Strive For Excellence (7)

We will be concluding our discussion of the topic of striving for excellence this week and to recap, the main points in the previous posts have been:

a.     Striving for excellence is not a desire for superiority over others

b.  While striving for excellence, have a disposition that views excellence as a direction and not a final destination

c.    Striving for excellence for God’s people should be done with a realization that we have a divine seed of excellence

d.    Striving for excellence requires some crucial internal attitudes:

1.      Determination

2.      Faith in God

This week I will go on to highlight a third crucial internal attitude required to walk in excellence

3.      Humility

One of the challenges that people who strive to walk in excellence face is pride. It really does not matter in what area or segment in life it is, pride just very easily creeps in. Once you begin abounding, there is a real temptation to become conceited and become self-congratulatory. With pride comes a desire to show one’s self better than others. Proud people usually have an exaggerated estimate of their achievements, attainments or status and they usually despise others or even treat others with contempt. Some of us become proud based on our previous achievements and some of us actually even display “spiritual pride”. 

The problem with pride is that it prevents us from reaching further, limits us from abounding further. That is not surprising as Scripture warns us:

“God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble” 1^st Peter 5:5b New Living Translation. 

You can also look up James 4:6, Psalm 138:6, Proverbs 3:34 and Proverbs 29:23.  

The only antidote to pride is humility. Maintaining a humble disposition is the only thing that can keep us from the nasty scourge of pride. Biblical humility is an internal attitude that accepts God’s estimation or assessment as true.

Humility is not a rejection of anything good. Some people think that is what being humble is about. They have such an inferior view of themselves and constantly refuse to see themselves as being any good. True humility is an attitude of not having any exaggerated opinion of one’s self but accepting God’s estimation (Romans 12:3).

Again in the life of Joseph (remember we have been looking at Joseph and Daniel as examples of people who walked in excellence), we find this lesson of humility. Throughout his journey Joseph learnt humility and at the point when he was to be promoted to that elevated position, he displayed humility as he spoke with Pharaoh (Genesis 41:15-16).

 

Humility keeps us teachable (James 1:21). Humility makes us seek to improve and abound further as we walk in excellence. In my life personally, I’m learning to maintain this attitude. As a believer in Christ Jesus, I am reaching forth to things ahead, I know I can be better. As a husband and a father, I am focused on being better in my relationship with my wife and daughter. As a Pastor and preacher, I am constantly seeking to be better in both pastoring and preaching, I never think that I’ve attained the best I can be at those. As a Medical Doctor, I also have the same attitude. I encourage you to have the same attitude in all that you do.

Remember as I wrote at the beginning of this series: whatever stage you are in life, God is calling you to abound. God’s desire is for you to excel and He has given us resources to enable us achieve just that.