False Humility

This command I am giving you today is not too difficult for you to understand or perform. It is not up in heaven, so distant that you must ask, ‘Who will go to heaven and bring it down so we can hear and obey it?’ It is not beyond the sea, so far away that you must ask, ‘Who will cross the sea to bring it to us so we can hear and obey it?’ The message is very close at hand; it is on your lips and in your heart so that you can obey it. – Deuteronomy 30:11-14

Sometimes people come to me complaining about their struggle with sin. They talk about their battle with the devil as though it were World War III and liken it to the struggle described in Ephesians 6:12.

I understand what they’re saying and to a degree I’m forced to agree with them because I am equally guilty! I also have not achieved a sinless state as yet. Maybe next week!!! Though there is a process to salvation and we are “working out” our salvation like a baker works the yeast into every bit of the dough (Philippians 2:12), I must also believe that the commands of God are not impossible to achieve.

Christ told us that His yoke was easy. There is still a yoke, a burden, but it is a light one. God tells us that His commands are not difficult. They don’t require a tremendous effort. Christ reiterated this when He said that if we just had a mustard seed’s worth of faith, we could move mountains. So, what’s the problem?

Part of it could be the Pharisee Syndrome. The Pharisees were a legalistic and separatistic group who strictly but often hypocritically kept the law of Moses and the unwritten “tradition of the elders” (Matthew 15:2). Jesus accused them in Matthew 23:4 of crushing the people with impossible religious demands, yet those hypocrites would never lift a finger in order to help. Perhaps the terrible burden that you are struggling with is one of your own making. Carefully check it out in the Scriptures. Is this something that God is actually demanding of you?

A large part of the problem, however, is false humility. I call it false because it seems so humble to admit your failures and weaknesses. All the while, our wicked and treacherous hearts are providing us with an excuse to not do what we know we should. “If only I were stronger, I could accomplish this, Lord! If only I weren’t sinful by nature, I could better love my neighbor, Lord! If only my heart weren’t so wretchedly evil I could do what you tell me.”

God’s response is “Listen folks, this isn’t rocket science.” As a wise man once said, “It is not so much all the things in the Bible that I do not understand that disturb me so much as all the things that I do understand and don’t obey.”