Allowing an honest compliment to break through to us at our core is one of the quickest ways of feeling God’s grace. Most of us, when we receive a compliment, out of humiliation, or pride pass it off. We excuse the comment. We don’t want the attention, or we don’t want to look like we want the attention.

Today I received an e-mail from a close friend that said some things that were hard to receive. True and good things, but still hard to receive. I would say that it was this way because my pride was saying, “Yes you have been like this.” My humiliation was saying, “You don’t deserve this. If they really knew what was going on they wouldn’t say this.” But my spirit quickly pointed out that only because of God working in me could a person say anything remotely close to what they said.

I think this is the battle that goes on whenever we receive a compliment. We let the compliment be about us, and not about what God has done in us. We try and deal with emotion of having somebody give us worth. We don’t like the uncomfortable feeling of giving somebody else’s words permission to effect our souls. For people in the limelight this is especially true. We begin to question motives and the genuineness of comments, while all the while we let the praises be about us and not what God is doing in us.

The way that we receive compliments and praise reveals a lot about how we receive grace. Our pride says, “You don’t really need grace, you try hard to be righteous.” Our humiliation in the moment of grace says, “You’re not really worth this, it’s too good to be true, don’t receive it.” But the Spirit in us says, “Soak it up, because you have died and found yourself risen in Christ. The good people see in you is a reflection of me!”

We must be a people who allow the Spirit room to speak these words of encouragement to. It is the lifeblood of seeing yourself the way that God sees us in Christ. And seeing ourselves in the victory of Christ is essential for seeing our value to Kingdom of God.

Humility is kind of a big subject in the Bible. Jesus often mentions that it is the humble who will inherit the Kingdom of God. The word is found 82 times in the Bible. This has been my dilemma: Is humility something that God gives me and I have no control of? Or, is it something that I have the power to choose?

The word requirement means petition, plea, or to ask for…and it shows up in the Bible a few times. Probably the most well known place where this word is found is Micah 6:8 “He has told you, Oh man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness and to walk humbly with your God?” (to do justice and love kindess are also pretty important to God, but for another post!)

Tucked into this list of requirements is the word ‘humbly’. Seems like God requires us to walk humbly…Jesus would certainly agree, with His many statements about servanthood, being childlike, and how the last will be the greatest in the Kingdom of God. In the book of James it says, “God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.”

Humility is a big deal to God. Humility is a big deal to us too because it often goes against the grain of our desires and it directly opposes our pride. My questions seem to be clearly answered in the Bible…Humility is something that we must choose…it is something that the Lord requires.

There is a store down the street from where I live called Imaginarium. They have it in the States as well. This store is really cool and has all kinds of cool stuff for kids…and childlike adults. One of the things I like about this store is that it has a big door for grown-ups and a little door that’s kid sized. The door to enter the Kingdom of God is like the kid door. It’s smaller and you have to crawl through it. I’m 6’2″ tall and I can’t fit in the kid door without crawling. My pride is as big as I am and unless I humble myself to go through the kid door then it will never fit. Nobody can walk tall into a Kingdom in which they have no business being an heir to or being a part of. God values and requires humility because humility is the mirror that shows us how much grace we have received. It takes humility to understand that we have needs and requires just as much more humility to receive a gift as lavish as grace.

Humility is easy to keep at an external level. Not receiving compliments well. Saying, ‘Praise God’ whenever somebody says something nice about you…the reality is that the external forms of humility can just be well-fitted masks. Internal humility is a journey that is learned through internalizing the promises of God and sometimes failure. But it begins with understanding God’s unending grace. It ends in not needing recognition for things that you do in order to give yourself worth. Delighting when other people succeed, even when you don’t. Taking jobs that you are ‘overqualified’ for to help somebody in need.

Humility is a picture of two open hands that have let go of all that they have held on to. Knowing that their value is in the fact that they were created to be hands, not in what the hands hold. And inviting God’s freedom and call to service fill the emptiness. God’s requirement of humility is always for the purpose of filling with something greater. Humility moves pride aside for God to fill the void.