LIVING WATERS
For the proclamation of the Gospel and the edification of the Body of Christ
To Go Up Is to Go Down
“Humble yourselves therefore, under God's mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time” (1 Peter 5:6).
The blessed Lord Jesus took the very lowest place; but God has given Him the very highest. He made Himself nothing; but God has made Him everything. He said, “I am a worm and no man”; but God has set Him as Head over all. He went into the very dust of death; but God has placed Him on the throne of the Majesty in the heavens.
What does all this teach us? It teaches us that the way to go up is to go down.
This is a grand lesson, and one which we very much need to learn. It would effectually deliver us from envy and jealousy, from strife and vain glory, from self-importance and self-occupation. God will assuredly exalt those who, in the spirit and mind of Christ, take the low place; and, on the other hand, He will, as assuredly, abase those who seek to be somebody.
Oh! to be nothing! This is true liberty – true happiness – true moral elevation. And then what intense power of attraction in one who makes nothing of himself! And, on the other hand, how repulsive is a pushing, forward, elbowing, self-exalting spirit! How utterly unworthy of one bearing the name of Him who made Himself of no reputation! May we set it down as a fixed truth that ambition cannot possibly live in the presence of One who emptied Himself? No doubt. An ambitious Christian is a flagrant contradiction. (C.H. Mackintosh).