Eating Humble Pie

Will the white collar associate with the blue collar? Will the Chinese and the Taiwanese serve together, the Hispanic and the Portuguese love one another? Will the black man and the white man share a hymnal? Will the home schooler and the public school principal care about each other? Will the PhDers be taught in Sunday school by a college dropout?

Paul gives us the test. Don't be haughty in your thinking. You do not partition your life from others. You participate in life with others.

I want to ask you a very personal question. Is there a category of people that when you think about them, you feel superior? Do you feel you're better than them because of a decision they've made or a habit they have?

Or maybe it's just an individual person in your life and in your estimation, they are inferior to you. Well, if that's true, the Apostle Paul is going to challenge your thinking today. We're returning to our study of the Book of Romans with this lesson entitled, Eating Humble Pie. In our last session, we began to study this factor of grace, this active dynamic characteristic of graciousness, which distinguishes us as people of God. Our lives should be marked with grace, our conversations, our activities, our relationships, our service, marked by that quality of God's character who is known for his amazing grace, isn't he? Paul in chapter 12 of Romans is not pulling any punches. It's as if he dipped his quill into the reality of life and he writes with clear, unavoidable language.

There just aren't any loopholes. In verses 14 and 15, we were challenged to be gracious to people who are rejoicing, to be gracious to the heartbroken and even gracious to the heartbreakers. And now in verse 16, we're introduced to several more real life situations. Notice there, be of the same mind toward one another. Do not be haughty in mind, but associate with the lowly.

Do not be wise in your own estimation. When Paul exhorts the church in Corinth and in Ephesus and in Philippi, and now here in Rome with this same language to be of the same mind, he is not saying you are to think like everybody else thinks. Frano does not refer to unanimity. It refers to unity. You may be very different from others in the body, but you have the same object of faith. You have the same hope, the same Lord, and the same desire to glorify God. Paul, when referring to this kind of harmony, one author wrote, talks of that which proceeds from a common object, common hopes, and common desires. That's how we can be so diversified and at the same time be unified. We have the same object of faith, the same hope, and the same desire.

You see evidences of that out there. David mentioned one yesterday, you know, the state Carolina game, thousands of screaming fans, right, cheering on the same team, probably very different from people sitting around them in the stands and yet they had this unified passion. Not to mention they all wore red and they all hated everybody wearing blue, right? They wanted to win the game. I was able to catch a few of the last minutes and I saw a few fans dressed in blue. Were any of those you?

A few. They had a similar passion and objective and that was to get out of the stadium alive after the game. When Paul says, be of the same mind, he is saying root as it were to win the game. It is a mark of graciousness. It is the outward evidence of unity, this harmony. We've entered the final stages and you've been hearing about a weekly of a building program which will tax this blessing of harmony.

It is to be expected. It's easy for people to say why aren't we building that or why are we building this or why aren't we using our money for that or couldn't we do without that or how can we build without this. The health of our church will be seen in a very tangible way with this level of harmony as we follow our leadership and ultimately the leader. Harmony would say even though I don't have preschoolers anymore in my home, I want us to give those children everything we possibly can.

Even though I don't have teenagers or college students, I want them to feel that this is their second home when they arrive. We want to give the men and the singles and the seniors everything we can possibly give them and for goodness sake, let's give the women as many bathrooms as we can build this time. Amen? I'm reading a little paperback by Warren Wiersbe entitled on being a servant of God and he reminded me that we have never been asked by God to manufacture unity. We already have it. We have an obligation to maintain it. It is not our responsibility to produce unity.

We can't. It is produced by the Spirit of God but it is our responsibility to protect it. One of the attributes of the church, the true church is unity. It's one body universal and oneness in local assembly and that's an attribute of a church that honors God.

Now our actions should match our attribute. One of the marks of a gracious people of God is not that we all have the same personality but that we have the same purpose. I simply put this first phrase here in this text is nothing less than a call from the Apostle Paul to get along. You remember from verse 10 in chapter 12 there is the principle of devotion to one another in love. We're devoted more to one another's desires than our own. There is the principle of deference to one another giving preference Paul writes to one another in honor.

Listen these are the marks of a gracious people in the world cannot figure out how so many different people from so many different backgrounds with so many different personalities in fact with so many different accents can come together and be unified. One answer we belong to the God of grace and we are a people of grace. Now if you study verse 16 closely you can easily divide it into three phrases and all three phrases have the same Greek root fran, franuntas, franomoi that all relate to the way we think. I don't know how your translation says it but it's a good one if it refers to mindset or thinking you could circle the words mind in verse 16 be of the same mind. There's the first one do not be haughty in mind. It's a good translation associate with lowly do not be wise. It's a little more hidden there literally means don't be high minded. We'll look at that in a moment.

Associate with the lowly. It's repeated three times and whenever God repeats a word so often in so little space it isn't because he's run out of options so he can't come up with another word. He wants to emphasize that this has to do first and foremost with our minds and then it's displayed and the way we act. Coming to Christ does not mean you begin to think a little differently from the world. When you come to Christ it means you have an absolutely new mindset a new perspective. In Romans 12 it began by calling us to be transformed by the renewing of our what? Our minds. One of the most significant changes in the believer is how we think about one another.

It's the greatest evidence of the work of the Spirit of God. Now in verse 16 Paul gives us three related to these three phrases very specific ways to think in our minds and then of course act. We could easily divide these three phrases and I have rewritten verse 16 into the form of three tests of gracious thinking. The first phrase would deliver number one the test of harmony.

We've already talked about that. Be of the same mind toward one another. Harmony in the body of Christ is as important as harmony in our physical bodies. You know when there is disharmony in your body there are a group of cells that are trying to devour another group of cells. We call that cancer. And it's a life threatening thing to the physical body.

It is no less serious to a local body of believers to not have one group of cells devouring another. You go to your doctor maybe for your annual physical. If you're like me you resist it. You put it off. Well I can have one every five years. That'll be enough. But how important when you do go are those results.

You think about it. How critical is that phone call or that report? How concerned are you? Probably very concerned.

The older you get the more concerned you become, right? A couple of weeks ago in my message to the student body at Shepherd Seminary's Fall Convocation I shared how a couple of months ago for the first time in my adult life I was lying in a hospital bed hooked up to IVs preparing for an outpatient procedure. I had arrived at that station in life where I was going to have that colonoscopy and endoscopy. A wonderful chapter in my life. A delightful time. I was dressed in that lovely blue gown. I was only given the front half.

Who designed those things by the way anyway? I was lying under the blanket which provided neither warmth nor dignity and the nurse came in and she said she needed to take my blood pressure and I said sure and so she wrapped my arm and she began to squeeze that little rubber thing to tighten up around the arm and then she stopped. She looked at me and she said now listen honey, which let me know I'm in the south of course, listen honey, your blood pressure is way out of line. What you need to do is just lie there and think happy thoughts.

What kind of theology is that? So I did. I lay there thinking the happiest thoughts I could think and finally she squeezed it and tightened it up again and then she took it and she said now honey that's the way it ought to be.

She patted me on the head and left peculiarly. Embarrassing to know that my inner frustration and impatience and turmoil and worry could be shown on a graph. That lady could say you need to think some happy thoughts. Does it ever bother you when you have a poor physical examination? I wonder how much does it bother you if you have a bad spiritual examination?

Here's one of them. What's the level of harmony? Be of the same mind toward one another.

I can hear that nurse saying think happy thoughts about each other. Which happens to be great theology. The second phrase will deliver the second test.

It's the test of impartiality. Paul writes a little further in verse 16 do not be haughty in mind and stop. I think he expects everybody to say come on Paul we're not haughty in mind. How would you ever say that? I mean how could you tell that somebody is haughty in their mind? He goes on to give a concrete illustration. Associate with the lowly. That's how.

That's how you can graph it. The first test asks the question are you stubborn? In plain English this test asks the question are you a snob? Are there people that you think are just below you? Will you associate with people unlike you? Maybe they grew up on the other side of town or the railroad tracks. How do you feel about them when they come here to assemble with you?

I just sort of kick my feet up on my desk and I begin to think of different illustrations. Will the white collar associate with the blue collar here? Will it matter? Will the Chinese and the Taiwanese serve together?

The Hispanic and the Portuguese love one another. Will the black man and the white man share a hymnal? Will the doctor and the mechanic laugh together in church? Will the home schooler and the public school principal care about each other? Will the business woman and the mother of six have a cup of coffee together? Will the old man seek to understand the young man? Will the single appreciate the marriage conference at the church? Will the empty nesters pray for the single parents?

Will the drummer appreciate the violinist? Will the PhDers be taught in Sunday school by a college dropout? Paul gives us the test. Don't be haughty in your thinking. You do not partition your life from others. You participate in life with others. Even though they may be vastly different, maybe they even wore red or blue yesterday.

There's a test. One of Colonial's first members was a native North Carolinian. In fact, she had lived in Cary all her life. Our church was only a few weeks old when she showed up the first time in her 70s. She didn't say much, but she came to love Colonial. I went to see her a couple of times. She didn't get around much.

Lived in the same home for decades, a small home, probably 700 or 800 square feet with wide, bare pine planks on the floor before they were now expensive and popular. When I would show up, she would say, come on in preacher, and she spit out her chewing tobacco. She put in her teeth. That woman was part of our early days, and she went home to be with the Lord a number of years ago, and I'm sure she stopped chewing tobacco and she has real teeth now. But she happened to worship in the same assembly with an IBM executive, a medical doctor, a former secretary from the Pentagon who worked for the Joint Chiefs of Staff. He was all brass, a mechanic, housewives, a painter, a missionary, and a pile of kids.

We didn't pull from one side of the railroad tracks or another. Do you know that the average seminary is teaching the average church planter now, when they leave seminary and they go and plant a church to target an audience, to target a segment of society, to pull from a certain class? I find that to be absolutely disgusting. I think Paul made it clear, don't be haughty in mind. You don't target a certain kind of person, and that's going to be the guy or the gal I'm going to hang around the church.

View others underneath you. That's what Paul is talking about. In one of his books, I can't remember which one, Chuck Swindoll tells the story of some children in his neighborhood who worked long and hard on their little cardboard clubhouse. Maybe you read that this was the place where they would meet together and play together and have fun.

Since a clubhouse has to have membership rules, they came up with these three. Nobody act big, they rode out on a piece of cardboard. Number two, nobody act small. Number three, everybody act medium.

That's verse 16, first phrase to the T. Nobody in here is a big shot. Nobody in here should feel they're worthless either. When you enter this special place, everybody just act average.

Just be medium. That ought to be the new rules for membership in this church. Let me say something, and I don't want you to misunderstand me here, but I have had people over the years say things to me a couple of different occasions thinking they're giving me a compliment, like one man who said to me, oh, you pastor of that church. Well, I've heard that anybody who is anybody goes over there.

How tragic is that? I don't want to be in a church of somebodies. I want to be in a church of redeemed nobodies who happen to follow the somebody. Amen?

That's who we want to be. By the way, the word lowly there in your text, this is the test. Associate with the lowly. That's the same Greek word used in Matthew Chapter 11, verse 29, where Jesus Christ described himself. I am meek and what?

Lowly. As a man, he was saying, I am ordinary. And wasn't he? It's as if he pulled a chair up and along with the servants reached willingly for the humble pie. He wasn't born into a high ranking family. Matthew 13, 55.

They said with amazement, is not this the carpenter's son? He had no special property or wealth. Luke 9, 58 says for the son of man had nowhere to lay his head.

Never developed a portfolio. He had no special upbringing. One of his disciples to be said when he heard about Jesus and where he was from said, could any good thing come out of Nazareth? Study the Bible lands during the days of Christ. And Nazareth was viewed as a crummy little town. And nobody of significance came from there.

And nothing important happened there. John one forty six. He certainly didn't have a special reputation. He was a friend of crooked men, tax collectors and sinners.

Luke seven thirty four. He had no special physique or appearance. In fact, Isaiah described him as absolutely unattractive.

No special record of success. He was despised and rejected of men. Let me paraphrase. I've written out what Paul wrote to the Corinthian Church in Chapter one. What kind of people has God chosen to be his followers?

What about them? He has not chosen many people who are wise in the ways of the world. He has not chosen many noble born or well connected. Look, instead, Christ has chosen the unskilled laborer, the one who isn't a mover and shaker in the world system. He has chosen people who are looked down on as unsophisticated and ordinary. These are the ones who make up the majority of the church so that none of us can boast. There is no aristocracy in the church.

There should never be an upper crust. Just people who neither act big nor small, just medium. Before we leave the second phrase, I think it's interesting to note that Paul's word for lowly, tapinas, can be understood two different ways depending on how you translate it. It could be translated as neuter and that would mean he's talking about lowly or ordinary things or ordinary jobs. Or it can be translated as masculine.

They're spelled exactly the same way in the Greek text. That would mean he's referring to associating with ordinary mankind. The context is to determine it. The context in this particular verse doesn't help.

After studying this textual issue, I believe the Spirit of God purposefully moved Paul along as he does everywhere else to write something that would remain ambiguous. For this reason I believe. We take it both ways. A gracious believer doesn't turn up his nose at ordinary tasks. He's willing to clean up after children or sweep the floor or water the grass. Furthermore, a gracious believer isn't above ordinary people.

He doesn't stick up his nose as he walks by someone that he thinks isn't in the same class as him. Either one has a place in the church. The main course of the church is humble pie. If you won't have a slice with the servants, you probably aren't developing that gracious spirit that should mark the people of God. There's one more test of gracious thinking. The last phrase of verse 16 delivers the test of accountability. Do not be wise, literally high-minded in your own estimation.

Let me put it in plain English. The first phrase tested our harmony and asked, are you stubborn? The second tested our impartiality and asked, are you a snob?

Are you standoffish? The third phrase tests our accountability and asks, are you stuck on yourself? Don't be wise in your own estimation, which is another way of saying don't be stuck on yourself.

Don't think you've arrived. Be open and accountable. The trouble is the natural man and our flesh is automatically addicted to ourselves.

Our biggest problem is the person sitting in the seat where you sit and the one standing here. Don't be high-minded in your own conceits. His greatest thoughts are of himself. His greatest plans are all about him. His grandest thoughts are all about his things and his life and his world. He is wise. He is high-minded in his own eyes. You know, the only biblical writers that use this phrase are Paul and Solomon. Solomon said it this way in the Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible.

Do you see a man who is the same word? Wise in his own eyes. There is more hope for a fool than in Proverbs 26 verse 12.

Pretty strong language. A fool never learns anything. Later in verse 16, Solomon wrote, the sluggard is, again, this phrase, wiser in his own eyes than seven men who can give an answer, which is an interesting truth. In other words, everybody knows the man is a sluggard. Everybody knows he's lazy.

Everybody knows he's a loaf. But when he is challenged on it and held accountable to it by his friends, he is capable of defending himself better than seven men put together who are great orators. Just try holding him to accountability and he can, boy, he can respond and it sounds so good. He is stuck on the impression that he has of himself and is above correction and beyond rebuke. So be open, be honest, be accountable.

God has designed us to need one another's counsel and to need one another's perspective. Probably two of the clearest evidences that you are accountable is that you can laugh at yourself and you can admit when you're wrong. Neither one is easy, are they? But they're both profitable.

A.W. Tozer said it this way, never be afraid of honest criticism. If the critic is wrong, you can help him. If you're wrong, he can help you.

Either way, somebody gets helped. You know the old saying, though, don't you? It was repeated again to Charlie Brown in the comic strip. Just remember, Charlie Brown, that you learn more from your failures than from your successes.

To which Charlie Brown responded, well, that makes me the smartest person in the world. Will you own up to it or will you resist it? Are you stubborn? Are you standoffish?

Are you stuck on yourself? It's possible, by the way, ladies and gentlemen, to be all of those things in the assembly of the redeemed. Otherwise, he would have never written it to the church in Rome and to the church in Kerry. Paul is saying, in effect, I highly recommend that you develop a taste for humble pie.

Pull up a chair with the servants and dig in. It will truly make you a man or woman of grace. Hudson Taylor, the great missionary who laid the foundation of the gospel in China several centuries ago, said on one occasion, a most powerful thought. As an old man reflecting on his years of ministry, by now very famous, world renowned, he put it this way, I often think that God must have been looking for someone small enough and weak enough for him to use, and he found me.

That's the heart of it. That's the heart of a gracious servant of God, pulls a chair up wherever God can use him or her and says, I love humble pie. That is the person who will experience the blessing of God and will be used to be a blessing of God to the church. This has been some hard truth from God's Word today and I hope you'll find time to evaluate your own attitudes toward others. I'm really glad you joined us today here on Wisdom for the Heart.

We have a gift for you today. We want to help you think biblically about those times when God answers your prayer with a no. King David had a project that he wanted to accomplish near the end of his life. David's dream was to build a temple for God, but God had other plans.

David's dream for his own life didn't align with God's plan for David's life. Steven's written a booklet based on that account called, When the Answer is No. Go to wisdomonline.org forward slash no to get your copy. Then join us next time here on Wisdom for the Heart. You