How Humble Are You?

Matt. 17:24-27

I remember a few posts back, I spoke of the prideful statements of the disciples as they walked down the road with Jesus after His transfiguration. Would Jesus use His knowledge of the hearts of men to teach them another lesson in humility? Of course; he knew the hearts of men and how they still think today!

Consider this miracle in Matt. 17:24-27: Peter is confronted by those who collected the temple tax and is asked if his master is going to pay the temple tax. The disciple answered "yes" as there was no reason to think the answer would have been different this time as opposed to the last time of their visit to the temple.

But Jesus wished for the disciples to learn something beyond this; far more than they knew...

"He wished them to understand, in the first place, that for Him to pay the temple dues was a humiliation and an incongruity, similar to that of a king's son paying a tax for the support of the palace and the royal household; that it was not a thing of course that He should pay, any more than it was a thing of course that He should become a man, and, so to speak, leave His royal state behind and assume the rank of a peasant; that it was an act of voluntary humiliation, forming one item in the course of humiliation to which He voluntarily submitted, beginning with His birth, and ending with His death and burial. He desired His disciples to think of these things in the hope that meditation on them would help to rebuke the pride, prevention, and self-assertion which had given rise to that petty dispute about places of distinction." The Training of the Twelve, A. B. Bruce, page 226

So what happens?

Jesus gives Peter instructions to "as the Lord of nature, to whom all creatures in land and sea were subject..." (pg. 227) put a hook in the water. When the first fish comes up, check his mouth and you will find a drachma to pay for both.

Here the Christ of all creation gives the order to His creation (the fish with the drachma), and uses His creation to pay for the creation (of the temple) which gives honor to Him (and His Father)!

And in all this, people would never know that God Himself was visiting the temple on that day without a person knowing He paid a temple tax so that He too could identify with the lowest of people and be among His people...

Here poses the question today for us: "When we think we are worthy of a title place or position within our lives; are we above the thing that we ascribe?" The disciples thought so at the time, but later would learn that it was about the Kingdom of God, not them.

Are we above that thing that we so desperately need to attain? Sometimes things we think are really in the truest sense important, may not even be close to what we really need. The disciples found out later after Jesus ascended into Heaven that this life was for Christ, not self.

I would ask you today to look at your life's pursuit and ask whether you look to the success of creation or to the success in the eyes of the Creator. One honors "self," while the other honors Christ!