The Example - Day 9

​Jesus is our example to follow when it comes to discipleship. When I think of how Jesus was, I think about humility and being humble. Jesus left the right hand of God in heaven to come to this earth incarnate and to suffer in every way so that He could be our high priest. He came here in the form of a man and suffered in every way, he was humiliated, persecuted, tested, tempted, harassed, beaten, and crucified on the cross for us. His life is “the” Example of self-sacrifice and the perfect illustration of humility for us to follow as we try to grow as disciples. Before we dig too deep into humility today, I want to look at what discipleship means. According to dictionary.com, a disciple is, “any follower of Christ.”  Based on that definition, we are all disciples as Christians because we follow Jesus and his teachings. A disciple is someone who disciplines themselves to follow Jesus. 
With our understanding of a disciple and discipleship in place, how then does humility come into play regarding discipleship?  The focus for this devotional is going to be on pride and how pride can destroy us. When we become prideful, we try to do things on our own power and without the strength of our Lord and Savior who gives us strength in all things. Pride is the opposite of humility. Proverbs 16:18 says, Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall.  This means when we get prideful, our failure and fall are soon to follow. Another Proverb says, when pride comes, then comes disgrace, but with humility comes wisdom.  The Bible is clear that pride and arrogance is a problem, and our natural tendency is to be prideful over being humble.
In fact, the world has corrupted the definition of humility and turned it into something that is related to weak, lowly, or even insignificant. These are not synonyms for humility; humility is not thinking less of your self, it is just thinking of your self less. It doesn’t mean we are weak or soft, but that we are servants of the highest God. God gives grace to those who are humble, but he opposes the proud (James 4:6).
Sometimes we get caught up with the world and get put into chest puffing contests where we need to try to proclaim our dominance and that we are better than others, and better than what we really are. We try to build ourselves up to make us feel good and live on a PETA-stool. The reality is we are all struggling, and everyone has issues that we don’t need to hide from one another but admit those issues through humility. When we confess who we are and what we are, we receive the grace and protection form the Lord, and he finds favor upon us.
Jesus is our example of humility, and he was the king of kings and prince of peace. He could have called down angels at any time to crush those who were against him and persecuting Him, but he remained humble. When he was called, “good,” He diverted that towards the Father who He stated was the only one that is truly good. He stated that he came to serve, not to be served even though he was a king (Matthew, 20:25).  Jesus was the essence of someone who could have been full of pride and arrogance, but instead, he was full of love and humility.
If we are to develop as disciples and learn true discipleship, we must look towards Jesus as our example and try to live as He did, through humility. We need to remember we have nothing to prove to others, and that our worth and identity is found in Christ Jesus, not of the world and what others think. If we can remember these two points, Jesus as our example, and Jesus is where we get our worth, we can keep the pride monster at bay.
My challenge for today is for you to reflect on if you are prideful or humble?  Are you puffing your self-up to others or are you living a life of humility and servanthood? The great news is that Gods mercies are made new every day and if you need to make adjustments, today is a new day, make the changes and grow in discipleship as we grow together!
God Bless!