"Trending Downward"

As the world trends downward, born again believers must do the same.

"Be clothed with humility: for God resisteth the proud, and giveth grace to the humble" (I Peter 5:5).

Our need for grace is profound in times such as these, and lowliness of heart and mind is God's requirement for providing it. The yoke of the Lord Jesus Christ ever steers us toward the sensibility that ruled His earthly life - "I am meek and lowly in heart" - and our consistent reception of grace is based on our consistent humbling of ourselves before God and man (Matthew 11:29). Our ministry of grace to others is also based on the character and way of the Lord Jesus becoming our character and way by the Holy Spirit's working within us.

This day will offer many opportunities for such humility. The path is not easy, and our flesh resists the attitudes and actions of lowliness motivated by genuine godliness. A dying world, however, must see the Lord Jesus walking in us, and our brothers and sisters in Christ also need the grace we receive and then dispense in words, attitudes and deeds of self sacrifice. The way upward for believers is always downward, and we most experience the glory of Heaven when we willingly kneel to the dust of earth for the glory of God and the blessing of others.

"Let nothing be done through strife or vainglory; but in lowliness of mind let each esteem other better than themselves."
(Phillipians 2:3)