Humility and Salvation

@civic said:


My exact experience (though it happened to me in my 30’s).

After the abandonment sin got a stronger hold of me. I was going on in dark paths.

But What was the darkest times of my life is what brought me to the light of the gospel.

Let me ask you to think it through a little more thoroughly. You were already sinful before you were broken. You were broken before you broke down. You were broken before you were brought down by your girlfriend breaking off the relationship. Give the Old Testament account of Jacob a read (Genesis 25-50). Then, if you're willing, read the account of Judah. As you read, look for the place each of those two men were broken. It's a little more challenging to do with Saul/Paul because Saul/Paul's story is not recounted in a single narrative, but when was Saul/Paul broken?

Ad hominem is not an argument for or against anything. I could be "way off the rails" and still be correct. The fact is the dictionary definition says humbleness and humility are alike and you said otherwise. If you are using a new and different definition of words then the onus is on YOU to let everyone know new and different inventions are being invented and applied. Words have meaning and mean what words mean. One of the most basic rules of proper scripture examination is to read the words with their normal meaning as evidenced in ordinary usage. 

You did not do that. 

And now, because I pointed that out I am being attacked personally, and unnecessarily. Even if I were wrong those words are disrespectful. 

The fact is humility and humbleness are related and they are not disparate in meaning. The fact is scripture actually states God acts to humble a person AND scripture states we are to humble ourselves. The two are not mutually exclusive conditions. I provided the evidence straight out of scripture and rather than acknowledge the scripture and its content I get, "Sorry Josheb but you're going off the rails...." Would you tolerate that if I said that about you? If not, then don't do it to others. 

Because it makes your op look bad and gives me more content to prove my dissent. 

Because now everyone can see the goal posts are being moved from "humility" to "abased." I will not agree humbleness and humility are two different things but I will wholeheartedly agree humbleness and being abased are different. Had you said "abased" in the opening post we'd have some agreement but that's not what was said. But..... 

Yes!!!! Was the account of Saul and David read before posting any of this? There are two problems with the way you've used Saul. The first is the selective use of scripture. The second is the failure to acknowledge the tyranny of sin. By selecting the one episode when David is favored all the other episodes in which Saul is eventually brought to humility are being ignored. By asserting the ineffectiveness of God and ignoring the tyranny of sin in Saul's life the case for volitional agency AND the sovereignty of God are undermined! The irony is NONE of the kings were good men and even the best of them were brought by God to humbleness and humility. Not necessarily repentance . There is only one king in God's kingdom, and it was never Saul. Wasn't David, either. 


The fact of scripture is that before Saul ever became king God had made it clear He did not want Israel to have a king like all the other nations. He considered Israel's request for such a king to be a rejection of Him! The entire nation was in rebellion, had rejected God, and the monarchy was an overt example of their rejection (1 Samuel 8). Even though God chose Saul, God did so having already declared His opposition AND telling the Israelites what would happen to them. And it did. This should never be ignored when reading the biblical history of the kings. God had acted quite definitively setting up the entire scenario; it should not be ignored. This opening post says God CANNOT bring a man to humility. "That claim denies God His omnipotence! That's not the God of the Bible. Not only was God's ability to bring a person to humility denied, human ability was also elevated above God's inability! It's not just a bad soteriology; it's a bad theology. Not a single scripture to prove any of it, either. 


So not only does the case forming to prove this op confuse the meaning of humbleness and humility, it also denies the ordinary, normal definition of words, and denies the facts of scripture. Now the goalposts are being moved, scripture is being used selectively, Contexts are being ignored and a bad theology that undermines the argument of the op are posted. 


I'm going to move on now because any one of these is a fatal error and should be corrected. There's no warrant for anyone to take this opening post seriously or consider it veracious in any way. I hope you'll at least try to correct these errors (and do it without attacking anyone). I'll drop in to see if the errors have been corrected, and if so, reply accordingly. 

Where does scripture require a who ?

God says a broken and contrite spirit I will not despise . Not the contrite spirit I caused . God gives grace to the humble and resists the proud . So either God makes you both proud and humble or He doesn’t . 

Self. I broke myself by trying to be the master of my own destiny. I really thought I was cool too, till I got to the end of that road.

Some of us are just hard cases we won't come to the realization that were broken men in need of a savior until we beat ourselves up real good. Like The Prodigal Son at the beginning he thought he had it going on then when he ended up starving and feeding pigs being a slave at his father's house didn't sound so bad.

Berean Standard Bible
Then I said: “Woe is me, for I am ruined, because I am a man of unclean lips dwelling among a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the LORD of Hosts.” Isaiah 6:5

The Bible is filled almost from beginning to end of God breaking people through the circumstances of their life. I gave you three examples to examine before answering. I could easily suggest many more. I know of one man who was old into slavery, wrongly imprisoned for rape, and given up for dead by his family. 

Genesis 50:20 
As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good in order to bring about this present result, to keep many people alive.



In point of fact, I am not claiming anything. I am pointing everyone here to scripture (and I'm surprised to be receiving resistance for doing so). I am most definitely not saying humility is God's responsibility, but I have provided the evidence in scripture the op's claim humbleness and humility are different and God can do only the firmer but not the latter. The op is wrong. I will suggest attributing salvific brokenness to sin and the circumstances of life but NOT God is a problem on several levels, not the least of which is the failure to give Him glory where glory is due. Moses was kept out of the Promised Land for doing that. 


What is increasingly apparent in this thread is how much and how often the whole of scripture hasn't been considered.