humility (part 2)

Read part 1 of my takeaways from Mahaney's Humility: True Greatness here.

You might not know CJ Mahaney - but you might have heard of his disciple - Joshua Harris. He became "famous" in some parts of the Christian bubble after writing I Kissed Dating Goodbye. I remember thinking as a teenager "what a weirdo!" I've still never read that book, but in college somebody gave me his later book Not Even a Hint and it is the best book I've ever read on sexual purity (probably post my takeaways from that book here on renown sometime in the future). He had crazy good stuff to say about and gave mad props in that book to his pastor, mentor, and discipler - you guessed it, CJ Mahaney. Pretty cool story that CJ was the lead pastor of a big booming church and after CJ mentored him & when Josh was ready he simply turned it over to him! pretty cool...

Here's some more thoughts on humility from a very humble & godly man. A man a lot of guys my age look up to.

(Picking up with chapter 7)
– “Apart from God, I cannot exist. Apart from me, God does exist. God does not need me in order for Him to be; I do need God in order for me to be. *Life is lived between two hospitals…but, God is not fragile.” – R.C. Sproul
– **“There are two things that are suited to humble the souls of men…A due consideration of God, and then of ourselves. Of God in His greatness, glory, holiness, power, majesty and authority; of ourselves, in our mean, abject and sinful condition.” – John Owen
- ***Laugh Often!!! “Laughter is a divine gift to the human who is humble. A proud man cannot laugh because he must watch his dignity; he cannot give himself over to the rocking and rolling of his belly. But a poor and happy man laughs heartily because he gives no serious attention to his ego.” – Terry Lindvall on C.S. Lewis

– am I frequently critical of others? Do I look at those around me only to find one blemish after another? “This proud tendency is a deeply rooted habit for many of us who have sown seeds of self-exaltation over the years.”
- * “actively look for ways that God is at work in the lives of other people.”
- we have no excuse to not find evidences of grace in our bros.
- *“I believe in the doctrine of election, because I am quite certain that, if God had not chosen me, I should have never chosen Him; and I am sure He chose me before I was born, or else He never would have chosen me afterwards; and He must have elected me for reasons unknown to me, for I never could find any reason in myself why He should have looked upon me with special love.” - Charles Spurgeon
[you all love the shirt right!?]


[i love this] = humility—a heart more concerned with God’s glory than our own, and more intent on serving others than ourselves. This indeed is the posture of humility to which God looks.”

– we speak 25,000 words per day. “how much of it reflects pride, rather than a gospel-motivated humility?”
– “in my experience, where there’s an absence of edifying words there’s also normally the presence of pride and of self-righteousness, because those who are proud are too preoccupied with themselves and think too highly of themselves to care about building others up or to be sensitive to their true needs.”

Inviting and Pursuing Correction
“Sin in its deceptive power so often blinds us, leaving us unaware of flaws that others notice clearly.”
– do others find it easy to correct me? = excellent question!
- “there’s truth to be gleaned at times even from an enemy’s critique.”
- “humility postures itself to receive God’s grace from any avenue possible.”

- *** Awesome advice = "don't celebrate anything more than you celebrate humble character in your children." Mahaney, and his son "break out into real celebration around their house only when there is a demonstration of humility, servanthood, or godly character." They have a bigger celebration for this than for academic or athletic awards. That's pretty sweet!


*** At the end of the book Mahaney has a sweet list of suggestions for how to weaken pride and cultivate humility - practical stuff like stuff to do at the beginning and end of each day, etc... This list is worth the price of the book (which is pretty cheap). You can read the whole thing in like 2 or 3 hours so but it today here. Or if you really want the extensive notes on the book, seriously tell me in the comments with your email addy and I'll send them to you.

Hope you enjoyed this.