Lesson 2: Humility ~ Coming to God on His Terms
"Humility is a virtue more often praised than sought. Who wants to think little of himself? The world admires the self-confident, the ambitious, yes, even the proud! Yet biblical humility - recognizing oneself as a sinner before the holy God - is a prerequisite for starting down the path to revival."
As we looked at in week one, the work of the Lord in bringing revival begins with breaking up of the fallow groud of our hearts, using the deeply penetrating work of the spears of a powerful plow (the double edged sword of God's word!) which dig down into the tender places of our soul, to turn over the hard soil and bring the nutrient rich soil of a broken and contrite heart to the surface.
One example from our study included looking at Isaiah ch. 6 in which Isaiah recounts his face-to-face encounter with the pre-incarnate Jesus Christ, seated on the throne of heaven and appearing in his GLORY. When confronted with the glory and perfection and holiness of our Good God, humility is immediately conscious of its falling short, its imperfections, its "undone-ness" as Isaiah observed, "Woe is me! I am a man of unclean lips, and I come from a people of unclean lips!"
Which is the exactly necessary disposition to then receive FROM God the very cleansing, merciful work. We see the dispatching of a burning coal to remove Isaiah's obstacle for standing in God's presence, namely, his unholiness, his "woeful" (cursed!) state.
We examined snapshots from the lives of both Rehoboam and Asa in 2 Chronicles. Even acknowledging that these snapshots don't give us all the complexities of the lives of these two Kings of Judah, we nevertheless trace the reverse patterns in each of their lives: Rehoboam ruled from a place of pride, was confronted with the word of the Lord by means of one of God's prophets, and he and the people's response was to humble themselves before God, and so they received deliverance. Asa started well, ruled from a place of humility and even observed first-hand how the Lord gave grace, but when given the opportunity to seek his own solutions rather than being led by the Lord, he exercised his pride, and when he was confronted with the word of the Lord by means of one of God's prophets, he responded with even more pride, angered by the rebuke, and suffered in his own body the consequences of his refusal to seek and depend on the Lord.
Certainly, these summaries aren't the whole of their stories, but they give us, nevertheless, living pictures of God's GRACE even to confront our pride by means of his word!, and yet, how we respond to that "cutting" of God's discerning even between the thoughts and intents of our hearts will determine the path that then we walk.
"For thus says the One who is high and lifted up, who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy: 'I dwell in the high and holy place, and also with him who is of a contrite and lowly spirit, to revive the spirit of the lowly, and to revive the heart of the contrite.'" ~Isaiah 57:15
"For the Word that God speaks is alive and full of power [making it active, operative, energizing, and effective]; it is sharper than any two-edged sword, penetrating to the dividing line of the breath of life (soul) and [the immortal] spirit, and of joints and marrow [of the deepest parts of our nature], exposing and sifting and analyzing and judging the very thoughts and purposes of the heart. And not a creature exists that is concealed from His sight, but all things are open and exposed, naked and defenseless to the eyes of Him with Whom we have to do." ~Hebrews 4:12-13 (Amplified)
God opposes, and brings low those who are proud and self-sufficient. But not only does he give grace to the humble, he does so by drawing NEAR to those who have acknowledge that in themselves they are spiritually bankrupt, or as Jesus said in the Sermon on the Mount, they are "poor in spirit." Our God "makes his dwelling place" with us (!) when we surrender our firm grip on our own self-importance and self-exaltation. Loosing our fingers in this way frees us to lay hold of HIM who has laid hold of us.
Next Lesson: HONESTY
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