Humiliation of the Heart

“Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God, so that he may exalt you at the proper time.” - 1 Peter 5:6[1]

When you think of humiliation¸ you probably think of something negative (like bullying), possibly even something evil (like verbally abusing another human being). However, humiliation sometimes is used in a positive way, and God often uses it to teach us his ways and to keep our own pride from destroying his purposes for our lives. 1 Peter 5:6 has been highly influential in my life and walk with Jesus lately. As I have read it, the Holy Spirit has shown me that I am prideful and trying to take over the reins of my life so that God cannot work. It is not my job to direct my life, but to submit to God’s direction. It is, in sum, humiliation of the heart. Let me give you a peak into my walk with Jesus lately, by looking at a portion of a book I recently picked up at the bookstore where I work.

The Crook in the Lot

Thomas Boston, in his book entitled The Crook in the Lot, gives a masterful exposition of 1 Peter 5:6. He begins by defining the duty we are given in this verse. The context, he points out, is the contrast between the proud and the humble in verse 5. The apostle Peter boldly declares that God opposes the proud and gives grace to the humble. This leads into his command to be humble, under God’s mighty hand. Boston points out first that we are to seek humility. This may be obvious from the verse, but this is the very first point of major importance. The apostle is telling us to seek humility.[2]

Next, Boston points out another, potentially less obvious point. The exaltation which we receive through this humility is not primarily for our exaltation, but his purpose in exalting us. If it were merely for our exaltation, then we could boast in our humility as the producer of this exaltation, thereby leaving God out of the equation altogether. However, he is sure to reassure us that this exaltation will indeed follow our humiliation. On the next few pages, he deals with several objections to this humiliation that our human pride would seek to rise up inside to pull the wool over our eyes so that we may not see how God is seeking to humble us.

The first objection, says Boston, is that, if we are humiliated by God, we will become doormats for people to walk over and trample. That is not true. In fact, the puritan writes, au contrare, that “pride of spirit ubsubdued, will bring men to lie at the feet of others forever.”[3] The Scripture he uses is the final verse of the final chapter of the book of Isaiah. In Isaiah 66:24, Yahweh is telling the prophet what will happen those who rebel against the Almighty: “their worm will never die, their fire never go out, and they will be a horror to all humanity.”[4] The point here is not to scare the Christian, but to reassure them that a willing humility of Spirit before a holy God will surely result in us being exalted by our heavenly Father. As a result, we can “assure [ourselves we] shall not lie there.”[5]

The second objection Boston anticipates is the pride of direlection of duty. Our spirit rises up within us and begins to tell our minds, “If you don’t do it, no one else will!” This is not the case, says the writer, for our duty is not to do the raising, but to do the submission. Consider this quote from page 92: “Bringing down of the spirit is our duty, raising up is God’s work; let us not forfeit the privilege of God’s raising us up, by arrogating that work to ourselves, taking it out of his hand.”

When we begin to think in this way, no doubt at the behest of the evil one, we begin to produce in ourselves pride to try and do God’s work ourselves. This will never end well. I have tried, many times over, and failed at this task. I have tried to do it with a job, with educational pursuits, with friendships, sexual desire, etc. It will never work. Nonetheless, Jesus waits for us to come back. Jesus waits for us to exhaust ourselves, to run out of options, hit rock bottom, or whatever other matephor you need to use, he waits for us to return to him and finish what the path he started us down.

This objection is all too common in our individualistic culture. You hear things like, “Follow your dreams!”, “Follow your heart’s desire!”, or worse, “No one else will do it unless you are the one to do it!” How many times have you heard these (or some variation) phrases in our culture? They are commonplace sayings, even amongst Christians. However, this is not consistent with God’s Word. God’s Word tells us that are to live in complete dependence on Jesus Christ, and our desires cannot be trusted unless they are first guided by the one who put them there.

The third objection the author foresees in our hearts is the thought that we may never arrive at the promised exaltation that this verse supposedly speaks of. This is wrong on two levels. First, the level of exaltation is proportional to the level humiliation. In other words, however low God brings us, he will indeed raise us up to a height that us equal to the level of humiliation which he pushed upon us. This is to teach us how to handle the level of exaltation that he may choose to grant us after the humility that he instills into our hearts.[6]

The second is that which is concerned with the date or time at which one will be exalted. This is never our cause to be concerned with. God is the one in control of the time at which we may be exalted after our humiliation. There is a right time for everything that happens (Eccl. 3:1-8). There is also the promise of a harvest, should we continue to toil and trust our Lord to give us strength so that we do not faint (Gal. 6:9). This exaltation, then, will come at the right time that is supposed to arrive. It should neither be too early (should it puff us up with pride), nor too late (should God leave us weary and we consider leaving our post). The exaltation that is promised to us through our humiliation is going to come, in due time.

Personal Reflections

This Bible verse, couple with Boston’s exposition of it in The Crook in the Lot was extremely helpful to me, and I hope it will be helpful to you as you read this. The Lord has been teaching me a lot lately, through the thoughts of having to stay put and not move jobs for something I thought was better. I was also seeking to pursue educational pursuits I was never fully prepared to handle, both spiritually and mentally. I also have still a blackness in my heart for certain sins of my past: anger, lustful thoughts, etc. Yet, through all of this, God is humbling me and allowing me to experience the results of my sinful actions in a relatively inconsequential way to show me how it should turn out should I seek to be lifted up before His right and holy timing.

Are you in a season of humiliation by the Lord? If you think you might be, don’t squirm and resist, simply submit and pray; ask God what he is trying to teach you. Through this practice, you will undoubtedly learn that God is showing you something that you have been blinded to all along.

All glory, power, majesty, honor, and praise be to the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe, and Ruler of all things!

Amen.

[1] Christian Standard Bible (Nashville, TN: Holman Bible Publishers, 2020), 1 Pe 5:6.

[2] Boston, Thomas, The Crook in the Lot (Banner of Truth, 2017: Edinburg, UK), 89.

[3] Boston, Thomas, The Crook in the Lot (Banner of Truth: Edinburg, UK 2024), 91.

[4] Isaiah 66:24 (CSB)

[5] Boston, 92.

[6] Ibid.