whom God uses for a great purpose will be so emptied out that he will wonder that God uses him in the least degree, and he will be ready to hide his head, and long to get out of public notice, because he will feel himself to be utterly unworthy of the favor which God manifests towards him. I do not believe that God ever fills a cup which was not empty, or that He ever fills a man’s mouth with His words while that man has his mouth full of his own words. Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God. If you desire that the Holy Spirit should bless you, be purged from your own spirit. The way to rise into God is to sink in your own self. As our Lord Jesus descended into the depths, that He might rise above all things and fill all things, so we, in our imitation of Him, must descend to the uttermost that we may rise to the highest.
II. HUMILITY IN OUR AFFLICTIONS
This humility will show itself, next, in this—that we shall be willing to be ignored by men. There is a craving in the heart of many to have what they do, written upon tablets and set up in the marketplaces. I once heard a professing Christian complain bitterly that he had been ignored. He had been a Sunday school teacher for years, and yet he had never been publicly mentioned by anyone. Did he make that a complaint? He might far rather have rejoiced in his quietude.
The fierce light of public notoriety is not much valued by those upon whom it falls. I wish some people would ignore me—at least, all next week, so much at least as not to call to see me, or write me a letter, or name me in the papers. I would be as happy as all the birds in the air to be ignored, if I might be left alone, and allowed peacefully to work for God with His sweet smile to cheer me in my loneliness. Oh, to be a little ant, allowed to labor on at God’s bidding, receiving nothing of men but the high privilege of being left alone! A saintly soul was known to pray, “Grant me, O Lord that I may pass unnoticed through the world!” It seems to me to be one of the highest delights of life for people to permit you to work for God without being interrupted by their praises or censures. When I have seen a certain great artist at work, I have only peeped at him from a corner, and have kept out of his sunshine. I am quite sure he did not want me to express my valueless opinion about his glorious creations. To have people forever talking about you, for you, and against you is one of the weariness’ of mortal life, and yet some people sigh for the attention that others would be glad to be rid of. Yes, so it is. It is but a little thing that certain friends have done, but they would like much made of it, their slender alms must be published at the corners of the streets, their prosy speech must be reported in all the papers. Oh, brothers and sisters, do not let us care about its being known that we have done our part. Let it be done as to God, and in God’s sight. And then, as to what our fellow mortals shall say, let us have scant concern, for if we live on human praise, we shall grow not only proud, but vain, which, if it is not more wicked, is certainly more silly. Serve God, and do not wish to have a trumpet blown before you. Never cry with Jehu, “Come, see my zeal for the Lord of hosts.” Go on serving God year after year, though you are altogether unknown, feeling it quite sufficient that you have by the grace of God served your generation and honored your Redeemer. This would be a great attainment in our church life if we could reach to it.
III. HUMBLING OURSELVES IN OUR DAILY DEALINGS WITH GOD
Brethren, we need humility, all of us, in our church life, in the sense of never being rough, haughty, arrogant, and hard, domineering, lordly, or, on the other hand, factious, unruly, quarrelsome, and unreasonable. We should endeavor to think very carefully of those who are poorest, for fear we should hurt their feelings, and very noticeable of those who are obscure, lest we should seem to despise them. It is ours never to take offense, and to be most cautious never to cause it even by inadvertence. He that is set as a leader in the church of God, let him be the person that is most ready to bear blame, and least ready to give offense. Let him say, “You may think what you please of me, but I shall lay myself out to do you good, and to be your servant for Christ’s sake.” The lower you can stoop, the greater is your honor. In the eye of wisdom, no piece of furniture in the house of God has greater dignity than the doormat. If you are willing to let others wipe their feet on you, then shall Christ Jesus take pleasure in you, for you are a partaker of His lowly mind. Even for your own sake, it will be wise to occupy a humble place, for in the valleys the streams of peace are flowing. The mountains are the playground of the storm, but in the quiet villages, the dove finds her shelter. If you would escape from ill will, and live peaceably with all men, practice the maxims of an influential man, who, when asked after the Revolution, how he managed to escape the executioner’s axe, replied, “I made myself of no reputation, and kept silent.”
IV. HUMBLING OURSELVES IN SEEKING FORGIVENESS AS SINNERS
I finish by using my text with all the earnestness my soul can feel in reference to the unconverted part of this audience in our seeking forgiveness as sinners. Oh, tender Spirit of God, help me now. The text was not originally meant for the ungodly, but it may fitly be applied to them. If you would find grace in God’s sight and live, dear unconverted hearers, you must humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God. So you want to be saved, do you? The way of salvation is, “Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ.” “But,” you say, “I do not understand it.” Yet it is very simple, no hidden meaning lies in the words, you are simply bid to trust Jesus. If, however, you feel as if you could not do that, let me urge you to go to God in secret and admit the sin of this unbelief, for a great sin it is. Humble yourself. Do not try to make out that you are good. That will be fatal, for it will be a falsehood which will shut the gate of grace. Confess that you are guilty. When a man is clearly and manifestly guilty, it is of no use his standing before the judge and beginning to urge his own merit. His best course is to cast himself upon the mercy of the court. It is your only course, dear soul, the only one that can profit you. Know that you have transgressed, and feel that it is so. Sit down and think over the many ways in which you have done wrong, or failed to do right. Pray God to break you down with deep penitence. It is no waste of time to dig out foundations when you build a house, and it is no superfluity to labor after a deep sense of sin. When your sin is confessed, then, acknowledge that if justice were carried out towards you, apart from undeserved grace, you would be sent to hell. Do not quibble at that fact. Do not entertain skeptical questions as to whether there is a punishment for sin, and as to what it will be, but acknowledge that whatever it is, you deserve it. Do not fence with God or quarrel with Scripture, but as His word declares that the wicked shall be cast into hell with all the nations that forget God, admit that you deserve to be so dealt, for you do deserve it. When this is acknowledged, you are on the road to mercy. You have almost obtained mercy when you have fully submitted to justice. You have in a measure received grace when you are brought to admit your sin and the justice of its penalty. Then, next, accept God’s mercy in His own way. Do not be so vain as to dictate to God how you ought to be saved. Be willing to be saved by free grace through the blood of Jesus Christ, for that is God’s way. Be willing to be saved by faith in Jesus Christ, for that also is God’s way. If your unbelief, begins to ask, “How can it be, and why should it be?” cease from such questions. Humble yourself and say, “God says it is so, and therefore it must be so.” If God says, “Believe, and be saved,” I will believe and be saved. And if He says, “Trust Christ, and live,” I will trust Christ and live.