Humility is one of the great virtues of a Christian’s heart. As we progress in our sanctification, we not only see more of the greatness of the Lord’s love for us. We also see more of the weakness of our love for Him. We see that reflected in the dynamics of Isaiah 6 (which is a great template for a worship service today!). Isaiah saw the Lord (this was Jesus, according to John 12:41), high and lifted up and seated on a throne, with seraphim crying out, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of His glory!” And then he reflexively saw himself, and he cried out, “Woe is me! For I am lost (literally in Hebrew ‘disintegrating’), for I am a man of unclean lips.” And since he was a prophet whose lips proclaimed the word of the Lord, even this, where he was at his best spiritually, was terribly deficient before the Lord.
Surely that duality will be reflected in the souls of growing believers. Few today would be sold brazen as to claim that they lived at greater spiritual heights than the apostle Paul. But after years of walking closer and closer to the Lord, Paul confessed that he was the chief of sinners (1 Timothy 1:15), not because he was sinning more then, but that his spiritual vision had improved to the point that he was then able to see more clearly into the depths of his own redeemed fallenness. Such genuine, honest humility is perhaps truly one of the greatest marks of spiritual maturity.
The first of Martin Luther’s “Ninety Five Theses” was this: “When our Lord and Master Jesus Christ said, ‘Repent’ (Matthew 4:17), He willed the entire life of believers to be one of repentance.” He was right. “Repentance” is not just one thing to check off the list when we come to saving faith in Jesus. It is something we must do every day, as the Holy Spirit convicts us further of our sin and our need of a Savior. It is what Jesus taught us to pray in the Lord’s Prayer: “Forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.” Such is a life of humility before the Lord.