Hello ,

It's always interesting listening to some folks who are trying to make sense of Christian virtues. For example, The Journal of Positive Psychology ran an article with the following headline: "Humble persons are more helpful than less humble persons: Evidence from three studies."

Humble people are helpful. Wow, you don't say? How shocking! The abstract for the article reads: "Humble participants helped more than did less humble participants even when agreeableness and desirable responding were statistically controlled." 

In non-technical language, this means in situations where people wanted to help for unselfish reasons, people who weren't full of themselves were more likely to actually lend a hand. The article also reports that humble people even make better bosses and employees.

So how do you explain this strange virtue? Well, not to worry. The researchers tried to examine the evidence "for the evolutionarily predicted connection between humility and helping." 

Christians have a simpler explanation for humility: It comes from Jesus.

"He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?"  Micah 6:8

When we recognize that every good gift comes from God, we have absolutely NO reason to feel anything BUT humbled by that reality. 

Have a great day and God bless!

Pastor Mike / The Open Word