Thoughts I Have

Humiliation

To be humiliated never feels good. On a small scale, it is frustrating. When someone blames me for something I haven't done, or says something about me I feel is untrue, I writhe inside.
For some reason, I seem to think humiliation on a greater scale is more honorable. I seem to think it is easier to deal with.
I have been told by many I'm not assertive enough. Perhaps they are right. :)
But before I learn to be assertive, I must learn love.
If I experience humiliation with the spirit of humility, with love in my heart, I will go beyond bearing the small humiliations I find so infuriating.
Humiliation in the spirit of humility and love produces fruit, the strength to have greater humility and love.
Humility means putting love over the pain of humiliation. It means not retaliating, but choosing in my heart to love instead. Love is less an emotion and more a choice.
If I can bear the humiliation of being blamed for spilling milk my little brother spilled with grace, then I can begin to think of how to endure greater humiliation.
I have heard those who pray for patience are given much to be patient for. Perhaps this is also true of humility. If I use humiliation to strengthen my character, to grow closer to Christ, I will become more humble.
But what a struggle it is!

"Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, 6 who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men. 8 Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. 9 For this reason also, God highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name, 10 so that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow, of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11 and that every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father."

-Philippians 2:5-11