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"From whence come wars and fightings among you? Come they not hence, even of
your lusts that war in your members? . . . . . Wherefore He saith, God resisteth the proud,
but giveth grace unto the humble" (James 4: 1-6).
So it is that the Apostle, in Phil. 2:, links together `lowliness of mind' and `one mind':
"Fulfil ye my joy, that ye be likeminded, having the same love, being of one accord,
of one mind. Let nothing be done through strife or vainglory; but in lowliness of mind
let each esteem other better than themselves" (Phil. 2: 2, 3).
What an example of this spirit follows, nothing less than the humility of mind,
meekness, longsuffering and forbearance should ever be the characteristics of God's
elect:
"Put on therefore, as the elect of God . . . . . bowels of mercies, kindness,
humbleness of mind, meekness, longsuffering, forbearing one another" (Col. 3: 12, 13).
Just in passing we call the reader's attention to the parallel with Eph. 4: expressed in
the two passages of Col. 3: 10 and 12:
"Put on the new man"
"Put on . . . . . humility"
(See the previous article for fuller detail)
We must not leave this theme without a word of warning. There is a true humility, but
there is also a false. The one flows from Christ, the other draws away from Christ. The
passage that gives the warning is Col. 2: 18-23, and we give Farrar's rendering in order
to stimulate thought and provoke attention:
"Let no one then snatch your prize from you by delighting in abjectness, and service of angels,
treading the emptiness of his own visions in all the futile inflation of his mere carnal understanding,
and not keeping hold of Him who is `the Head' from Whom, supplied and compacted by its junctures
and ligaments, the whole body grows the growth of God. If ye died with Christ from mundane
rudiments, why, as though living in the world, are ye ordinance-ridden with such rules as `Do not
handle', `Do not taste', `Do not even touch', referring to things all of which are perishable in the mere
consumption, according to the commandment and teachings of men? All these kinds of rules have a
credit for wisdom in volunteered supererogation and abasement--hard usage of the body--but have no
sort of value as a remedy as regards the indulgence of the flesh."
Humility of mind is in the original tapeinophrosune; tapeinos `lowly', is wonderfully
illustrated in Matt. 11: 29, especially if we realize the point of the word `At that time' of
verse 25. Other references worth noticing are Rom. 12: 16 and Phil. 2: 8. Humility of
mind is closely associated with meekness. Because of the `meekness and gentleness of
Christ', Paul, the one in authority, can find it in his heart to condescend to `beseech'
(II Cor. 10: 1). See also I Cor. 4: 21. Meekness is no product of the flesh. When the
flesh attempts to bring forth humility and meekness it produces such creatures as Uriah
Heep who was `very humble', who writhed and twisted in his excessive humility, but
who was nevertheless a monster of hypocrisy.
"But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness,
faith, meekness, temperance" (Gal. 5: 22, 23).