Okay, the Bible is going to turn to 1 Peter chapter 5. 1 Peter chapter 5. This morning we looked at the impact of repentance. Tonight we're going to look at the impact of humility. It's a topic that is very familiar for us to hear. I'm sure most of us, if not all of us, in the auditorium tonight have heard at least one sermon on the topic of humility, maybe multiple hundreds of, who knows, maybe you've sat through Sunday school lessons on the topic, but it's something that we perpetually struggle with. The idea of humility is something that I don't know about you, but I'm constantly, God is constantly confronting me with. And it seems like my pride and my selfishness, it is always creeping up. And it's like I think I get a handle on it, and then all of a sudden something else shows up, and the Lord's like, hey, you haven't arrived yet, son. Topic of humility is something that really in our world, in many errant ways, our world looks at it. If I were to take time tonight and ask you how is humility defined in our world today, some would look at it as a sign of weakness. Some would, I'm sure there are elements of the world that get the definition right. It's a lowering of oneself. Some would define it as low self-esteem. I would say that, and we'll come to a definition here in a few moments, but I would say humility isn't high or low self-esteem because in both of those cases you're still thinking of yourself. You're still emphasizing yourself in your thoughts. It's just one is positive and one is overly negative. Friedrich Nietzsche describes humility as this, never thought I'd quote Nietzsche in a message, but he said this, he said, he who despises himself feels at the same time a certain respect for himself as being a despiser of himself. I really don't even know what that means. Basically, he means the guy thinks of himself still. So, whether he thinks too highly of himself, he's still thinking of himself. And honestly, if you read some of these philosophers, you wonder if they just sat in a room and thought too long. Because sometimes they don't make any sense. But in an article written at the University of California, Berkeley, the author basically likened, in an article I saw written, likened humility to having a tolerant worldview. You know, you read humility as, okay, it's okay for you to believe what you want to believe, or you do what you want to do. That's okay. I'll let you do that. In that mind, you're not calling them out on whatever it is they're doing and saying they're wrong. That idea of tolerance. In Nietzsche's case, he falls short in his definition because the person still has self at the forefront of their thoughts. In the case of the article written at UC Berkeley, humility is not being tolerant of another's belief system or worldview. If this was true, then we as Christians would not be humble in any form because there is a sinful worldview that we do not nor can we tolerate. So if you look at the one definition that was given at UC Berkeley, that means all those who are born-again believers, who believe what the Bible says about humility, we'd all be arrogant and proud. Because we know the answer. We know what the Bible says, and we're not going to back down from that answer. At least, I hope we don't. I hope we don't compromise on Scripture. This being said, we can live humbly when worldviews are disagreeing. Where humility is being practiced, we are not living in anxiousness about life, but rather it opens the door to trust God and see His grace active in our lives. The author of this article says that the worry that comes along with humility goes on, and they have a whole long paragraph on the dark side of humility and how it can lead to negative results. And I'm not going to take the time to walk through their article and things that way, but it was somewhat interesting. However, Scripture states otherwise. In our own text, we see that humility opens the door for trust in God and not worry. It opens the door to thrust your cares and concerns to Him and live out righteousness. Proverbs 3, 5, and 6 says, Trust in the Lord with all your heart. Don't lean on your own understanding. In all your ways, acknowledge Him and He will direct your paths. In order for us to obey Proverbs 3, 5, and 6, we need to get a handle on humility in our lives. So, humility defined, and I don't have it on a slide for you tonight, but humility defined. Humility is not, it's been defined as it's not thinking highly of yourself, it's not thinking lowly of yourself, it's not thinking of yourself at all. Now, I don't want to take the time for a long discussion here, but when I was down in Myrtle Beach on vacation, my brother-in-law and sister's church, actually one of the adult Sunday school classes, was going through the topic of humility. And I leaned over, and my brother-in-law was co-teaching it. And he brought up, it was interesting, as they were discussing things, are there ways that we can be humble, but we're actually still thinking of ourselves? And I would say yes. Because how are we to, so that is not a complete definition of humility. It's on the right track. Okay, it's on the right track, but that's a definition that I've been hearing since I was a kid. And it's not that we don't think of ourselves at all, because how are we going to grow spiritually if we're not thinking of ourselves? You can't absently say, okay, God, help me grow in this and not think about how you're going to grow. So if that's not a full understanding of it, well, John Calvin said this about humility in his Institutes of the Christian Religion. He said, "'Christian humility consists in laying aside the imaginary idea of our own righteousness and trusting entirely to the mercy of God, apprehended by faith in Christ.'" Jonathan Edwards, in a shorter definition of humility, said this, "'Humility is having a right sense and estimate of oneself before God and others.'" And so a couple others kind of rephrased that, and I really like this idea of rephrasing that and putting our own little spin on it. Having a right view of yourself in relation to God and others. Humility is having a right view of yourself in relation to God and others. So in order to be humble we need to understand what is it, how are we to live in relation to God? How are we to view ourselves in relation to a holy God? And how are we to live in relation to those around us? We even saw this morning in the text we looked at this morning that that part of, as we, actually I just got my own text mixed up with, I knew that was going to happen, but I'll get to the verse that I was going to talk about in a minute. It's actually in the text tonight, not on repentance. That's what happens when you're not used to studying two messages every week. But Calvin also states this as the purpose of our lives. He says, So part of humility is also the glory of God. Humility in our lives, we are to bring about the holiness and show the glory of God. If our purpose in life is to glorify God, and it is, then a key way we glorify God is living humbly before others and Him. The big idea this evening is just simply this, that humility facilitates God's grace in the Christian life, enabling them to serve others and to trust God. Look at our text this evening, 1 Peter 5. We're going to start in verse 5. You younger men, likewise, be subject to your elders, and all of you clothe yourselves with humility toward one another. For God is opposed to the proud, but gives grace to the humble. Therefore, humble yourselves unto the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you at the proper time, casting all your anxiety on him, because he cares for you. Be of sober spirit, be on the alert. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. But resist him, firming your faith, knowing that the same experiences of suffering are being accomplished by your brethren who are in the world. After you have suffered for a little while, the God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself perfect, confirm, strengthen, and establish you. To him be dominion forever and ever. Amen. And we won't be looking at verses 10, really 8 through 11 that much. Really, it's interesting in the text here. Peter transitions from speaking of really giving a consistent idea that goes down through verse 7, and then he branches off and he has a bunch of individual commands. Now you can link them back to humility. But there are individual commands that he's giving here. So to give a little more context to this, chapter 5 verse 1, he actually begins by writing specifically to elders, to pastors. And he talks about how pastors are to have really humility in exercising and shepherding the flock of God. And then he comes down and says, "'Nor yet is Lord in it over those allotted to your charge, but proving to be examples to the flock, When the chief shepherd appears, you will receive the unfading crown of glory. And then he comes to verse 5. You younger men likewise be subject to your elders. And all of you. And so here is where he transitions from talking about just pastors and the younger and the older concept. And he uses this phrase and he says, and all of you. He's not speaking of just all the young people or all the elders. He's speaking of everyone that he's writing to. The language here, Paul is saying he's transitioning into speaking and says, okay, this is how pastors are to live. This is how they're to act. This is how they're to shepherd. Younger men, this is how you're to respond to those who are older. Now, everyone, Clothe yourselves with humility. Christians are commanded to live in humility toward one another. Christians are commanded to live in humility toward one another. The language here, it's an imperative that he uses here. The idea of clothing yourselves is really an imperative that Peter is giving. So working off our definitions of humility, we see humility is grounded in knowing our need for God and our need to depend on God. As we looked at, as I quoted Proverbs 3, 5, and 6 about trusting the Lord with all of our heart, in order to live this verse out, humility is necessary. When it comes to living out humility toward one another, Peter gives a command to the Christian. This command is to clothe oneself in humility. It's not, so the idea of clothes. We all got up this morning and put clothes on. That means that our lives have got to be covered in humility. That humility has got to be a part of all that we do, all that we say, all that we think. And it's not something that we just put on and wear the rest of our lives. It's something that we're going to have to make a decision about every single day that we put on humility. If you ever come across a situation in your life where maybe it's at work and that co-worker or that boss comes to you and says something to you and maybe you are in the wrong but you don't really think you are because you're always right. The boss is always wrong. And you have this fighting inside of like, okay, now that temptation is there. Now what are you going to do? Are you going to clothe yourself in humility? Or are you going to let that arrogant, proud, selfish flesh rule and win? Peter here is saying, clothe ourselves with humility toward one another. Now when it comes to humility, There is a thing called false humility. False humility is kind of like a backhanded way of saying, I'm better than you. This looks like when you may have done something in church or for someone and you receive a compliment for it and you say something along these lines, it wasn't that great, it's no big deal. Really, is that real humility? Not really. Because it is a big deal to God if you're serving him. It is a big deal to God. It is something to be praised. He's allowing you to receive the praise that you can then shift that praise to God. Other examples of false humility we often fall prey to are, have you ever been around someone or maybe you're guilty of this, fishing for compliments? Hey, how do you start saying things about maybe something you've done, or you compliment somebody else so that they'll compliment you? What about deflecting praise? Or self-deprecating jokes? And you down your own self all the time. I'm not that great. I'm not that good at this. I'm not that great. It's okay. See, true humility is marked by serving one another. And Peter here is saying, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another. So what does that look like? What does it look like to put on humility toward one another? If you have your Bible, go over to Philippians chapter 2. Philippians chapter 2. Another familiar passage. Philippians chapter 2 verse 1 says this, Therefore, if there is any encouragement in Christ, if there is any consolation of love, if there is any fellowship of the Spirit, if any affection and compassion, Make my joy complete by being of the same mind, maintaining the same love, united in spirit, intent on one purpose. Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind, regard one another as more important than yourselves. Do not merely look out for your own personal interests, but also for the interests of others. Briefly this evening, as we look at this passage here, how does humility show itself? Well, in this passage, we first of all see in verse 2, there's a unity of mind, a being of the same mind. In order for us to be of the same mind, we have to be clothed in humility. And Paul here in Philippians is writing, he is encouraging the church in Philippi to have the same mind, to think the same way. As those of us, the longer that we have been married, the more and more that we begin to think in line on things. And it's, I don't want to say scary, I just feel bad for her that she's thinking the same way I am. I'm blessed to think anything like her. But that unity of mind, thinking the same way, going on after unity of mind, there's maintaining the same love. We need to be expressing a mutual love for one another. Humility is expressing a mutual love for one another. That's not just a love that, hey, I care about what's going on in your life, just a general kind of concept. It's, I care about you and what's going on in your life. It's really encouraging to see all the prayer that's going out and things like that as comments go across our community group. It encourages my heart every time I see it. It's expressing that mutual love for each other. But we need to make sure that we're checking our own lives and asking God and the Spirit of God to continually check us. Do I have that love that is what? It's the mind of Christ as we see in verse 5 of this passage. It all comes from and seeing the example of Christ later on in chapter 2. The same mind, united in spirit. What is Paul talking about here? It's we're acting as if we are one person. In order to act as one person as a church family, we have to humble ourselves, because we aren't all going to agree on anything, on one thing. There are going to be some disagreements, but that's okay. We need to make sure, though, that we are united in mind, united in love, united in spirit. And then he uses the phrase, united in purpose, intent on one purpose. And we know from the overall context of Philippians, the purpose that Paul is getting at is the gospel. But it's Christ. It's really, again, it's emphasizing, Paul's again emphasizing that common mindset. That common mindset. And then he continues on and he says, unselfish. Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit. But, what is it? With humility of mind, regard others more important than yourself by looking out for their own interests. You mean that means I might have to not do something because it might benefit somebody else? I've heard this question asked of me on other topics, and it's somewhat related to this, but it's like, does that mean I need to live according to what other people think? Well, if what other people think is biblical, and you're going to help them grow by submitting to them and showing the humility in that, then yes! then yes. If I know that there's a certain thing that's going to encourage Michael to grow spiritually. Biblically, we see precedence for me to humble myself so that he can grow spiritually. It's regarding others as more important than yourself by looking out for their interests. One commentator said this, at its core, this humility that Jesus and the apostles preach is the mindset that puts the needs of others first, that diminishes oneself for the sake of ministering to others, as seen in Philippians 2, 1 through 11. Do you so desire to see others grow spiritually that you're willing to humble yourself and maybe what you would like to do, Have you ever been invited to someone's house and you just didn't feel like going? As a pastor, I'll have to admit there are times where that's happened in my life. I remember in Illinois there's a couple times where last minute we were invited to someone's home and Liz comes up to me and tells me and I'm like, I really don't want to go. Okay, let's go. You know, I have a good time and things like that, and it's a blessing to be with them, but it's my flesh. I have to humble myself. I have to humble my own things, and it's wrong for me to have this mindset of, I'm better than them. My time is more important than theirs. In fact, all throughout 1 Thessalonians, Paul discusses the one another relationships that take place within the church. See, proper relationships in the Church, smooth relationships in the Church can be preserved if the entire congregation adorns itself with humility. See, it really is simple not to have arguments in church. It's just be humble. It's simple. It's not always easy, because our flesh sprouts out. But we need to adorn ourselves in humility. Another, Thomas Schreiner, said this, Humility is the oil that allows relationships in the church to run smoothly and lovingly. We as a church must be acting unselfishly and with one mind and purpose. We are to have the mind of Christ. We'll come back here, jumping back now to our main text, 1 Peter 5. We'll come back to verse 5 here in a moment. But I'm doing it a little bit out of order to keep you on your toes. Because the end of verse 5 gives us the theological reason for what Peter is talking about here. And I want to end with that as our third point. So our second point this evening is that Christians are commanded to live in humility under God. So we're commanded to live in humility with one another. And then he goes on in verse 6 and says, therefore, because of before, because of verse 5, because of the theological principle there in verse 5, therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God. I don't know about you, but that sounds kind of imposing. The mighty hand of God. But we're to submit ourselves to God and his might. God, through Peter, commands us to live humbly before others and here under God. So the recipients of this letter, by the way, the recipients of the letter of 1 Peter, were dealing with suffering. We're dealing with persecution. We're dealing with a lot of those things. So take that context. And here he says, therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God. They're going through all these different things in their life. struggling with all these different things. And God says through Peter, humble yourself under my mighty hand. Can you see where the encouragement comes from that? See, when we humble ourselves under God's mighty hand, it's us placing our trust, our faith in God and his power to accomplish what he wants to accomplish in our lives through whatever we're going through. And sometimes that is difficult. There are church family members that are going through difficult things right now. And as we submit ourselves under the mighty hand of God, it is that that helps lift us up, that gives us the joy, that gives us the strength to make it through. Our ability to humble among each other truly flows from our ability to humble ourselves before God. If we aren't humbling ourselves before God, we're not going to humble ourselves before one another. It is vital we humble ourselves before God. In fact, humility is vital to true repentance, as we looked at this morning. But humility before God says that one's trust and dependence is properly placed where it needs to be. This humility is not a passive humility where we sit around waiting for an opportunity to be humiliated. And that doesn't mean made fun of. That just simply means being humbled by God. Because there may be those situations in our lives, right, where we're actually not living humbly before God, but God does something in our lives to humble us, to bring about that humility. That's always a scary place to be. It's always an unfun place to be. But if we respond right in those situations, it's humbly, it's a glorious result after the fact as we grow in Christ. God deals with us as his children. He's not, as the world thinks of the word of submission and things that way, God's not this heavy-handed dictator. He deals with us as children. In fact, we even see in Hebrews how He deals with us. He disciplines us, Hebrews 12, as His children. So just as the Lord delivered His people from Egypt, so He would vindicate His people in Asia Minor who suffered, the image of a mighty hand emphasizes the power of God. We see all throughout Scripture the idea, so this phrase, the mighty hand of God, was used often in relation to Israel during the Exodus. God's mighty hand was on the nation of Israel. That image emphasizes the power of God. So what Peter is saying here is that we are to humble ourselves under the power of God. You want to defeat that sin in your life, like we talked about this morning? Humble yourselves unto the power of God. When we look at living out humility before God, it will help to enrich the church and her ministry. In fact, Peter here actually somewhat quotes from a similar passage in Proverbs 3, verse 34, where it reads, Though he scoffs at the scoffers, yet he gives grace to the afflicted. Look at the end of verse 5. God is opposed to the proud, scoffs the scoffers, but gives grace to the humble, but he gives grace to the afflicted. The alternative to living humbly before God is living proudly and arrogantly. It is living in your own might and capability. Arrogance and pride only brings turmoil, disappointment, and a broken relationship with God and often those around us. God has no room to reward those who think they deserve God's reward. God in his grace wants to lift up those who are righteous. Jesus himself says in Matthew 11, 29, take my yoke upon you and learn from me. For I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls." It shares Christ's heart. So where does God desire us to humble ourselves? If we're to humble ourselves under His mighty hand, how does He want us to humble ourselves? And what are some things that He desires us to live? How He desires us to live? Well, the husband is not the Lord over his wife. We're to submit to God in these things. The wife is to submit to her husband. Children are to submit to parents. Christians are to submit to the chastening of the Lord. Workers are to submit to bosses. Church members are to submit to the authority of God that has been placed over them. These are just a few areas we are to humble ourselves before God. To those who humble themselves in church will have no problem submitting to proper authority. When we are submitting ourselves under the mighty hand of God into one another, when we go out there, it's not going to be hard to submit. It's not going to be hard to humble ourselves. Because one, we are in such a practice of it and we are thinking, because when we humble ourselves before God, we are thinking of God first and foremost. When we humble ourselves before others, with others, we are what? We are thinking of them. We are having that right view of self before God and before man. And the neat thing that comes along with humility often is a love and a concern for that person. Maybe there's that coworker that it's just hard to humble yourself before God and to that person and love them. And to think of them before yourself. How often do you take the time to just pray for them? See, giving authority to someone or to some tradition involves being humble. Giving up authority in your own life is the idea of humility. It's subjecting yourself to something else. It's an understanding that the person or tradition has something to teach us. We can all learn from each other. And we know that we can all learn from God. How are you humbling yourself before God? Are you humbling yourself and submitting yourself to what God wants you, to how God wants you? Are you submitting yourself under the mighty hand of God? That brings us back to the theological principle. Look at the end of verse 5. I've already said it once, but God is opposed to the proud, but gives grace to the humble. I don't know about you, but I don't want to be in opposition to God. I don't want to be, as James puts it, in enmity with God. I don't want to be on the opposite side. I don't want God to be His discipline and the punishment of God on my life. We know as Christians we're not judged for our sin, but God does punish us in the sense that we think of the word punishment. But the joy here is the positive. Let's look at the positive here in this theological principle. God is opposed to the proud, but what? Gives grace to the humble. God divinely favors us. He favors you. He favors the humble, but he's opposed to the proud. God bestows his favor on those who acknowledge their need of him. God gives grace to the one who elevates God and has a right, understands who he is before God and who he is before others. And what does it say that God does? blesses the humble. How does He bless the humble? Well, we see that what He may exalt you, verse 6, He may exalt you at the proper time. Now some refer to this phrase proper time as the here and the now. I truly believe that it's referring to that day when we will be with the Lord, the day of our glorification. God will exalt us at that point. But either way, the fact that this passage is saying that those who humble themselves under the mighty hand of God, God will exalt, will raise up, will bless. God's grace is amazing and will lift us high for all eternity. Also, humility manifests through dependence on God through life's concerns. Look at verse 7. A very familiar verse to all of us, but I think sometimes it's taken out of the context of which we find it. Casting all your anxiety on Him because He cares for you. This is in the context of humbling ourselves before God. So, if we aren't humbling ourselves before God, that anxiety is not going away. It says, Therefore, humble yourselves unto the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in the proper time, casting, because of who God is, because of his power, Cast all your anxiety on Him because He cares for you. We need to humble ourselves under the power of God and truly give our cares, our concerns to Him. And that is through the process of humility. Have you ever had something going where there's so much stress that you just can't sleep? I know I have. You know those nights where, and it's a horrible feeling, because you can feel your flesh just wanting the anxiety to keep on going. Wanting that worry to keep on going. And it seems like you go an hour or two without sleep, you're like, God, I've been quoting scripture for two hours. Why isn't anything working? Perhaps it's because we haven't truly humbled ourselves under the mighty hand of God and truly said, God, it's yours. This is yours. Micah 6.8 He has told you, O man, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God? In many ways, this echoes what Peter is talking about. Now, Micah 6.8 is not talking to us directly. He's not speaking directly to us with this verse. But the principle is, what does this verse tell us? We can look at this verse and say, what does this tell us about God? It tells us that God desires to what? For us to walk humbly with Him. In fact, we compare it to what Peter is saying, and even what Paul says in Ephesians chapter 4 through 6. Peter is saying what? To humble ourselves unto the mighty hand of God. We're to humble ourselves to one another. In that humbling up to one another, there's what? There's kindness to be exuded. In Ephesians chapter 4, we see that we're to live righteously. We're to be kind and forgiving toward others. And we see that humility is inherent in the true attitude of forgiveness. You can't truly forgive without humility. So this evening has been a reminder, a simple reminder of our struggle to live humbly with others and seek ways of serving others. It has reminded us the command and responsibility we have to live humbly before God. Are you struggling with humility tonight? Are you struggling with humbling yourself towards one another under the mighty hand of God? Because our big idea this evening is that humility facilitates God's grace in the Christian's life, enabling them to serve others and to trust God. Heavenly Father, thank you so much for who you are. Lord, I thank you for your word. I thank you for this truth. There could be so much said and applied and shared about true biblical humility. I know we just scratched the surface this evening. Oh Lord, I pray that we would have a positive, that humility would impact our lives in a positive way. That we would truly submit ourselves to one another, that we would humble ourselves before each other and under your mighty hand. Because you give grace to those who are humble. We thank you and we praise you for this evening. May you receive all the honor and glory, in Jesus' name we pray, amen.