There is nothing in the Christian life that does not depend, in a manner of speaking, on the Christian being humble to some degree. There can be no growth in grace apart from humility because God only gives grace to the humble. So in one sense we can think of it as the greater the humility that is there the greater the grace that can be given. But we must be very careful at this point not to think of humility as a work in order to obtain grace. What we must understand is that humility can also only come to the soul by grace. It is grace preparing the soul to receive more grace. When Jesus told us in the context of the vine and the branches that we could do nothing apart from Him, He meant nothing rather than just a few things (John 15). We tend to dismiss the “nothing” in that text as perhaps nothing major and then think of ourselves as having the power to do the small things. Perhaps Jesus meant what He said (nothing). All spiritual growth in the soul and all spiritual fruit that the soul produces must come from Christ.
If we think and act as if we must humble our selves in order to receive grace, the logic of our position is that we are working in order to receive grace. James 4:10, along with I Peter 5:5-6 giving essentially the same teaching, tells us to “Humble yourselves in the presence of the Lord, and He will exalt you.” We are left with two choices as we view this verse. 1) We will believe that if we humble ourselves then God will do the work of exalting us. But this leaves us with a system that is essentially of works. 2) To humble ourselves means to realize that we cannot do the work of humility and that God must do that work in us as well and this is the true exaltation of the soul. This leaves us with a system of grace and not of works. It is faithful to the text and to the Bible as a whole. True humility, then, would see that it cannot truly humble itself but then bow to the work of God in the soul to work a humility that grows deeper and deeper in the soul. Another way to look at this as a whole would be to understand it as the Old Testament does at times which would be that the people were to do certain external things to humble themselves. But the inward work of casting out pride and self can only be done by God or it would be nothing more than the works of pride and self. If a proud person could humble self, then humility can be accomplished by a proud person. If humility can be accomplished by a self-centered person, then humility can be accomplished by a selfish and self-centered person. These things are simply not possible other than by twisting the meaning of words.
In the very back of his book on Humility Andrew Murray wrote this prayer which would be good for all:
“Lord, I pray that of Your great goodness You would make known to me, and take from my heart every kind and form and degree of pride, whether it be from evil spirits, or my own corrupt nature; and that you would awaken in me the deepest depth and truth of the humility that can make me capable of Your light and Holy Spirit.”
He also wrote the following words:
“The truth is this: pride must die in you, or nothing of heaven can live in you. Under the banner of the truth, give yourself up to the meek and humble spirit of the holy Jesus. Humility must sow the seed, or there can be no reaping in heaven. Do not look at pride as only an unbecoming temper, or at humility as only a decent virtue. The one is death, and the other is life; the one is all hell, the other is all heaven. As much as you have of pride within you, so you have of the fallen angel alive in you. As much as you have of true humility, so you have of the Lamb of God within you. If you could see what every stirring of pride does to your soul, you would beg of everything you meet to tear the viper from you, though it may mean the loss of a hand or an eye.”
It may sound as if humility is to stand around and wait for God to do it all, but that is not the whole story. We must set ourselves against the pride of our hearts and seek the Lord in prayer against the pride of our hearts and for His grace to tear it from us. We must learn to pray for humility and to seek the Lord for strength against self and its pride. This is spiritual warfare as it is the seed of the devil in us (pride) as we seek the seed of the woman (who is Christ) to crush the head of the devil which is pride in us. We must learn to fight the fight by realizing our utter impotence and His real strength. We must use the means of grace while knowing that those things are means of grace that He may show grace through, but also grace only comes in His timing. We are in a fight against our very selves. We must pray against ourselves (proud & natural self) in order that the spiritual self will grow by grace. It sounds so confusing to some, but as people learn to battle within their souls it becomes clearer.
God Loves... Himself 
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