The Humility of Service

The hallmark of Jesus’ ministry was service and His greatest character trait was humility. This can be clearly seen in Paul’s letter to the Philippians, where he writes that Jesus, “made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death – even death on a cross" (Philippians 2:7-8).

True service, the way Jesus did it and the way we are called to do it requires humility. But humility is not our default characteristic. Instead, we all have the tendency to fall into the oldest sin, the sin of pride. Jesus said, we are to love God with all we've got and love our neighbor as ourselves, but pride removes our ability to love. It causes us to exclude instead of embrace. Pride moves us to judge instead of serve.

Humility has become confusing in our world today. We know we are to become humble, but we’re not if sure it is all that desirable to be humble. At its very root, humility requires us to be self-forgetful and most of us have a difficult time doing that. Instead, we compare ourselves to others, judge others, and show a lack of love to others.

But, the Apostle Paul tells us that in our relationships we are to have the same “mindset as Christ Jesus” (Philippians 2:5). If we do this, if we make our mindset as that of Jesus, who is the Infinite Servant and the most humble person who ever lived, than service and humility will become the hallmark of who we are.

This week, where and with whom can you have the mindset of Jesus? Maybe it is with a family member or a co-worker. Perhaps it is a neighbor or a stranger. We all have connection points in our lives where we can humbly serve another.

~ Tim Hall https://twitter.com/1timothy12 (I encourage feedback, questions & comments - email me at 1timothy46@gmail.com)