Is it hard to be humble? It can be. God has blessed all of us. How do we respond when someone asks us what we are good at? We can give them an honest opinion about our gifts. But as soon as we do I think that we walk a thin line between pride and humility.
The story is told by Walter Cronkite who was awarded the most trustworthy person of the 60s and 70s. That’s pretty amazing! The famous journalist comments on his own egotism in his book: Sailing back down the Mystic River in Connecticut and following the channel’s tricky turns through an expanse of shallow water, I am reminded of the time a boatload of young people sped past us here, its occupants shouting and waving their arms. I waved back a cheery greeting and my wife said, “Do you know what they were shouting?” “Why, it was ‘Hello, Walter,’“ I replied. “No,” she said. “They were shouting, “Low water, Low water.’
Pride can get in the way, can’t it? Jumping back a few verse before our text we see Joshua, Moses’ aide, calling on some people to stop doing the Lord’s work because he didn’t like it. Moses stops young Joshua and says, “Are you jealous for my sake? I wish that all the LORD’s people were prophets and that the LORD would put his Spirit on them!”
Moses asks are you jealous for my sake? Or are you jealous because someone else received God’s Spirit besides you? The text doesn’t really answer the question for us but there are so many ways Satan tries do cause dysfunction in the family of believers through jealousy. As we use our time for God our jealousy can cripple our service. Instead of looking for ways that we can use the unique gifts God has given us, do we complain, God why aren’t we more like Bob or Betty. They can do wonderful things for the church – why should I even bother when those two can do it all!
Want to hear more? Watch this week’s message taken from Numbers 12 – Hard To Be Humble.
Book(s): Numbers
Tag(s): Moses
Speaker(s): Fred Guldberg