The Priority of Humility

By: Pastor Dennis Yim

New Testament Passage: Ephesians 4:1-3

1 I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to

which you have been called, 2 with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one

another in love, 3 eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. (ESV)

The Apostle Paul makes humility a top priority for us Christians. Life in Christ always starts

with Spirit-wrought humility. But why humility? Why not prioritize anything else but that?

Here’s the reason why: Paul understood that humility helps us to acknowledge our short-

comings, failures, limitations, and it helps us to respond to them by calling out for help to

Jesus and to His people. Humility helps us to acknowledge that we are dependent people, even

though our culture says that we independent, that’s really not true and delusional. We are all

dependent upon someone, but pride hides that truth. But the Christ-like humility helps us to

come to grips with this reality of ourselves and place our trust in His control, our confidence in

His forgiveness and love, and to His openness that allows us to be who He created us to be so

that we may be able to rest in Him – we don’t have to put on a mask and try to be someone that

we’re not to impress Him.

It’s strange but by prioritizing humility this helps us to acknowledge our neediness and weakness

which opens the door to the grace of God where we find His confidence, peace, security,

wisdom, strength and freedom in Him. But if I’m honest with you, I don’t always ask for

humility, usually I ask for strength, wisdom or something like that sort. I suppose many of us

(including myself) don’t ask for humility is because we don’t want to be faced with our

weaknesses, sins, limitations and failures. It can arouse shame. But here’s the good news: Jesus

has given Himself to us, you and I no longer have to live as though we need to prove ourselves to

each other, we have already been deemed righteous in Christ! What Jesus calls us to do now is to

live faithfully as His united people so that the world may see that He is risen and may experience

His unconditional love and shalom. But all of that is only possible if we prioritize Christ’s

humility in our lives.