In 1st Peter chapter five, Peter talks about what it takes to shepherd a flock and then gets into how the flock itself should act.  Humility is a key part of it.  In 1 Peter 5:5, we are told to be clothed with humility because as Solomon wrote in the Proverbs, “God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.”

This verse touches me this week as I have been preparing a message on grace.  The sermon was inspired by one I heard last Sunday, yet I am humble enough to know that I will struggle to give it the same voice my friend Guy Hudson did last week.  In preparing the message on grace, I was further humbled to remember that it is by nothing I do that I am saved, no action, no worldly status or title that I receive earns me salvation…only by the grace of God am I, or anyone else for that matter, able to claim heaven as their next home.

I was further humbled this morning as I went to ask AI a question about a quote I had read.   Instead of copying the quote into the chat box, my sermon was still on the clipboard and that’s what I pasted in.   Good old “Copilot” upon receiving my sermon, told me it could be written more concisely and then provided me with a message containing about half the wordcount as what I had written.  Here I am, a guy who spent more than 20 years editing news copy so that it wouldn’t be too wordy, being told that I was in fact too wordy.  I’m sorry to inform you that if you come on Sunday morning, you’re still getting the sermon I wrote.

Grace and humility are important for us all.  It’s so easy to go around each day believing that we are always right and that someone else is always wrong.  We love for things to be black and white and rarely give folks a chance to walk in the grey area.  Each of us is going through their own issues, attempting to walk in faith with occasional (or even frequent) steps off the path of righteousness.  We should all be offering a gentle hand to one another, showing humility and acting in grace.