Humility

Humility is an interesting thing, isn't it? According to the ever-useful www.dictionary.com, the synonyms for "humility" are "lowliness, meekness, submissiveness", and the one listed antonym is...you guessed it, "pride". Humility - the act of being humble. Realizing our own lowliness, being submissive to others, remembering that the universe does not revolve around whether or not we get our way. My BU1000 group discussed the topic of humility this week and I had a thought that I, of course, being the thinker, found interesting. Get this. God gave us the challenge to humble ourselves countless times throughout the Bible. One of my favorite verses, in fact, is 1 Peter 5:6-7, "Humble yourself under the mighty hand of God that He may lift you up in due time. Cast all your anxiety on Him because He cares for you." Now, God knows everything, right? And God knows that we are not perfect. He made us as imperfect people! So he knows we're going to fail at being perfectly humble. In my opinion, aside from that one exceptional man who lived 2000 years ago, perfect humility is impossible; even in thinking you've finally got it, you've messed it up. So why would God assign us this impossible task? Well, I don't know. To bring glory to himself and his perfection? Probably. But here's what's cool. God didn't just hand us this massive task and say, "Here, now, get to it. As far as you know, no one's mastered it over the past 2000 years so you might want to get crackalackin.'' No! God gave us help! And you know what the help was? The command. He gave us the command to be humble, knowing all along that we would fail. In failing, however, and realizing we've got to ask forgiveness and start over, we come at least a little closer to perfect humility. Will anyone ever get it? No. But we at least become closer to the people God wants us to be and even develop an appreciation for the perfection of Jesus! Isn't that crazy?! God worked it all out for us. Just because He's God and that's what He does, he gave us a huge task, watched our jaws drop and faces pale, and then winked and threw us the floaty-rafty-thing you use to save drowning people.

You know, I think that can really be applied to anything. Any situation, any problem, any command. God never gives us something we can't handle, and he never gives us something to handle that has no purpose. College, stress, emotional upheaval--these things all have purpose and also help available.

Good news, man. Good news.