Humility – 19-Mar-2023

by Pastor Roy Esposito

Micah 6:8 (AMP)” He has told you. O man. What is good, and what does the Lord require of you, except to be just and to love [ and diligently practice] kindness and compassion, and to walk humbly with your God [ setting aside any overblown sense of importance or self-righteousness]?

Humility will lead us to the  Honesty we need to be able to “commit our works to the Lord ” and have our thoughts established by Him. (Proverbs 16:3)

Last week: Our thoughts frame the reality we operate in.

Proverbs 23:7 –” For as a man thinks in his HEART, so is he.

The Heart – is the “central command hub” through which God communicates with us.

Jeremiah 17:9 – Says that the human heart is deceitful above ALL things and desperately wicked. (Even the devil?)

If our hearts are unhealed, all of our works will be tainted and essentially dishonest.

Unhealed hearts have a distracted focus on God and a distorted view of the reality of His love for us.

A distorted view of God’s love for us will cause us to seek OTHER things to fill the void of the disconnect we feel with God.

Psychological terms: Attachments     Spiritual / Religious terms: IDOLS.

God’s solution:  Ezekiel 36:26 and Jeremiah 31:33 – Promise to give those who seek Him – “New Hearts.”

Hebrews 10b-11 (TPT)“…I will embed my laws within their thoughts and fasten them to their hearts. I will be their loyal God, and they will be my loyal people.

There will be no need to teach their fellow citizens or brothers by saying ‘You should know the Lord’ since everyone will know Me INWARDLY….”

God is FOR us, church!  He’s ALL IN and fully committed to us.

Our part: Is simply not to run away from Him!

Many run away from God through False Pride – an “I can do it on my own.”

Pride, in this sense, is not just boasting.

Pride creates an illusionary life: a False Self behind which we can hide: from others, ourselves, and ultimately from God.

We become afraid of God because, down deep, we know God as “The Truth.”

Our spirit knows this, and our consciousness confirms it to our soul, causing it to be unable to rest and be at peace. We doubt God’s love for us and His commitment to us.

Humility – puts an end to all this.   

Follow this Flow Chart:

Humility >> Honesty >> Truth >> Self-discovery >> Healing >> Liberty >>
Ability to Liberate Others.

Walking in Truth sets us free to create a Safe Space for others to discover themselves in God without fearing guilt or accusation.

This becomes the ultimate expression of the Hospitality we can offer to those walking the spiritual path.

But first, we must come to our Humility – the “Get over yourself” exercise.

Colossians 3:2 (NLT) “Let heaven fill your thoughts.

Philippians 4:8 “Fix your thoughts on things that are true, honorable, and right.”

TPT – Authentic, real, honorable, admirable, beautiful, respectful, pure, holy, merciful, and kind.

God is FOR us – it’s true.  But it’s through our expression of humility that we allow Him to be so!

Humility allows His power to become magnified in our lives by agreeing with Him on the present state and condition of our being.

When we can concede that we are angry, selfish, lustful, or deceitful – God can respond on our behalf and grant us the grace to overcome whatever obstacle we face and get free of its influence.

Isaiah 57:18-19 (Message) “When I looked and saw what they were doing, I decided to heal them, and lead them, and comfort them, creating a new language of Praise for mourning, Peace for the far-off, Peace to the near at hand, says the Lord! Yes, I will heal them.”

The healing spoken of here is not just physical or even emotional; It also heals an infected soul of “sin-sickness.”

Humility – allows us to acknowledge our needs and allows those needs to become the “voice of our prayers.”

Our prayers then are transformed from mere petitions for help to  “communications of truth” – and open to God.

They go from being “head prayers” to “heart prayers” based on TRUTH.

Our Heart Prayers become the “voice of our dependency.

It’s the place where we not only bring our needs to God but we leave them there with Him, transferring them to Him.

Strong-willed, independent people never pray this way, but humble people do because they’ve come to realize that willpower will never be enough to fill the void they feel.

So, why don’t people pray from a humble heart more often? 

Many haven’t yet learned to really trust God and remain suspicious and afraid of Him.

FEAR of losing control over the conditions and circumstances of their life and of the lives of their loved ones.

The Prayer of Fear can do little to alter anything in our lives and will most likely keep us bound to the conditions we’re most afraid of.

The Prayer of Faith, though, is a powerful thing.

It takes just a tiny smidge of it to change stuff dramatically. (Mustard Seed)

Faith (Trust in God) is powerful in that it is the means through which we can appropriate Grace.

The Good News is: – Faith is the by-product of Humility.

                              – Fear is always displaced by it!

We can now read the scriptures with fresh, faith-filled eyesight: 

2 Chronicles 7:14 – “If My people who are called by My name will humble themselves and pray – I will hear from heaven and HEAL them.” 

Now, we no longer pray from FEAR but from PROMISE as our prayers become an expression of our growing trust in God.

These are called “The Prayers of the Restful” or Hesychastic Prayers

Our circumstances don’t necessarily change –the world is still a dangerous and threatening place – but. 

The prayer empowered by faith transforms the world by transforming the heart of the one offering the prayer.

A transformed heart transforms our thinking, and we become the result of our new thought patterns. (“As a man thinks in his heart, so is he.” – Proverbs 23:7)

The key seems to be trusting God more with our lives.

This can seem risky because little in our “normal” life supports it.

To trust God is counterintuitive to the natural mind, which tells us:

  1. “Bad things happen to good and innocent people.”
  2. “Whoever collects the most ‘toys’ before they die wins.”

Sentiments like these communicate several messages:

              If you put yourself in God’s hands, you are:

  1. Superstitious
  2. Ignorant
  3. Irresponsible
  4. Maybe a bit psychotic.

(And these are just the theologians speaking!)

But today, I believe God is calling to those who are seeking more,

 “Rise Up! Ascend into this realm; I want to show you things to come.” –  Revelation 4:1

But we can Rise Up only through letting go of that which tethers us to this realm and restricts the depth of our understanding to what we already know.

If you desire to answer His call –  Stay humble and honestly try to take an inventory of your current state of being.  He has promised those who will, A New Heart that will be close to His.