Daily Diary - January 18th 2016

Humble Yourself

We have all heard the saying be humble.  It is hard for us to understand the value in humility, but it is an important part of our foundation and walk with God. 

The reason we must be humble is because it is and admission of God being in control.  It is aligning ourselves with God as our Lord and creator.  Basically if God can create us, and promise that He has a plan for us, then therefore He has the ability to fulfill our perfect destiny. 

Question of the Day: How many things in our lives are we pridefully pushing into action without being humble and asking God to be our guide? How many times do we allow our flesh to get in God’s way?

When we leave God out of things our outcome is never “complete” and has tainted value!

Webster’s Dictionary defines Lord as: someone or something having power, authority, or influence.

 1 Peter 5:6-7 Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time, ⁷ casting all your care upon Him, for He cares for you.  This scripture makes it clear that we need God to be in power and authority over our lives, meaning He is our Lord based on the definition.

James 4:10 Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up.

To humble ourselves basically means that we are getting out of God’s way and allowing His will to be done even if our flesh argues with the transformation from our fleshly desires over to an amazing spirit filled life.

Personal Perspective:  When I first became a coach at the age of twenty-two, I was looking for identity. I believed our success on the field was about me as the leader and I was at least partly deserving of the credit. There were ups and down as far as on the field success was concerned, but the foundation and the perspective of the teams were tainted. It was murky and cluttered.

In 2001 I became the head coach of the Oklahoma Travelers. We were in a situation to move the team to a new city and get a fresh start. The move was a good one on many fronts. I remembered praying about where to go with the team. I was building a relationship with God and knew in my heart that Elk City was the answer. When I discussed the move with others, it was a consensus that it would never work. Elk City had been a rivalry of sorts for years and bad feelings and relationships had been created.

The decision to go to Elk was firm in my heart, and I was certain that the Holy Spirit had confirmed the move. The transition to Elk City was smooth and success was immediate. We became Regional Champions and made our way to the second World Series in program history.

I had begun to operate in what the Word of God had taught me. Make yourself of no reputation and be humble. Give God the glory! He was the focus of our success. I began to give the players and assistant coaches’ praise for their hard work. My spirit was in check. We can choose to not want the glory. The success was wrapped up in not wanting praise or credit for the success. I had “laid my Isaac down,” similar to Abraham laying down Isaac because he had become more important in his life than God.

Baseball was that Isaac in my life. I had previously placed it ahead of God.  It wasn’t about pride anymore. We were helping kids gain a perspective that would help them in life.

That foundation transformed into success on the field as well. I learned if you do it the way God planned it, then all things worked out according to His will. He was super- naturally transforming our team concept into an unstoppable organization. The foundation of the Word of God works in every aspect.

Circumstances in life provide us opportunities daily to humble ourselves.  It takes conditions that we face to give us a conscience choice to be humble. 

1 Samuel 2:7 The Lord sends poverty and wealth; he humbles and he exalts.

I believe that we will continue to face challenges and obstacles throughout life. Each time we will be presented with an opportunity to become humble or take our own fleshly prideful path.  One has a positive eternal destiny with the promise that God will lift you up and the other will simply postpone your failure until you go around the same or similar mountain again and face the same choice. 

“Life can be miserable without the peace of knowing God is your Lord!”

Proverbs 16:18 Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall.

Based on God’s word in 1 Peter chapter 5 we have the opportunity to be exalted by God in “due time”, because He cares for us.  Being exalted is when we align with God and He gets the glory.  We are capable of achieving every goal we have in life with a humble plan that places God at the helm of our outcomes.

We must conclude that God has a great plan for us because “He cares for us”.

He cared enough to send His son to the cross so that we could choose life in Him.  That choice is directly related to our humility, which also is declaring that He is God and Lord. 

Global Perspective:  As a Christian we must learn to evaluate a person’s vocabulary and how much they refer to themselves, especially the use of the Word I. This brought me a new perspective about how to listen to people.  When they use the word I repeatedly most often they are consumed in themselves as their own master and have exalted themselves. 

2 Corinthians 10:4-5⁴ For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds, ⁵ casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God,

It is clear to see how our global leaders most often refer to themselves as the source for us all rather than God himself.  America especially has been a nation “UNDER GOD” for this very reason.

We must be reminded of this scripture that is found in 2 Chronicles

2 Chronicles 7:14 if my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land.

This scripture tells us to humble ourselves and “PRAY”.  So many times we leave out part of God’s word. 

This scripture also implies that if we are not humble and don't pray then our ways are "wicked".

Question:  Are our Worldly leaders humbling themselves and praying?

We need to elect people for government that will humble themselves before God and Pray!  Period.  This is not hard.

Father, we pray for you to bring ourselves, and this nation to a humble position that recognizes you as Lord. We thank you for caring for us in a way that brings us peace and joy in life in Jesus Name! Amen.