Joe Cotta | Sunday AM Service | Humbleness | 1 Pt 5:5-57

Chapel Harvest Valley in Prosser before me and Faye came up this

way, we were on his elder board and it's a it's a fun, fun

little church and he he's great. So welcome Joe Kata, and he's

pretty awesome. Thank you, it's awesome to be

here. I'm from California.

That's when I was born and raised in a family farm and then

moved out to Missouri for five years, came to the tri-cities in

2009. That's where my wife and I

really grew up in the Lord. And, you know, we'll talk a

little bit, Dave, today about, you know, finding your flock

and, you know, the people that you want to hang out with and

grow with and people that can pour into you and people that

you need to pour into. And man, it was just a great

friendship with Nick and Faye just from the very beginning of

moving there. So that's how long I've known

them. They've been pretty awesome in

our lives. Let's pray.

Lord Jesus, we love you, Lord, and we just thank you for all

the good that you give us in our lives.

Lord, we come here wanting to hear a word from you.

And so, Lord, I pray as we go through the message, as we

examine your word, that you're speaking to our hearts, You're

changing us, You're making us more like you, and you're

bringing us to a place. Of.

Spiritual maturity, Lord, more and more every day that we

desire to grow in you and and you are satisfying us Lord, as

we continue to grow and desire. Thank you Jesus, Amen.

You know, we all have a ministry, whether you're a

parent, a spouse, if you're a Christian, you have a ministry

just in regard to the people that you influence.

And it's just how and where you you serve for the.

Effectiveness of the Kingdom and so today we're going to talk

about the one thing that's going determine to to determine your

success in that ministry and the quality.

Is. Humility, and we're going.

To be spending most of our time in first Peter 5 and verses 5

through 7. You can begin turning there if

you'd like, but we're going to pick that apart and examine that

passage, so. You know what gives me the right

to talk about humility? There isn't much, really.

If I tell you, it's because I'm really humble and you need to be

more like me. That doesn't really work.

Actually, it's the opposite, and we need to be looking at the

humility of Jesus. But I do know what happens when

you plant the flag on pride. Things do not go very well, and

I'll give you some of those examples as we go through the

study. Why Will?

The success of your ministry be determined by humility.

Because I can't learn, I can't understand, I can't repent, I

can't forgive, I cannot show any grace or any mercy without

humility. You know where where the the

point in which humility ends and pride begins.

All the understanding stops. All of the repenting stops.

All the forgiving stops. There's no grace and mercy.

It all stops when humility stops.

Pride is the brick wall of your ministry and your relationships.

To your wife, to your kids, to your family, to the people that

work in anything. Pride is the brick wall that

ends everything. Humility will ultimately have

the single greatest say on where we end up in life and in the

effectiveness of our Christian service.

Humility is actually the most desired trait of a pastor.

It's not how much he knows, it's not how much he influences.

It's his humility. When I started going to Calvary

Chapel tri-cities in 2009, I was pretty sure that God wanted me

at that church. I'd been there three times and

just, you know. Anytime I try to go somewhere

else, God would. Just send me back there.

And and then I had some concern about picking Pastor Steve as my

pastor. I thought he was arrogant and

that was a problem. For me, because I was arrogant

and you know, 2 arrogant people in a church don't make for a

happy church, so that wasn't going to work.

And so my wife and I, we went and we met Pastor Steve in his

office and we were going to leave or or go based on how this

this discussion went in his office.

And so I just prayed, God, you got to show me this is really

where you want me to be. There's a lot of things that are

working out here really well, but I just want to make sure

that this one hurdle is, is is removed.

I had just come out of the 7th Day Adventist faith.

I thought I knew way more than than I actually did.

And Steve gently let me know that we started talking about

end times prophecy, and he started talking about the

Millennium. And I was, I'm listening to him.

Talking, that sounded good. I was like, Oh yeah, we, we

believe that too. That's really great.

And he's kind of raising an eyebrows.

I I don't think that's what Adventists believe.

I'm just like, oh. I, it wasn't that hard of a pill

to swallow and that I didn't think I was a Bible expert or

anything like that, but I, I thought I knew more than I

actually did. And I also realized how much I'd

learned, you know, in just three Bible studies and listening to

him as a pastor. In my conversation with him in

that conversation, I didn't say anything about pride or what I

was thinking about or what I thought of him that would have

been rude. And so I just was looking for a

way for the Lord to reveal. Something in the conversation

and in the in the middle of the conversation, as he's talking,

he's completely off the subject. He stops.

He starts talking about humility, and he says, you know,

it's just easy to get a big head when you're a pastor.

And I need to be on guard for those things, and I need to be

careful of that. And just as willingness to say.

I got to watch out for pride was enough for me.

You know, I mean, number one, that's from the Lord.

And #2 this guy, I realized, is just trying to follow the Lord

like I'm trying to follow the Lord.

And neither of us are going to be doing it without making

mistakes. You know, people want to be

around. Humble people, you know, we

actually naturally hope that the humble have success.

You know, we lift them up. We like cheering for the

underdog. The champion gets prideful and

we don't like the champion anymore.

Once he becomes a champion for a while, you know, people allow

the. Influence in their lives of a

humble person. Our success is determined by our

humility. It's not by our spiritual gifts,

it's not by our talents, it's not by our work ethic.

It's really easy to try to outwork people.

But that's not where our success is determined.

It's good. It's not determined by our

knowledge either. Why?

Because without humility, over time, all those things will get

tragically wrecked by pride. You know, they'll all be wasted

and pride will ruin all of it. In John 1, John the Baptist is

asked about his identity and he says, I'm not the Christ.

Are you? The Christ says no.

And that's a humble statement because he knows who he is.

Humility is not just knowing who you are and being who you are,

or it is just knowing those things.

The reason John the Baptist is humble is because the first

thing you need to know to know yourself is Jesus.

Now you need to know Jesus. To know who you are.

John knew who he was, and he knew who he wasn't.

And then when all. Of his followers and disciples

began to leave his ministry and join Jesus's ministry.

John the Baptist humbly said he must increase and I must

decrease. So the main scripture we're

going to be into today, first Peter 5.

Let's take a look at first Peter 5 verses 5 through 7.

1 Peter 5:5–7

And Peter says likewise. You younger people, submit

yourself to your elders yes, all of you be submissive to one

another and be clothed with humility, for God resists the

proud but gives grace to the. Humble, therefore humble

yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in

due time, casting all your care upon Him, for He cares for you.

It's just kind of interesting that when Peter thinks about

submission and humility, the first thing that comes to mind

is, oh, the young people, they need to remember to submit.

Then he quickly considers that the application is for everyone.

This command be submissive to one another and be clothed with

humility. It applies to everyone for

perhaps especially young men. Peter.

Wasn't mature until he got older.

He knew what it was like to be a young man.

Peter knows the younger people need to find their older people.

That's really what's. Easy admonishing people to do

here you know one young person plus another young person does

not make wisdom it brings passion and it brings you know

volume when young people to get the other not a lot of wisdom

when I was younger I. Found some guys that had been

through some battles in life and I leaned into them and tried to

get everything from them that I possibly could.

They the advice that I received for them, it was extremely

valuable. See the the first part of first

Peter 5 here talks about shepherds and pastors and it's,

you know, for for us, it's like, it's like find your shepherd.

This is what 1 looks like. And so you find your shepherd,

you find the guy that can biblically lead you through your

difficult circumstances that you know you're going to have.

And then the next thing you do is.

You find your flock. You know, who are the people

that the friends that you're going to join in the church, you

need to find people that you're going to build up and you need

to find people that can build you up.

You know, the older guys mentor the middle age guys, the middle

age guys mentor the the younger guys.

And then in that we see which group needs the most humility.

It's the younger guys. They don't have anybody to teach

yet. Not that we can't learn anything

from them, but they especially need to be humble.

And so, Peter says, younger people, submit yourselves to

your elders. To everyone else, Peter says, be

submissive to one another and be clothed with humility.

Being clothed with humility is demonstrated by submission.

This is to put away our own agenda for God's agenda.

This applies to pastors too, Obviously.

It's easy to define submission to authority.

And your pastor. But the submission is actually

collectively to God's will. You know, the pastor and the

elders are just leading people into the will of God.

A bad pastor will lead people in his own will, in his own selfish

desire. But a bad congregation will do

the same thing. They won't submit to the pastor

due to their own selfish will or desire.

And so Peter says, be clothed with humility.

Humility submitting to one another.

Nobody's perfect at this. We all make mistakes.

We offend people when we should probably be more gentle and more

gentle to people when we should probably be a little more

offensive. It's a hard thing to do

sometimes, but our desire. Is to be humble and submissive

to God's will. A person that desires to be

humble and submissive to God will apologize when he realizes

he's made a mistake. Sometimes it takes a while to

figure it out. Peter is saying that's what

everyone should be doing, especially younger people, but

also everyone else submitting to each other.

That phrase be clothed is a rare word that refers to a slave

putting on an apron right before he serves.

Jesus did this before washing the feet of the disciples in

John 13. You know, so when we're thinking

about humility, we want to be clothed in the humility of Jesus

Christ. You know, washing feet was the

job of the lowest servant in that culture.

You know, are you willing to perform the lowest and smallest

services for the sake of Jesus? This is a good thing to take

pride in, you know, doing The Dirty work, you know, men,

you'll be the first guy to do that job that nobody else wants

to do. And when you get there before

the rest. Of the guys you call them girls

and you say you know you what are you doing I beat you to this

job good thing to take pride in are you conscious of.

Your own inability to do anything apart from God, Jesus

said. Without me you can do nothing.

Yeah. What's nothing?

Yeah, nothing. Exactly.

Good job. Most people don't get that.

And we have to have a conversation about what nothing

is. I'm kidding.

Are you willing to be ignored by people?

You. Know when you do The Dirty job

that nobody else wants to do, Will it matter to you when no

one notices? Or will you get irritated when

you don't receive praise for that thing you know I need?

Jesus to do anything of spiritual value, even basic

tasks can can. My service to God can be ruined

by a bad attitude when I'm not relying on the Holy Spirit.

Are you others centered or are you self-centered?

You know, honestly, to some degree I can, I can say that

I'm, I'm negative on all these things.

I can say no, it's all these things.

I, I don't want to do The Dirty job.

I'm going to be upset when I don't get praise for.

It I'm going to be a little irritated when I get nothing in

return. Every once in a while I catch

myself not having the right attitude and so I give it to the

Lord. And then I become really

grateful because God knows all about my bad attitude and he

paid for it anyway through the cross.

And that brings me back to the place where I need to be in

humility, because Jesus just showed me his humility through

the Gospel. I become more submissive and I

become more humble. At the end of verse 5, Peter

quotes Proverbs 334 For God resists the proud, but gives

grace to the humble. The word resist is not a word

that means. God, you know, like passively

ignores you. He passively ignores the proud.

It's a verb that pictures God prepared for.

Battle standing against the proud.

If you pick pride, you're picking a fight with God.

You know, if you build it in pride, God is going to come and

he's going to knock it down. There is one specific time when

God told me that the guy who was making my life card and and

being a really big jerk, you know, God, God explained.

Yeah, I, I. Sympathize.

He's being a really big jerk, but I'm going to deal with it.

And then he said to me, if you go against him, I'm taking his

side. That's your authority and you

need to submit. And if you don't submit, things

are going to go really bad for you.

And I, I had to submit to the authority of God, which was to

submit to my authority, the, the instrument that he picked.

And I had to trust God in faith that I was doing the right thing

because I was young and I was confused over the issue.

I was one of those young people that needed to submit to older

people. And I want to say young, I was

like, oh, 33 years old. But God didn't need me to be

right. That's not what he was trying to

teach me. He was trying to teach me to be

humble so that I could grow. And apparently this was the way

that he wanted to teach me to do it.

But submitting in that moment is still yielding fruit in my life.

Can't imagine where I would ended up if I want to submit it

in that point in time. God would have gone to war

against me if I had decided to plant the flag on my pride in

that situation. Pride causes most of our

problems. I mean, how's.

It going to show. How's it going to go when you

show pride to your wife or your husband or a friend?

You're just going to get pride right back at you because you

reap what you sow. It's not going to be not going

to be a good time. What happens if you show

humility to that? Person your hearts get softened

and then you can start working through the issue because people

start getting a lot more genuine when you show humility.

Humility allows you to take a good look at yourself and ask

what's really going on here, Lord, like, what do I need to do

to reconcile the situation? What do I need to do to behave

more like you in this situation? When you show pride to your

kids, you know then your kids get attitude.

It doesn't work really well. You know when dad shows pride to

his kid, kids gets all mouthy and it's like, oh, you're going

to be mouthy OK, And then then dad gets prideful back.

Then dad double S down the. Pride.

That's not good. If mom has a mockery for one of

her kids, that's going to harden his heart.

He's going to get all ticked off.

He's going to show rebellion. Pride makes arguments go nuclear

and there are some topics that you just can't even bring up

with. People, because of their pride,

you know that things are just going to erupt if you bring that

thing up. God resists the proud.

He opposes pride to the married men here.

You know your your wife is God's daughter.

Your kids are his kids. In first Peter 37, it says

husbands likewise dwell with them.

Your wives with understanding. And that's because he knows we

don't understand giving honor to the wife as to the weaker vessel

and as being heirs together in the grace of life, that your

prayers may not be hindered. If you show pride to your wife,

God will stand against you. And it's certainly, you're

certainly not going to be answering your prayers, is what

he's saying there. In Malachi chapter 2, God says

Malachi 2 · chapter mention

he'll reject the offering of a man who deals with his wife

treacherously. How would you respond?

To someone showing pride to your wife, How would you respond to

someone showing pride to your daughter?

I mean, it's standing against that.

That's what the word means. That's what the word word resist

means. That's what God's going to do

with you when you show pride against his daughter.

God will stand against you and it's going to turn into a

disaster. You know, what if somebody shows

humility to your wife? What if somebody shows humility

to your daughter? Well, I'm going to go out of my

way to. Do things for that guy and so

God will shower you with grace. God resists the proud, but gives

grace to the humble. Humility brings grace.

You get good things that you don't deserve when you're

humble. Humility brings heaven down.

Pride brings hell up. You know when you're giving

somebody hell or you're giving somebody.

Pride. That's how that goes.

When you show humility, you're showing them the love of God in

the heart of Jesus. Humility ultimately comes from

the Holy Spirit. But it's interesting that the

Bible says to humble ourselves. This is something we have to do

in us. We have to voluntarily submit

and be humble first. Peter 5-6 the verse 6 it says

therefore humble yourselves. Under the mighty hand of God,

that He may exalt you in due time.

Some people think that going through a disaster or a

difficult circumstances can humble.

People. But that's not the case you.

Know when someone gets a beat in a competition, sometimes they'll

say well they got humbled, but truthfully they probably became

more prideful people. Can either harden their hearts

or soften their hearts when they lose a battle in life when dads

compete with their kids and beat them all the time, there's an

unfair. Advantage there so it can make

the kids bitter and prideful, you know, they'll try to prove

their value then in annihilating their opponents and their pride,

you know, pride just breeds more.

Pride. It doesn't soften their hearts

just because they lost is my point.

It. Actually makes them more

prideful When the marriage fails and there's divorce, it doesn't

mean that you know, people are now humble and everybody learned

their lessons. You have to humble yourself

hopefully before it gets to that point.

God gives grace to the humble. You know, grace and pride are

just eternal enemies. Grace demands that God bless me

in light of what I think I deserve.

God deals with me. Or grace is when God deals with

me on the basis of what's in God, not what's inside me.

You know, your salvation is about God being good, not you

being good. And when pride gets in the way

of that, God mightily opposes it.

You know, pride is the worst sin and it's the one we all suffer

from. Pride was found in Lucifer and

that led to his fall. Pride was what led Adam to.

Sin. And now we all have sin.

Pride. It's something that starts out

really small and we make different names.

For it so that's not so bad sometimes we call it

independence and self-reliance now look I'm.

I'm just as patriotic as anybody, but I'm talking about

independence and self-reliance because you care more about you

than your team. You know you can be, you can't

be independent in your marriage, you can't be self reliant on a

job that requires teamwork, and you certainly can't be

independent and self reliant in a relationship with God.

Some people realize this, so they start modifying their

behaviour. Some people hear the sermon on

grace and humility. And so they say, well, I can act

humble because I know what acting humble looks like, but

they're really not humble. And if you take your eyes off

Jesus while you're trying to fake humility, it's it's going

to go radically bad. However, if you're willing to

give up pride, you you're probably going to be surprised

with how much grace Jesus gives you.

Humility is the key to receiving more grace.

It's the, the way that the, it's, it's, it's the way of the

church. When you, when you're thinking

about climbing the church ladder, it's kind of a

disgusting thing. Like you're going to climb the

church ladder like people climb up in corporate America.

But the lesson of humility teaches us that if you want to

climb the ladder, you aim for the bottom.

That's humility, Peter says. Therefore, humble yourselves

under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due

time. That's Peter encouraging

Christians to be patient. You know, we all want to bear

fruit in our ministries and a relationship, all of our

relationships. Maybe it's to your family.

When you're raising your kids, sometimes it feels like you're

just poured into a black hole and there's.

Nothing coming out yet. You know, I don't see the fruit

yet. Lord, you know what's going on.

I pray with my kids. I'm teaching them the Bible.

I'm surrounding them with Christian influence, but they

act like they don't care, Peter says.

Humble yourself, be patient. Keep doing the things that God

has told you to do. You know, maybe it's a Sunday

school ministry, maybe it's a service ministry, a home Bible

study. Sometimes it's just a service

project. You're building something.

You're doing something at your job.

With with a, you're doing it, showing Jesus how you do it.

That's a ministry. And there are a lot of times

when you're going to do all the right things and you're going to

be in the will of God, but you will not be exalted.

Yet it's going to take some time for that to happen.

You know, nobody knows what you're doing.

The ministry is not growing. You're struggling to get things

off the ground. You know, maybe something's gone

wrong. You know somebody.

Slandered you. Somebody since stopped the

progress of whatever you were trying to do.

Maybe you got injured and that stopped the progress of whatever

you're trying to do, Peter says. Don't get frustrated.

Don't start acting like God owes you something.

That's pride, he says. Remain humble.

God will exalt you in due time. Humble yourselves and at the

right time God will lift you up. Humility is a constant journey.

It never ends. We need it more and it.

Surprises us when we learn that we don't have it.

It's like that in marriage. It's like that in finding a job,

you know, ministry, raising a family.

In 2004, I left California. I took a job to manage a

vineyard in Missouri. And it was a good opportunity to

farm in really adverse conditions and just learn how to

be a better farmer, a godly guy that helped lure me out there.

Once I, I got started and, and he said you should start a

vineyard business. And so I prayed, you know, I was

young in the Lord, definitely immature.

I didn't really know how to how to listen to the Lord

completely, but I didn't pray about the little things.

But this was a big thing, so I prayed about the big thing.

And so I prayed and as I sat in the quiet there, I just felt a

piece of God come over me like this was a confirmation of this

is what I was supposed to do to start this business.

So. It was kind of an awesome thing,

you know, I knew God's will for me.

Now I know what to do. And so I made a business plan

and there was a lot of interest and it looked like it was going

to be lucrative right out of the gate.

But Long story short, everyone backed out at the last minute

with no time for me to react or seek more opportunities.

You know, leaving me with no income.

So I explained the situation to my wife and we prayed.

That's a humble thing to do. And so, and the prayer was just

like, you know, God, if I messed up, if I've been disobedient to

you, let's, let's, let's make this quick and painful, not slow

and painful. Let's lose the house now, get

things right now, start over. Now.

I'll think about how dumb I was, how smart you are, and we'll

just get things right right now. And that was pretty much it for

about 20 minutes. And then the phone rang.

And I just went and answered the phone being exhausted from

prayer, and it was a consulting call and it wasn't $1,000,000

call or anything, but that peace of God was something that I felt

returned in that moment. I just told Jenny, I think God

wants us to go forward with this.

I think that peace and that. Call is something telling us to

go forward and I had two appointments on my work calendar

going into the month of May and they were only going to make a

day's wage at the end of the month.

I only did not work 2 days. That was pretty amazing.

Now I'm looking at the month of June and I've got three

appointments on my calendar at the end of June.

I only did not work. Three days now, I'm getting up

in the morning and many times somebody would just call, you

know, you wouldn't happen to be available today.

Oh, actually, I am available today.

I could. Come and see you right now.

And so that that happened for five consecutive months and that

was just God saying you're not going to be the one that builds

this company. I am.

And everything that you scheduled, everything that

you're doing, I am taking away. This is only going to be me.

It was a pretty amazing time, an intimate time with God where I

was learning how to trust Him. And I was in 2005.

By 2008 the company was flourishing and growing, but I

needed more labour to commit to the large jobs that I wanted to

take on and so I decided it would be a good idea.

This is this is the humble part of the testimony.

Here to break all kinds of laws and take matters into my own

hands because my company was not being exalted the way that I

wanted it to be exalted. And so then I got caught.

To the level where the senior prosecuting attorney from the

state attorney general's office was calling my house.

And my immigration attorney said this is out of my league.

This is really scary. You need a criminal attorney.

Went and got a criminal attorney.

He took every dime that I had and and I was immediately

repentant in the thing. You know the way the whole deal

went down, don't have time to get into all of it, but it was a

set of circumstances where as soon as it happened.

It was like, oh, this is definitely from you.

This isn't just something that happened on accident.

Not that anything does, but in that point in my life, it's.

Just how it felt I I repented. I knew it immediately was from

the Lord. I had two young boys at home.

I had my my wife. And I thought I was going to be

without them for a. Very long time.

I was looking at a minimum sentence of around 20 years.

And so after two months of just kind of being in limbo, my

humble wife cried out to the Lord and confessed that she had

made me her Jesus. You know she was humble to me,

but not to God you. Know she trusted me to take care

of everything and didn't take a stand when I chose to do what I

did. She warned me hey you better not

do this. And then when I didn't listen to

her, she helped me do it. And so she tells the Lord, I

realize I need to follow you, not him.

But I beg you, Lord, will you? Please have mercy on this

situation. The same day.

I wasn't expecting a call, but I get a call from my lawyers and

these guys say we met with the prosecuting attorney and they

aren't going to press any charges.

You're probably still going to have some fines even later on.

We didn't even pay any fines. It was complete mercy.

I asked the attorney why, you know what, what could have

possibly led to this outcome, and he just kind of got out

awkward and said things that didn't make a whole lot of

sense. You know what did?

You say, how did this happen? I don't understand.

And I just knew it was from the Lord.

He didn't have a straight answer for me.

So God answered my wife's prayer at that moment, You know, she

humbled herself before God, and He gave grace.

The business was wrecked, but I could find more work.

I just needed people. I only had one employee at the

time and he was one of those guys, though, that would go do

The Dirty job and call you a girl if he beat you to it.

So that was really helpful. Eventually, through that summer

season, I hired and trained and fired about 60 employees.

None of them could do the work. I'd get him started and

eventually have to let him go and try to find other people.

But we got through the growing season with something to show

for it. We kept things afloat, and then

God presented me with a tremendous opportunity through

an equally amazing alignment of circumstances.

And God made the business even bigger and better than it was

before. Then a year later, in 2009, he

told us to walk away from it. You know, bag it and walk away.

Last year was our best year, so that was a hard thing to do.

But he wanted us to go to Washington.

God revealed that to us and we knew that if we were offered

this job in Washington that we were supposed to take it.

It didn't even matter what the offer was.

And the offer was about half of the income we were making in

Missouri. But we took it because we we

just knew God's will was in it and we had learned some lessons.

So faith is radically increasing and changing, humility changing

and increasing. I don't need money.

I just need to follow the Lord. I was also transitioning out of

the 7th Day Adventist religion at the time, as I mentioned

before, and I found Calvary Chapel where my wife and I

learned the Bible. We picked our shepherd, we found

our flock guys like Nick and ladies like Faye.

And my wife and I learned ministry.

We received amazing mentorship, and I learned how to lead my

family in the Lord. After being in Washington less

than a year, I was called the ministry.

You know, there was a job offer in California and there was

continued opportunity in Washington state.

And so I was praying about those two options and God did this

thing. I'm not that emotional of a guy,

but he broke me. I guess I'm a little more now

than I. Was then, but then definitely

not. He broke me down five times and

I did not know what was going on.

On the 5th time I was exhausted and I just cried out to the.

Lord, you know what is going on here.

What are you doing? And he said you're going to

build a church. Long story really short.

I spent the next 12 years in in volunteer ministry, teaching.

I spent nine of those years in Prosser.

That took us to 2022, when a pastor gave.

Me, his church building, I did three more years of a volunteer,

you know, pastoring at that church and then in 2000. 25 I

lost my job of of 16 years, you know, being a vineyard manager

because the entire industry there is just radically

shrinking. And I didn't know what to do

because my church wasn't big enough to support me yet.

And then it was. And I I still need to have.

A a part time job in to pay the bills and things like that.

But now I'm supported by my church and got opened a door for

me to sit on the Pasco City Council.

The houses where I live in is in Pasco and that has a little bit

of income that supplements where I am.

So that just worked out. And my wife has a part time job

where she prayed Lord. I think it could be a secretary

at Calvary Christian School. She didn't ask anybody, tell

anybody or anything except God and me.

And the principal calls up say, hey, we'd like you to work a

couple days of work at the. Calvary Christian School be a

secretary for us and so God is miraculously providing you know

why am I telling you this? Well, I I was proud and I didn't

need God, you know, to build my business.

That plan failed and then I humbled myself and then God

built up the business. I created my God, created my

business in due time and his power not mine.

Then I got proud. Again.

And God, you know, I said, God, I could do this without you.

And that plan failed, which is a radical understatement.

And then I got humble. Then my wife got humble and he

showered us with grace. After that, we decided it was a

lot better to be humble than to be proud.

And so we fully submitted to God.

My wife and I had another baby, we had a daughter, Julia, and

God LED us to adopt two kids from Columbia in 2013.

We learned a lot about ministry, and we are still learning a lot

about ministry. The most important ministry is

to your family. You know what happens if you're

the leader in your home and someone is in rebellion?

They have all kinds of pride. You know if you answer them with

pride, that's that's going to be a total train wreck.

If you answer them with humility, that's not going to

work either. The prideful person in their

rebellion will probably just eat you for breakfast if you show

them. Humility.

And so you have to employ very disciplined leadership that

involves humility and no pride. But humility alone will not

resolve this issue. You know, there I'm saying that

just because I'm giving a caveat because there there are a lot of

men that need to stand up to their wives and the culture that

we're living in today. And you know you can't tolerate

behaviour in your family that you know is destroying your

family. Stop it.

So that's a different Bible study, but I just want to give

that that caveat, that humility. Is not the answer to rebellion

in your family. It's part of it.

It's a necessary component. When that happens, you need to

stand against the proud like Jesus stands against the proud.

So are you pursuing humility before God?

You know, one thing that God has done in my life to remind me

that I don't deserve anything that I have is that He uses this

number 5 in my life. God made work fall from the sky

for five months. He gave me a job for five

months. He provided for five months.

Then He blessed me with five kids.

That wasn't the plan. We were just answering a call

and then he called me into ministry and he broke me down

five times. And so that's a God saying, I'm

giving you a job that you don't deserve, I'm giving you kids

that you don't deserve, and I'm giving you a ministry that you

don't deserve. God has done a work in me far

beyond, you know, the personal testimony.

I still get mad at myself because I still have feelings of

pride. You know, God doesn't stop

revealing your pride to you. Pride gets revealed.

It's like looking in the mirror. You know you bring your sin to

the light. And God starts dealing with it.

You're looking in the mirror. You're cleaning yourself up.

Things look pretty good now. OK, I'm better.

I look a little bit more like Jesus today.

And then God brings some more circumstances and adversity to

your life, and he brings a bigger light.

And so then you look in the mirror, he goes like, you know,

he's like, Oh no, where'd all this stuff come from?

I didn't know I was there. And he just starts dealing with

it. That was how the Doing Ministry

Well conference went for me. You know, that's how God was

dealing with me when I was there two weeks ago.

Some of you were there. I was mortified for.

About a day at the pride that I sensed in my heart and I learned

again how I just need to be really humble before Jesus and

that Jesus humbled himself for me on the cross.

You know, thankfully I didn't act on my pride and embarrass

myself. You know, I've learned some

things being a Christian for a number of years now.

And being a hypocrite. For a number of years as well.

But I need to, all I needed to do was pray to God.

I mean, he, he is so faithful when you're just like, Lord,

please change my attitude. He's so faithful to do that and

bring you to that place of humility when you humbly ask.

I become overwhelmed with a sense of gratitude and hope

because I know that God's going to work out His plan for me.

His plan is the best one. I want God to give me everything

that I receive in my life. I don't want to be going out and

getting stuff for myself because I'll glorify God much better

that way. First, Peter 5 verses 5 through

7. Let's let's read through it here

and we can add 7. Likewise, you younger people,

submit yourselves to your elders.

Yes, all of you be submissive to one another and be cold with

humility. For God resists the proud but

gives grace to the humble. Therefore humble yourselves

under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due

time, casting all your care upon Him.

For He cares for you when you know God's will, but you're

waiting for His timing. That can feel like God doesn't

care about you. And so Peter says God cares for

you, He loves you, you just need to wait on him.

You know when you have anxiety, when you have stress, when you

have trouble, when you have impatience, you just need to

give all of that to the Lord and He will do what's best for you,

casting all your care upon Him, for he cares for you.

Humility can be measured. You can know how humble you are

by this measurement. You can measure it by how many

of your problems you are giving to the Lord.

If you're giving all your problems to the Lord, that's a

lot of humility. But if you try to manage and

worry and solve. Those concerns yourself, that's

pride. Casting is not laying down.

Casting is a really energetic term when it talks about casting

your care upon him, and it doesn't.

Say you like like lay your cares on him.

This is not a something you just kind of do.

It should not be slow and methodical is the point.

You actually throw it away from you.

That's casting. If God wants your burden and he

wants it immediately dumped on him and the faster you get to.

The point where you realize I can't do this on my own, the

faster that burden is cast to God.

He cares for you. Most people don't have a problem

with realizing. And envisioning a good God, the

problem comes. The harder thing to accept is

that God actually cares for you, that He specifically loves you.

Peter, through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, is reminding

us of the character of God. He loves you and cares for you.

The key to navigating a crisis in the future is humility.

In the present. We're all on a continuum of

humility leading to pride. And so I got an ugly heart just

like everybody else. You know, I'm teaching a study

on humility because God is hilarious.

You know, We're having dinner with Nick and Faye.

Last night, Nick says, what are you teaching on?

I said humility. And they both look at me like,

really, I know, I don't know, it's just what I got.

All I can tell you is I am a proud person seeking humility by

the power of the Holy. Spirit, if you stop seeking

humility, pride will get you. Anytime you get attention for

service or your hard work, you're in a great environment to

cultivate pride, and we all have to be guarded against that.

In times where I acknowledge my pride, I'm listening to the Holy

Spirit and I'm going where He leads me, which is a path to

humility. You know, humility.

It's just an honest understanding of your ability to

serve according to how Jesus directs you through the Holy

Spirit. The key to humility is focusing

on Jesus's humility. Humility says that God is the.

Center of the universe. I am orbiting around God, and

there's plenty of room for people to orbit around God with

me. Pride is obviously.

Putting you in the center of the universe and everybody orbiting

around you. The key is not focusing on your

humility but Jesus's humility. This is Philippians 2 verses 5

Philippians 2:5–11

through 11. It says let this mind be in you,

which was also in Christ Jesus, who being in the form of God did

not consider it robbery to be equal with God.

It just means that Jesus didn't cling to His deity like a robber

clings to his treasure, but made himself of no reputation.

Taking the form of a bondservant and coming in the likeness of

men and being found in appearance as a man, He humbled

himself and became obedient to the point of death, even death

on the cross. Therefore God also has highly

exalted him and given His, given Him the name which is above

every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow of

those in heaven, of those on the earth and those under the earth,

and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is

Lord. To the glory of God the Father.

Jesus committed the most humble act, and so he receives the

highest exaltation. Jesus is not fighting for

position here, He is humble unto death.

Without humility, Jesus would have never come to serve us.

In Mark chapter 10, the disciples James and John, they

Mark 10 · chapter mention

ask if they can sit be seated at the right and left hand of Jesus

when he. Reigns and is.

His millennial Kingdom and that really ticked off the other

disciples. That's what happens when we show

pride. You show pride.

Everybody wants to knock you down.

That's everybody's mad about that.

You show humility. Everybody wants to lift you.

Up. But when you are proud, people

want to knock you down. A number of times the disciples

asked Jesus who is the greatest. People who have the ability to

lead. Are typically very driven and

they're always trying to get better.

They're always trying to win. They like competing, that it's a

fun thing. They want to get better.

They want to be the. Best at what they do.

And some of those guys are the types of guys that Jesus picked

for ministry. They're the same way.

Those kind of people, they really need Jesus and they need

his example of humility. If they don't get Jesus and they

start getting prideful, then the wheels come off the cart.

Really quickly, it turns into a really ugly situation.

If they do receive the humility of Jesus, that's a lot of energy

pointed in the right direction. Now, when they ask the question,

Jesus doesn't rebuke their desire for greatness.

He just redirects it and he tells them to serve.

You know, valuing greatness is not necessarily a bad thing.

If they didn't value greatness, they wouldn't be able to value

the greatness of Jesus or the attributes that make Jesus

great. So Jesus responds in Mark 10

Mark 10:43

verses 43 and 45, he says. Whoever desires to become great

among you shall be your servant, and whoever of you desires to be

first shall be slave of all for. Even the Son of Man did not

become to be, did not come to be served, but to serve and to give

his life a ransom for many. Serving is a great way of

redirecting your energy and desire to be great.

If you want to be great, serve others.

Pride and selfishness, they make others serve us, and it's tough.

Because pride is how we win in the world.

You know, pride is really bad in the Bible, but it is talked

about favorably in the world. You know, we have a whole pride

month, right? You know, we don't have a

humility month and we're going to, you know, and I understand

it's a, it's a sexual morality kind of pride.

We don't have a purity month. We don't, we don't have a parade

where people wear 5 belts to make a point.

And you know, we don't have anything like that.

So, so, So what are some? Things you can do to express

humility. These are 5 actions that

demonstrate humility #1. We pray, you know, pray before

the confrontation, you know, pray before you walk into your

house, you know, you dad's getting home from work, you've

been beaten down by the man or. Whatever's going on, pray before

you walk through that threshold. You know when your spouse gets

upset with you, take the criticism to the Lord and pray

hopefully before you respond. You know if you disagree with

your spouse, pray anyway. Send the Holy Spirit to you.

Argue with your spouse. There's nothing wrong with that,

you know. Take your wife under your arm if

she'll let you, and invite Jesus into the conversation before you

start it. You know, seek His will and pray

from your heart, because that person listening to you pray is

listening to you reveal your heart to God.

It's an act of humility. And if you still can't figure it

out and you know, just keep praying together.

Number two, serve serving expresses humility.

You do the hard work even if no one.

Appreciates it and including including if your wife doesn't

appreciate it you know we always like to do that little chore

around the house and then oh, I did this one little thing and we

have to make sure that she knows about it go find your way go out

of your way to serve and be kind you know do something that makes

the other person's life easier that's.

Service take some stress out of the other person's day #3

humility. Humility gives grace giving

grace you. Know when you're having an

argument with your teenage kid and then you go and fill his gas

tank. That's that's grace.

You know, take the wife to dinner.

You know when you know you've got to have a tough conversation

with the kids, You don't do something, eat dinner, eat

dessert first, do something. It just kind of just kind of

lightens. Everything when you show grace

#4 apologize, saying I'm sorry, it's my fault.

That can radically change the trajectory of the relationship.

Don't give the legal. Briefing about how right you

are. Don't defend yourself.

It never works because it's pride.

Just apologize for the things that you did that were wrong and

forgive the things that the other person did that was wrong.

If they don't ask for forgiveness, move on.

You know, if you're getting bullied because the prideful

person is taking advantage of your humility, let them know,

hey, when you do this, when you say this, this is how I feel.

And as opposed to saying you know you're a terrible person,

you don't have, you know you. Have pride.

You need to say sorry #5 listen. Don't articulate your response

while they talk. Seek to understand.

Ask them to explain it again. Repeat what you are hearing.

Ask them. Ask them if you understand, you

know. Is this correct?

You know if you've listened and the other person is telling you

no, you're you're still not getting it.

Go back to the first four things.

Pray, serve, give grace, apologize.

So the five examples of humble actions, Pray, serve, give

grace, apologize. Listen, you won't be able to do

those things without some measure of humility.

Those are humble actions. But what if you're really not

humble? I mean, these actions are the

result of having some humility, but how do you actually get more

humility? And this is probably the most

important part of the Bible study here.

If I want you to walk away with anything, it's it's the last

kind of closing of the Bible study here.

How do you get more? Humility because when you break

down humility and pride in the Bible, you basically get these

three principles that show up. And the first one is that you

need to desire to spiritually grow, that you should desire to

grow spiritually in the love of God and seek humility.

When you stop growing, it's due to pride.

You know, pride says I know everything that I want to know

about this thing. You know I'm going to stay here

because I've made it to the top. Or I'm satisfied with what I

know or what I'm doing, so why should I do more?

Paul writes after being saved. For 30 years and leading the

ministry of the church. He says this in Philippians 3

Philippians 3:12–14

verses 12 through 14. Not that I have already attained

or am already perfected, He's saying.

I'm not the picture of Christian maturity or humility, but I

press on that I may lay hold of that for which Christ Jesus has

also laid hold of me. You know, I know Jesus has more

for me, so I'm pressing on to go get it.

Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended He has an

apprehended humility or spiritual maturity.

But one thing I do know, you know, this is what I have

apprehended. This is one thing I do

understand. Forgetting those things which

are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead.

We make a lot of mistakes in our pride, but you can't give up,

you know, forget about your past sins, receive forgiveness from

Jesus and move forward. He says, press toward the goal

for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.

In second Timothy 4, Paul writes from prison.

This is at the end of his life. He's about to be beheaded.

I think he understands that this is his last stop here.

And he writes to Timothy and he says.

Luke is the only one who's still with me.

Bring Mark. I have use for him.

I sent to Caicus, to Ephesus. But Timothy, when you come bring

the books and he says especially the parchments, you know, Paul

still wants to grow. You know, he still wants to have

those moments where he reads the Scripture.

He says, wow, I've read this 100 times and I never saw that

before. He wants to continue to grow.

The gap between what we teach and the way that we act should

always be narrowing. It should never be widening.

We can't be deceived by the temptation to measure our

spiritual maturity based on what we know you know, It's actually

based on how much knowledge is applied.

So to increase humility, you need to desire to grow

spiritually. The second thing is that you

need to be teachable, express a willingness to be taught.

Apollos is a great example of that in Acts 18.

I'm going to read to you Acts 18 verses 24 through 28.

Acts 18:24–28

It says now a certain man named Apollos, born at Alexandra

Xandra. He's from Egypt, an eloquent man

and mighty in the Scriptures came to Ephesus.

This man had been instructed in the way of the Lord, and being a

servant in spirit, he spoke and taught accurately the things of

the Lord, though he knew only the baptism of John.

Apollos is a he has expert knowledge of the Bible, and he's

probably inspired by John the Baptist.

We know that he knows about the ministry of John the Baptist.

But apparently he's been living under a rock, maybe all the way

back in Egypt, in some part of the world where he did not know

that Jesus came and died and was resurrected, Verse 26 says.

So he began to speak boldly in the synagogue, and Aquila and

Priscilla heard him. They took him aside and

explained to him the way of God more.

Accurately, you can even tell like the way that Luke writes

this, this is a sensitive situation.

Apollo's had to humble. Himself to receive their

teaching he's there's a a humble couple in the audience listening

to Apollo speak. And they say we need to talk to

you about your teaching. And Paul says, really, Are you

guys teachers? Well, no, we're we're tent

makers. OK, well, what do you have to

say? Well, we need to explain that

your message is not quite. It needs to be more accurate.

There's some things that you. Need to know, verse 27 says.

And when he desired to cross to Akaya, the brethren wrote,

exhorting the disciples to receive.

Him, and when he arrived, he greatly helped those who had

believed through grace, for he vigorously refuted the Jews,

publicly showing from the Scriptures that Jesus is the

Christ. And so if Apollos doesn't humble

himself, his ministry stops to growing, and so does he.

But now, because he humbled himself, the disciples are

telling the. Other disciples, they said you

need to receive this guy. He can.

He can explain the gospel as well as anyone.

He's teachable. Teachableness is a mark of

maturity. So humility is to desire growth,

desire spiritual growth #2 be. Teachable.

And the third one is probably the one that a lot of us get

hung up on. Let God pick the teacher.

That's the third one. Be willing to be taught by

whatever instrument God chooses to use.

It's easier. To be humble and humble yourself

before God because he's God. He.

He's in control of everything and is all powerful and knows

everything. We have a natural fear of God,

so being humble towards God just kind of makes sense.

But what about to the man that God wants to use to teach you

and. What about your pastor?

You know, are you going to try to outsmart your pastor or are

you going to humble yourself before your pastor?

You know, sometimes submitting to a pastor is easy and

sometimes it's not. You know, pastors have a lot of

things to share and we look at them as leaders and so humbling

ourselves are not that bad. But what about if you have this

person in authority that that has not earned your respect yet?

You know what if you know more than the person in authority,

maybe you know a lot more. Apollos didn't know anything

about Akula and Priscilla. He knew way more about the

Bible. He has expert knowledge and can

explain explain the scriptures all pointing to the coming of

this Messiah. He's going to come.

He's going to die, Apollos. And then?

So like, you know, he doesn't know.

He was a way better teacher than they were, yet his ministry

became more fruitful because he humbled himself.

Probably a bit of a difficult pill to swallow.

For Apollo's, you know, Okola and Priscilla, they're not

teachers. But they know that Apollos's

teaching is irrelevant and radically outdated because he

didn't know about the most amazing event in world history.

And so if we're seeking humility, we can't just be

willing to be taught by those who excel and know and

experience more than we do, but by those who know less and have

experienced less than us. We can't say God, I received the

lesson, but I have the problem with the person that you're

using. To teach me the lesson, it's

actually a lot. Easier to just not care about

it, not care about who God uses. It's a ton of work.

It's a waste of energy. Pride is always a waste of

energy. And you're just fighting the

teacher. It's it's don't fight the

teacher that God picks. So you desire spiritual growth.

You're teachable and you let God pick the teacher.

Pride will RIP away. Humility and kill your ministry.

It's so dangerous because it's so well hidden.

You know, sometimes the prideful guy gets a pass.

It's not this grievous sin like you see in some other

situations. And when we give that guy the

free pass, it turns out to be a train wreck later on because

nobody stopped it. Then it's too late.

Pride is the most dangerous thing because once it gets

established, we become too proud to recognize it.

Humility is undervalued and ignored in the culture, but it's

the quality that makes the church and you attractive to the

world. It's humility.

We all love the humble guy. Humility pleases God.

It sets us free from pride. I'd never be where I am without

continually practicing humility and choosing to continually

practice humility. Humility determines where your

spiritual maturity is going to end.

And the ultimate way that God tells us to remain in humility

is to remind people of the gospel.

The gospel is that God made you to have a relationship with Him.

But we do things that are wrong. We fail to do things that we

know are right every day. And so God loves you.

He made you for a relationship much like a a husband and a wife

will decide to have. A child, they want to share

their lives with that child, a different kind of relationship

than with anybody else. They want it to be a family.

That's what God wants to do with you.

He wants to bring you into his family.

And then we have this sin problem where?

When we're like the only species on the planet that knows right

and wrong and continually chooses to do what's wrong, and

there's something radically wrong with us.

And we sin, and then we can't stop sinning, even though we

know it's wrong, it's a curse and we have no hope because we

understand that people who do things that they know are wrong

deserve a punishment for those things.

And so we are without hope, sinning and continually sinning

and waiting for judgement. And So what God does is he

writes himself into human history.

Jesus comes to the earth, God the Son, always teaching, always

loving, always giving. He came to reveal God to us.

And then he goes to the cross after living a perfect life and

dying a sinner's death. He bore the wrath of God in our

place. We did not.

He did not deserve the wrath of God.

We did. We're the ones doing things that

we know are wrong. But he went to the cross in our

place, suffering the wrath from the of the Father in our place.

Then he died. He was buried.

He rose again on the third day according to all the scriptures

that foretold He would do, so that when you receive Him, He

brings you into relationship and you receive eternal.

Life He comes back and he says I love you, I've always loved you,

I'll never stop loving you. All I want is a relationship.

With you and and that gospel and we receive eternal life.

We get heaven, we begin living our eternal lives now we get the

Holy Spirit. Everything changes and that

brings us to a place of humility where we can humbly go suffer

for Christ, serve Christ, love him, do battle for him, lose

battles for him. We don't care.

We're just doing what his will is and and we're humble when we

do it because of what he did for us.

Let's pray Lord Jesus, we love you and again Lord, we thank you

for the tremendous sacrifice that you made for us.

Lord, it was this ultimate sacrifice where there's nothing

we can do to to. Trump, what you did, you just

did it, and it's the most. Amazing act, you leaving your

place in heaven to humble yourself, become becoming a man

here. And Lord, we're so grateful

because you saved us. You saved us from hell.

We are eternally grateful and we just give all of our lives to

you. Lord, we want to be filled with

your Holy Spirit to be poured into us so that we can go out

and pour on to other people around us.

Lord, I pray that you bring great blessings to this church

and to this ministry. Lord, we know you're going to do

it through humility. Thank you Jesus, we love you,

Lord, Amen.