Humility

I wasn't planning on posting something about this topic, but here it is! Nothing too great, but something that I've experienced as being very important.

Humility is not being concerned with our petty, daily injustices, but rather submitting to God's will. That can be a challenge. Many times it takes a great trial to bring us down low. And many times that's probably the reason. Many times it's because of our own fault. It's a requirement in our search for God. He asks of us a sacrifice of “a broken heart and a contrite spirit” (3rd Nephi 9). Being humble to our neighbors can be a very useful trait, but it's the humility to God that really counts:

38…Take upon you the name of Christ; that ye humble yourselves even to the dust, and worship God, in whatsoever place ye may be in, in spirit and in truth; and that ye live in thanksgiving daily, for the many mercies and blessings which he doth bestow upon you. (Book of Mormon, Alma, Chapter 34)

I don't know why, but that is beautiful language to me: “humble yourselves even to the dust, and worship God”. It is very descriptive of the type of real humility that we must obtain. Humility is what prepares us to do God's will. It prepares us to detach ourselves from faith in things and people, and instead prepares us to renew a determined faith in God:

41 O then, my beloved brethren, come unto the Lord, the Holy One. Remember that his paths are righteous. Behold, the way for man is narrow, but it lieth in a straight course before him, and the keeper of the gate is the Holy One of Israel; and he employeth no servant there; and there is none other way save it be by the gate; for he cannot be deceived, for the Lord God is his name.
42 And whoso knocketh, to him will he open; and the wise, and the learned, and they that are rich, who are puffed up because of their learning, and their wisdom, and their riches—yea, they are they whom he despiseth; and save they shall cast these things away, and consider themselves fools before God, and come down in the depths of humility, he will not open unto them. (Book of Mormon, 2 Nephi, Chapter 9)

With humility, we can start anew. We admit to God that we know nothing. Our way is not going to work. It takes that process to believe correctly. And remember, “unbelief” in the scriptures also means that we don't believe the correct doctrine:

7 And now I, Nephi, cannot say more; the Spirit stoppeth mine utterance, and I am left to mourn because of the unbelief, and the wickedness, and the ignorance, and the stiffneckedness of men; for they will not search knowledge, nor understand great knowledge, when it is given unto them in plainness, even as plain as word can be. (2 Nephi 32)

I think that God is more likely to give us truth when we beg for it in humility, after seeing the errors of our ways. I hope begging doesn't have a negative connotation. I don't mean for it to. I mean, we're all beggars. We all need God. It becomes clear to us by our weaknesses, sin, and long-fought trials that perhaps are yet to be won. It is then after we have fought for the truth that we will finally treasure it. Something for which we'll always remember and be thankful. It becomes locked in our heart, and sacred. We made a sacrifice to obtain it, after all.

32 May the gates of hell be shut continually before me, because that my heart is broken and my spirit is contrite! O Lord, wilt thou not shut the gates of thy righteousness before me, that I may walk in the path of the low valley, that I may be strict in the plain road! (2 Nephi 4)