Pink Polyester Pants

"I could easily forgive his pride, if he had not mortified mine"
Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice

I'm about to reveal my deepest, darkest humiliations.

Once in the fifth grade, this kind of cute boy in my class suddenly became aware of the black hair that grew like grass on my arm. What do you think a ten year old boy would say to this? A ten year old boy would very loudly announce that "you look like an ape". Ooof, I was horrified. What was I supposed to do about that? The hair on my arm was outside my control. I scolded God for His role in this seemingly random and completely unfair choice. He could have made me a blond!
Then, in the sixth grade, I had a favorite pair of pants, bright pink polyester pants that my mom had sewn for me. Polyester knit, in my opinion, is possibly the worst synthetic material ever invented, but I loved those pants, til a different cute boy in my class started calling me "Pink Elephant". It slowly dawned on me that these pants I had worn practically everyday, under the delusion that I looked good in them, actually brought this humiliation upon me. Betrayed by my own perception, I shoved my horror deep within and kept it hidden, but I never forgot, and I never wore those pink pants again!
For three more years my weight mocked me, though looking back, it felt like a lifetime. I was finally able to shed those pounds, and being thin gave me a new confidence, a new belief in myself. My time had come to rise to the top, to no longer cower behind my image. Convinced that my weight had been holding me back, and having lived in fear of the mockery that could jump out at any moment and mortify me, I knew freedom and power for the first time, and I loved how high it made me feel.
So when I finally realized what the Bible had to say about humility, I considered myself "off the hook" for two reasons. First, this could only apply to people who had never been humiliated and needed to learn the lesson;  and secondly, I already served my "humility" sentence, therefore, I didn't need to do any more time. Besides, I had been humbled enough, God wouldn't be so cruel to want me to be humbled more!

Doesn't it seem like humility is going backwards, going in the wrong direction?
I mean, I can't say that humility ever achieved anything for me.
In all honesty, I find it difficult to believe that humility is really necessary in my everyday life, don't see a place where it seems to fit into my daily activities.

Then again, why would I think I need humility? I'm daft enough to think I don't have a problem with pride either.

To follow Christ is to take up your cross daily, to crucify the flesh, to die to self.
To follow Christ is to be a dead man walking, to be someone who wakes up everyday with a death sentence.

Of the  four tools God uses to help us die to self,  we have, up to this point, covered weakness and suffering. Flesh cleverly creates counterparts for weakness and suffering that keep us stuck in muck, but God uses the authentic kind to free us from the sludge and allow us to walk in the Spirit. While weakness and suffering require complete surrender to God's truth, the next two, humility and repentance, require radical changes of heart. These two will go straight for the jugular of our flesh, that is, our pride and sin.  Like a weakened and broken Frodo Baggins, who finds himself staring up at the top of Mount Doom, preparing to finish off the true source of all the evil in Middle Earth, we have now arrived at our Mordor of the flesh.
Or to use a plant analogy, I can cut down the weeds in my yard, but if I don't get them up by the root, they will just grow back. Humility and Repentance will get at the root of your flesh.

So, yes, humility is more than necessary, because neither the roots nor the fires of my pride will be dug up or quenched in one tug or splash. Mine is a pervasive pride that can never be humbled too much.

Your pride needs humility when....
you want to insist on being right.
you are falsely accused.
someone less qualified than you is promoted.
you want to prove that you are better.
you are comparing yourself to someone else.
you are overlooked, not appreciated, not recognized.
you try to put another down so as to put them in their place.
you can only be seen with the "in" crowd.
you need to show off.
you refuse to give up your rights.
you think of yourself as better than those whom you serve.
you want revenge.
you resent those who do better than you.
you need to wait in silence.
you want to worship God.
you pray.

"Pride must die in you, or nothing of heaven can live in you."
Andrew Murray, Humility