Life has been crazy with homeschooling and now swim lessons that I thought I would revisit an old blog from years past!

Written back in January 2017

Humility in strength – what a strange idea, is it not? We all know that we learn humility through our weaknesses and our failures, but is it possible to learn humility through our strengths? Lord willing I’m not pulling at straws here when I say “I think we can.”

This past week I was brought down by my back. I take a great pride in my “brute” Norwegian strength, but last Tuesday I was shown just how weak I really am. I have had this pain in my lower back for a few weeks and I thought that I could just work through it (like I always do). But after a while, it didn’t go away. I have been exercising by running on the treadmill and it turns out I have aggravated a disk in my lower back by the constant jolting applied over and over on that same spot. On Tuesday, after vacuuming, I could hardly walk due to the pain radiating through my back and down my leg. I walked upstairs to my room and I bent down to untie my shoes when my back suddenly went out! If you’ve ever experienced that you know how painful it was. I could no longer walk, and I felt that at every movement I would fall. I called my dad and brother to help me – by the time they got to me I was crying so hard I couldn’t breathe. Unable to help in any physical way, my dad told me exactly what to do and how to get on the ground and put my legs up on my bed at a 90˚ angle. I laid in that position for two hours. By then the sun was setting and my room’s temperature was dropping. Because of that, I became chilled so my lower back was locking up again and a knot formed on not just my left side but also on my right side. Crying again I called for my mom to help me get up or take the pain away, whichever came first. I couldn’t move my legs at that point because my lower back had seized up. My mom called for my brother to come and pick me up and make me straight up and down. I can’t even begin to describe how much pain I was experiencing. When I was standing with my mom holding me up I got in the shower to raise my body heat and relax my back a little – very little.

There is much more to this story, but to keep it as short as possible, I’ll say I have been on my back for a whole week icing with my feet elevated. It was only by the grace of God and His healing hand that by Friday I was walking on my own and by Monday I was sitting up with little pain.

Last night while reading my Bible I realized something –  my weakness humbled me to ask for help from the Lord and my family, but any strength I had was from the Lord Himself. Which inspired today’s blog.

Humility through strength.

How then can we have humility in our strength? We need to realize that our strength is not of our own hand. We cannot make ourselves stronger, only God can. 2 Samuel 22:40 says, “For You equipped me with strength for the battle; You made those who rise against me sink under me.” We know life is a battle so God gives us the strength we need to face each day as seen in the Armor of God. He provides the “brute” Spiritual strength and allows us to have the physical strength (see Judges 13-16 to read about Samson).

We can only receive this strength by seeking Him and His presence. “Seek the Lord and His strength; seek His presence continually.” (1. Chr 16:11; Psalm 105:4) By seeking Him we are humbling ourselves by admitting we need Him.

“If my people who are called by My Name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sins and heal their land.”

(2 Chronicles 7:14)

The book of Psalm is all about King David learning the lesson of humility and leaning on God for His strength and courage. He was brought low through choices he made, but he had a teachable spirit and the Lord was able to teach him over and over again the value of being near to Him and being as a needy child asking for help without pride.

James 4:6,10 even talk about how the Lord responds to prideful people and how he responds to humble people.

“But He gives more grace. Therefore it says, ‘God oppresses the proud, but gives grace to the humble…Humble yourselves before the Lord, and He will exalt you.’”

So by seeking Him we remain humble yet strong.

We also need to remember that being humble is part of the heart. When we have a heart that is striving after God we remain humble, selfless.

Humility is of the Heart – God strengthens the heart

“My flesh and heart my fail. But God is the strength of my heart and m portion forever.” (Psalm 73:26)

Ephesians 3:16-19 says, “…that according to the riches of His glory He may grant you to be strengthed with the power through the Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your heart through faith – that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what the breadth and length and height and depth, and know the love of Christ the surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.”

Our strength is a gift from the One who saved us from our sins. We cannot waste such a precious gift. We cannot become prideful in that gift. We can only remain strong in our humility by DAILY seeking after Him.

When we humble ourselves by acknowledging we are in need of a savior because we cannot heal ourselves or have a sacrifice big enough to cover our multitudes of sin. We need God. When we don’t humble ourselves we leave it up to God and His way is sometimes very painful. (Eustace becoming human again in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader) “Now I, Nebuchadnezzar, praise and extol and honor the King of heaven, for all His works are right and His ways are just; and those who walk in pride He is able to humble.” (Daniel 4:37)

Our strength is a gift – don’t waste it with pride.