Your New Clothes

A couple of days ago I blogged about Paul's prayer in Colossians 1 that was, for me, quite timely. Yesterday my devotional reading took me to Colossians 2, which is amazing, but about which I didn't have time to blog because I was doing home school with my son and passing out door hangers for our Trunk or Treat this Sunday. (By the way, if you live in central Ohio, you should definitely come to our Trunk or Treat. There will be candy, and the candy will be free. Do you need another reason?)

So today I came to Colossians 3, which is also thoroughly amazing. (You know what, maybe you should go read the whole book of Colossians. It's really great.) Here is a portion of what struck me today:

Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity.

What are you wearing today? I'm wearing my favorite Ohio State zip-up; but am I wearing compassion? Are you wearing kindness and humility in such a way that people notice the quality of your character the same way they notice the clothes on your body? When they see you coming, do they see a red shirt and blue jeans, or do they see a person who is gentle and patient?

I'm not trying to guilt you; I'm trying to change your perspective about the person you could possibly be. You really could be a person whose compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience (all held together by agape love) is as evident to others as the clothes you wear. You really can possess these qualities of character because this is exactly what God is trying to do in your heart. He is remaking you--reclothing you. Through the power and presence of the Holy Spirit, and by faith in Jesus Christ, God is slowly but surely remaking your character so that you possess these qualities.

Your responsibility is to put on the clothes. Sure, it may not feel natural at first. Yes, you may feel like a hypocrite in the beginning. But the only way to live into this new character God is forming in you is to actually try it. You've got to give it some effort. (Remember, you're saved by grace, but you're changed by active cooperation with God.) Because compassion et. al. don't come naturally to us, we have to choose to live that way. So put on your new clothes; they look much better on you than what you were wearing before.

Ember Church Core Values: Humility

The second of our seven core values is humility. In the early stages of our launch meetings, I wrote up a document called Foundational Theology: The Humility of God. You can view this document here. Basically, I tried to assert that all of God's attributes--everything he is and all that he does--flows out of his humility; beneath all else, God is humble.

Humility

At the root of everything God is and does, and all that he calls us to do and be, is humility. Pride is the fundamental betrayal of the way of life Jesus gave us. We strive to maintain an attitude of humility toward God, one another, other churches, and the unbelieving world.

You cannot maintain an arrogant attitude toward God and expect him to a) bless you, or b) put up with it. The Scriptures say, again and again, that God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble. Proud and arrogant people simply do not receive the grace of God, not so much because God withholds it from them, but because they refuse to accept it.

The new way of being human into which God has called us through faith in Jesus demands that we have humble hearts toward one another. Pride is the disease that kills the body of Christ on earth. Pride makes the bride of Christ ugly and unpresentable. Humility, however, is like medicine, instantly attacking the disease of pride and destroying it. Humility is essential if the church is to work the way God has designed it to work.

Ember is just one of many churches in our area, and we want to work with the churches around us to advance the rule and reign of Jesus the King. That means that we will honor what God has done and is doing elsewhere. We aren't the best church around. We haven't got it all figured out. We've written about this in our Philosophy of Ministry:

We are not the only people doing this. God is working through many local churches in our community to spread the gospel and advance his kingdom. Many of these churches do everything we do and more, and they do it much better than we can. We will work to partner with these other churches with the sense that we all make up a singular, universal body of Christ on earth.

Finally, and maybe most importantly, we want to have humble hearts and attitudes toward those that do not believe in Jesus. In a world overflowing with blustering arrogance blowing from every corner--religious, secular, political, entertainment--maybe humility will be the most convincing apologetic that Jesus the King really did lay down his life on the cross for the sins of us all.

Humility is hard. Pride comes naturally to just about everyone of us. But by the grace of God, we will fight off the creeping pride of our hearts and look to model the deep humility we find in the heart of God.

Preaching Essentials: Humility

Seeing how this is a blog by a preacher (sometimes, anyway), I thought I should occasionally talk about preaching. So this is the first in a series of posts called "Preaching Essentials". As I've studied preaching in seminary, listened to great preachers, and done a little bit of it myself, I've developed a particular philosophy of preaching. These posts will be my attempt to communicate that philosophy to those of you who are interested, which is probably a small percentage of you. Hopefully, if you are a preacher, you'll find something of value here.

Now to it.

Humility is the most important thing in the world, and therefore it is the most important thing in preaching. The preacher must be humble. There is nothing less tolerable and more awkward than an arrogant preacher. Oh, let me guess, you're the hero of this story, too? Ah, another personal illustration of how godly you are! Let me give you some practical advice: Never tell a story that makes you look good.

You need to understand that the congregation assumes, simply by the mere fact that you are preaching, that you are more mature, more spiritual, and just plain better than they are. They expect you to have wisdom they need. They anticipate that you will say something that will change their lives. They are willing to sit, in silence, and listen to you talk without interruption for up to an hour. You, preacher, are highly-esteemed and wield a power that is unparalleled by any other vocation in our soundbite, jump cut, 140-character tweet culture. If you do not come to the task with humility, therefore, it will swallow you whole.

The preacher's responsibility is to step down from the pedestal upon which he has been placed by the congregation. God, alone, can be lifted up. You cannot take his place. If you stand too tall you will block the congregation's view of the risen Christ. So how can a preacher stay humble?

Don't Take Yourself Too Seriously

Your task is important, but you are not. Don't get caught up thinking that you're going to save the world through your preaching. That's ridiculous. God's going to save the world through his Son, you just get to talk about him.

Be Self-Effacing

Make fun of yourself. Be open about your shortcomings. Tell stories about how you've gotten it wrong. Name your sin before the congregation. Too many preachers think they have to maintain some kind of image in the society of their church, but that kind of image is from the devil. The only image you need to maintain is the broken-but-being-repaired image of God you carry with you everywhere.

Praise Others

If you're going to share a personal illustration, make sure it's one where someone else in your church comes out looking good. Heap praise on other staff members. If you share a pulpit, talk up the other preachers on your team. And, most importantly, mean it.

Be Respectful of Opposing Viewpoints

Who knows, but maybe you're not nearly as right as you think you are. Don't let arrogance seep out of your soul by trashing someone else's viewpoint (or, even worse, someone else's humanity). Talk about it as though you were having a respectful dialogue with someone with whom you're trying to share Jesus.

I'm sure there are other things we could do to demonstrate humility in the pulpit. Maybe you've seen a good or bad example of this: please leave it in the comments so we can all learn. Remember, whether you're a preacher or a CEO or a college student, humility is the most important thing in the world.

dia•spora Sermon: Humility

Take a listen to my sermon on humility. I preached this at our young adult service this past Sunday. You may have also noticed in the right hand column at the top is a new Sermon Player. I intend to upload as many sermons and classes of mine that I can. Check back for future updates.

The Riverbed

Last night I preached a sermon on humility at dia•spora, our service of mostly young adults and young families. Humility is one of those topics that doesn't get covered a lot, probably because most preachers and teachers deem themselves unqualified to speak authoritatively on the subject. (I mean, can you really be an expert on humility? A bit of an oxymoron, isn't it?) But I happen to believe that humility is the most important thing in the world. So, despite my shortcomings, I wanted to address it.

The Bible tells us, on several occasions, that God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble. (Proverbs 3:34, 1 Peter 5:5) In other words, humility is the channel through which God's grace flows to us. It's the riverbed of the River of Life. The deeper the riverbed of humility the greater volume of God's grace flows into your heart.

Of course God's heart is to give us as much grace as we can bear. That's why, I believe, everything that happens to you is an opportunity to humble yourself. God has so ordered creation that it might humble the greatest of creatures--men and women. Life is humbling, and every experience is an opportunity to grow. Every difficult time is an opportunity to learn. We dig the riverbed deeper when we humble ourselves and learn the lessons that God is trying to teach us.

Whatever God is doing in your life, I assure you that part of it is trying to build humility into your soul. God wants that riverbed to be as deep as it can because his reservoir of grace is infinite. Think about the circumstances of your life--the good, the bad and the ugly. Ask God what he's trying to teach you, and specifically how he's trying to teach you humility. Dig the riverbed deeper by humbly obeying him, and enjoy the rush of grace that flows into your heart.