5 In the same way, you who are younger, submit yourselves to your elders. All of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, because,"God opposes the proud but shows favor to the humble." 6 Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time. 7 Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you. ~ 1 Peter 5:5-7
Today, we return to our study of 1 Peter 5 where the Apostle Peter continues to show us the utter importance of submitting our lives to God. And, when we submit to Him, He will define us. Peter reveals two postures which cause us to either submit to God or to not submit to Him. Submission to the God of the Bible is the ultimate expression of wisdom and humility, and, pride is its nemesis. Humility and pride are center staged in today's passage.
In v.5 of today's passage we read, "In the same way, you who are younger, submit yourselves to your elders. All of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, because,'God opposes the proud but shows favor to the humble.'"
The group mentioned right before this verse were the elders who had the responsibility of shepherding the flock. The elders were commanded to lead by example. After addressing the elders, the Apostle Peter addressed those who were younger, and then everybody else, saying that we should be submissive and to humble ourselves before God.
Peter's audience was made up of a group of sufferers. Twenty-one times in this letter he addressed the subject of suffering. So, he wrote this letter to a group of people who were intensely feeling the pain of suffering. And, it is in these contexts that good leadership shows up best. Those who feed God's suffering sheep give them the ability to navigate their suffering. And, most often through our sufferings we often resort to being defined by the flesh, we need oft reminders to humbly submit ourselves to the Lord who desires to inculcate His culture into our submitted lives.
The word for "submit" is a military term that means to line up under. The idea is that we line up under the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ. This means that we relinquish our rights to Him. Peter commands us to voluntarily adapt ourselves to each other, or blend with one another, or to be willing to surrender our rights to the Lord Jesus for the benefit of the others who are in our lives. In God's economy, humility is essential to the success of the believer in Christ. And, in today's verses Peter gives two very important reasons for us to be humble.
All of society is built on the principle of submission. There are laws that we must live by. And if we do not keep them, those in authority will enforce those laws to help us remember. When we go to work, we have to submit to rules and regulations of the company or the vision and instruction of the boss. In virtually every part of life there is a structure, a chain of command for anything to work, and so, it is among believers in Jesus Christ.
When we choose to be humble, we choose to submit ourselves to the capable hands of our Heavenly Father. In Micah 6:8 we read, "He has shown you, O man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God." God loves humility in His children because humility gives us the vantage point of wisdom and wisdom will always enable us to see the diabolical nature of the self life.
In v.6-7 of today's passage we read, "6 Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time. 7 Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you."
In v.6-7 of today's passage we read, "6 Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time. 7 Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you."
The primary expression of humility in this passage is when we "cast all our anxieties on God." Peter commands us to be humble because, if we are proud, the culture of God will be foreign to us. Peter also commands us to be humble because as we access His grace through humility, He will lift us up in due time. The primary hindrance to casting our anxieties on God is pride which most often expresses itself through the sin of worry.
Pride stubbornly refuses to be taught the ways of God, and makes its own wishes the measure of truth. Pride cannot trust God. The posture of trust is too weak and dependent for the proud. And, trusting God is the heartbeat of humility. When pride keeps us from trusting God to take care of us, there are two detrimental results: 1) false security based on our own imagined power and shrewdness to avert trouble, and 2) since we cannot guarantee our security, we are controlled by our anxiety.
Trust is the opposite of pride, and trust is the essence of humility. Trust is the confidence that God is not out to crush us but to care for us. We must be careful to not give pride safe haven in our souls; we must be diligent to cast our anxieties on Him because He will care for us. We learn to trust God by trusting Him. We don’t learn to trust simply by reading books on trust. We only learn to trust God by trusting God.
Finally, our choice to submit, to be humble and to rest in His will for our lives are not instantaneous things that come to fruition in our lives over night. These characteristics of God's culture take a long period of time for them to be inculcated into our souls and this process is supernatural. This process comes on the heals of us learning to trust the Lord increasingly. God has to work His culture in us as we choose to submit to Him. This process is sanctification or the reshaping of our souls by the person of the Lord Jesus Christ.
