Cultivating Humility

I want to share with you two practices that have been my safeguards in the pitfall of ministry pride. In ministry there is always an emphasis on success. Questions are constantly posed like, "how many people attended?" or, "how did it go?" In fact, we do monthly ministry reports as a way of communicating how successful particular areas of ministry were. I remember in the ministry I was in prior to Central, I wrote monthly newsletters where I paraded the very best stories in-front of the readers so they could buy in to what that ministry was up to.

Do you see the pressures that lead to ministry pride? Now I know that pride creeps in in so many different ways. Pride is not exclusive to ministry. So, I think these strategies will be helpful to anyone. There are two that I routinely use:

1. I pray what John the baptist said about his relationship to Jesus, "He must become greater; I must become less" (John 3:30). This simple little statement turned into a prayer becomes a great way to curb pride. The goal in all things is that Christ would be seen as supremely glorious... not me. It changes the way I view any ministry that I might perform. Is it glorifying me, or Christ? Is He becoming greater, or am I? The goal is that Christ would get the credit/ glory. Which leads me to the next thing I do.

2. I remind myself of my gifts and Who gave them to me. For example, I am not a public speaker. Never have been. I am the kid that froze up when he had to give a presentation at school. I am not confident of even talking in a group of 5 people. Sharing at small group makes me get all flush, my palms sweat, and I stumble through words. Now God called me to a preaching ministry. In doing this God wasn't being mean, He just knew that He would get the glory. It is His gifting placed on me. It is not mine. I get to participate but I do not create. Therefore, I want to constantly remind myself that it is a gift. It is not my skill or hard work, but it is God's Spirit working through me. He gets the credit and I get the honor of being the instrument God uses.

Pride is a dangerous sin. If you have no strategy for "putting [pride] to death", it is likely that you will get dominated by it. I hope that these little strategies will help you in your struggle with pride.