Thomas Charles III: Growing in Humility | Behold Your God Podcast

Welcome to another episode of the Behold Your God podcast. I'm Matthew Robinson, director of Media Gratiae, and I'm here again with Dr. John Snyder for part three of a four-part series where we're looking at some help from Thomas Charles on the subjects of pride and humility.

We're taking these from a book that he wrote. You can read these in Thomas Charles' Spiritual Councils, which is, I suppose, collected essays and letters and that sort of thing that Edward Morgan put together and the Banner of Truth Trust publishes.

We also have a copy of these letters that you can read at our blog. So, John, remind us who Thomas Charles is.

Charles is really the leader, organizer, theological thinker, and author of the Welsh side of the evangelical revival at the late part of the 18th century into the 19th century, which was kind of the period where they consolidated the gains of 50 years of extraordinary work of the gospel under the blessing of the Lord during the days of George Whitefield, men like Hal Harris and William Williams and Daniel Rowland.

Those men have passed away. The baton is passed to a young man, Thomas Charles, and he helps guide that denomination theologically really from Anglicanism into what became a Presbyterian approach and helped them take the Westminster Confession and adapt it to their present needs and to set them in a pretty clear path, which lasted for about a century in a healthy way.

So initially, as a group, these men were known as the Welsh Calvinistic Methodist Fathers. And if you're unfamiliar with that and you haven't listened to the first couple of podcasts, so we invite you to go back and listen to parts one and two of this series where we've talked about spiritual pride.

Humility and Proportion in the Christian Life

And today we're going to talk a little bit about humility. Thomas Charles opens his letter with 1 Corinthians 4 -7, specifically the part that asks, what do you have that you did not receive? And if you did receive it, why do you boast as if you had not received it?

Charles opens the letter in a way that perhaps we wouldn't have expected. He starts off by talking about all the works of God reflect balance. They reflect proportion and beauty. He talks about nature and he talks about the human body.

Think about how the human body grows, a healthy human body. The growth is proportioned. It all grows kind of at the same rate. So there's balance there, there's beauty, each part growing together. And that's the same in the spiritual man.

All the graces of Christ, all that work that God has begun in regeneration and all that the Holy Spirit is cultivating in us, the fruit of the Spirit, all those qualities of Christ likeness ought to be increasing, you know, in some measure in proportion or in balance together.

And when there is a lack of that, when one grace seems to really be moving forward, I'm really strong here, but other things just seem to be left behind, almost not even cared about. So you're having something growing in isolation to others.

Charles says, be careful, that isn't a mark of the work of the Spirit.

One place where that shows up that I think we and other perhaps in our audience should be particularly aware of is the grace of knowledge. You know, as we grow in our understanding of the things of God, we call that theology, which is a true work of the Spirit.

If we're genuinely coming to understand more and more of who God is as He's revealed in His Word and how He works, that should be growing proportionately with love and joy and peace and repentance and faith and humility.

And sadly, we can look back at times in our own lives and we can think of others where we've seen examples of where growth in knowledge far outpaces our growth in, say, humility toward one another.

Yeah, and another example that Charles gives is the growth in our vertical relationships and our horizontal relationships. So things that we tend to think of as qualities in the Christian life that are more directly aimed at God, devotion, love, consecration, these cannot be growing in a healthy way if they're not also producing, you know, a proportionate, balanced growth in the areas of how we deal with other people.

So love, tenderness, forgiveness, sacrificial service, you know, gentleness, humility. So when we see a man claim that he has these vertical virtues growing, but we don't see the accompanying external things, then we know that something's not right.

Right. It's not the work of the Spirit when we see unbalanced growth. And there are a lot of places we've talked about it as an introduction, but the one that we really want to drill down on is the one that Thomas Charles helps us with, which is humility.

Humility Before God and Toward Others

For example, when we say we're humble before God, but we're proud in the way that we respond to the people around us, that's a fairly sure sign that that's a work of the flesh. So let me go here to the first quote from this treatise on humility.

If we're thoroughly sensible that we have nothing but what we daily receive, our conduct towards those from whom God by superior gifts hath distinguished us will be suitable to this sense of our poverty.

It is in vain to pretend that we are duly humbled before God and that we're sensible of our poverty if our conduct toward man is proud and assuming. And this is a good test for us. He goes on to write, This is the subject to be now particularly handled, that is the true humility and a genuine sense of our poverty before God will effectually influence our conduct toward all our fellow creatures and that the one as it is the effect of the other, so it proves its truth and reality.

So in other words, does the awareness of our ability and our spiritual strengths produce gratitude toward God?

Yeah, that leads to a very simple test that he gives in the following paragraph. Let me read that. He says, If we truly believe that we do receive everything from God, we cannot glory as if we did not receive it.

That's simple logic. But then he goes on and presses the Christian. Do you believe this? Then we cannot glory against those who have it not, but our conduct toward them will be full of modesty and humility, pity and compassion.

Are we eminently distinguished by gifts useful and ornamental? That would be probably the old way of saying not only has God used us, but it's in a way that's pretty visible. Are those gifts and our labors abundantly blessed?

All of these are from God, but do we believe this? If so, we shall not despise those who have them not, but we shall, with all humility and industry, employ them for the glory of God and for the good of others.

So very simple tests. If we are in the grips of a reality that God has given us gifts that are both useful and visible to other people, then it ought to produce a real humility, a real compassion, gentleness toward our brothers and sisters, but also the twin desire to exercise that gift in service in a way that brings honor to God and does good to our brothers and sisters who may not have the same gifts as we have.

Pride Thinks Less of Others and Humility Thinks Less of Self

Well, Thomas Charles' letter is very helpful. He breaks it down into three areas, three headings, and we'll get to the first and maybe second today. Pride and humility, his first heading, think differently.

Pride thinks less of others and humility thinks less of self. So here's a quote from his first point. Pride is apt to think ill of others, but humility leads a man to think ill of himself. When pride is observing the defects of others, their coldness and deadness, their ignorance and weakness, and is ready to condemn them without mercy, humility has work enough at home, is most jealous of itself, and most suspicious of the deceit of heart which it occupies.

Yeah, so pride makes a man prone to see the flaws of others and to exaggerate his own strengths. Humility makes a man prone to see the good in others and to see his own flaws. And even at sometimes the enemy uses that and the man may become kind of preoccupied with his own flaws in a way that, you know, paralyzes if he's not careful, if he doesn't take that back to the mercy seat and lay it before the Lord.

But he points out that at times when we're called to rebuke another Christian, the humble man finds it a costly activity and he does it with as much love and humility as possible, you know, gentleness.

And he gives the example of Jesus Christ, first of all. On the final night of his life before his crucifixion, he goes into Gethsemane and he takes the three men with him to pray. And Peter, James, and John are there and they fall asleep.

And he goes back to them and there's a rebuke. Could you not watch with me one hour? But there's also a pity, a compassion because he immediately explains that he understands the struggle that they're feeling when he says, The Spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.

And in that statement, we find the gentleness of Christ restoring three men that he's just had to rebuke and point out that they have really misunderstood the significance of this situation.

Yeah, we see something of the compassion of Christ there too and his humanity. Although he never sinned, he did know what it was to have a tired, weak flesh. It's so amazing to think about. Charles' second point is that pride and humility talk differently.

So pride is severe. Humility is compassionate with our words. Pride is contemptuous, whereas humility is loving. Charles writes,.

Humility in Speech, Persecution, and Receiving Criticism

So really clear picture of how humility shows from Christian to Christian. What he goes on to say next is something that I find very helpful because I don't know that I've ever heard it directly mentioned.

And that's where he deals with how humility will be shown when the Christian refers to the way the world treats the church. And this, of course, is a thing that in our culture with the media, all the personal media and radio or television as well.

It's very easy for a Christian to not be careful when we feel stung by the world's criticisms or mistreated. And maybe it's a legitimate persecution. But how we respond shows whether deep within we're proud or humble.

So listen to what he says. In speaking of the enmity, opposition and persecution of the world, spiritual pride is apt to enlarge a little, to speak often and dwell much on the subject in a revengeful and contemptuous spirit, reviling again.

So there's one clear statement. When I'm a proud man and the world speaks against Christianity or the world overlooks my abilities at work and someone who's not a Christian is promoted ahead of me and I know it's because I'm a Christian, I really make a bigger deal of that than it is.

And I talk about it a lot and I dwell on it. It's almost like you see old Joe come and you think, oh, it's going to be the same thing. He's beating the same drum. How Christians are so persecuted. Part of that can be from pride, he says.

But true humility is the spirit of Christ who when he was reviled, reviled not again. When he suffered, threatened not, but committed himself to him who judgeth righteously. He conquered enmity with love, pride with humility, persecution with prayer and all contemptuous treatment with father, forgive them for they know not what they do.

It was the meekness of the lamb and not the rage of the lion that triumphed over all the rage and malice of men and devils.

Yeah, and that's not to downplay the fact that Christian persecution in our culture is a thing and it is growing, but actual persecution, physical persecution is not at all foreign to Christian history or even Christian present in some parts of the world.

And he mentions the time in the early church where real killing type of persecution was going on and he says the apostles of the lamb fought also with the same weapons. And then quoting, being reviled, we bless, saith Paul.

Being defamed, we entreat. Being persecuted, we suffer it. Intent on their master's business, they passed by unnoticed the injurious treatment they met with.

Yeah, what a statement, what a statement. I mean, what a God honoring thing it would be if in the 21st century that could be written above Western evangelicals as the culture is shifting and we are experiencing an antagonism that hasn't been there in our lifetime before and certainly we feel that there are some social issues which are custom designed to bring Christianity into great disfavor with the culture.

And so what if the Lord in the history of the church himself writes over our page, they overlooked the injurious treatment they were given as they brought the gospel to their culture which became increasingly antagonistic.

But I think that from that statement, we would have to say there's a lot of pride in us and a lot of opportunity for us to go to the Lord and ask Him to make us more like Him, less like maybe conservative culture at times.

But how can we even afford to do that? How can we pass by our persecution and not defend ourselves?

Yeah, that's a great question. Not only do we have the pattern of Christ in His own meekness trusting Himself to the Father who judges righteously, but you say, well, but I'm not Christ. That of course is not a legitimate excuse.

We've been called to follow Him as a true man dependent on the Lord. So we can take that pattern, but it's not just Christ. Think of Moses, the meekest man on earth and how he could afford to bear patiently with those that were attacking him.

He writes about Moses.

When Aaron and Miriam stirred up by envy, opposed Moses, the servant of God, it is particularly observed of him at that time that he was meek above all men on the face of the earth, doubtless because he then gave an imminent proof of his meekness.

And God as imminently appeared in his vindication.

Yeah, wonderful, wonderful pattern. The man that can humbly respond to his attackers can expect that God Himself will rise up and answer his calls. You know, when we think about giving or receiving criticism, Thomas Charles points out that humility combined with a godly zeal won't remain silent when he sees sin that's endangering God's honor or endangering a brother or sister.

But it will be spoken in a way that is humble and it's the sinful behavior that is the source of displeasure, not a personal antagonism that develops toward a person. But he mentions receiving criticism.

The humble man will receive criticism. And you and I have talked about this. I mean, we've both received criticism. Sometimes we've both received criticism from the same person. Oftentimes when we receive criticism, the person who's criticizing us, what they think they're seeing isn't really what's happening.

And so in a sense, they've kind of missed the mark. And then pride rises up and says within my heart, they don't even know what they're talking about. I don't have to listen to anything that they said.

But it's a much healthier pattern to say, okay, so they missed the mark. They didn't quite, what they thought they were seeing wasn't exactly what was happening. But there was something that's bothering them.

And it would do my soul good to stop and say to the Lord, is there something there? Okay, they don't see it as clearly as they think they do, but it's there and I see it. And it's a good opportunity for me to deal with it, even though they didn't say it perfectly.

You know, a humble man to receive any criticism, it's almost as if you have to say it perfectly. Sorry, a proud man to receive any criticism, you think I'll have to say it perfectly. But a humble man can hear it imperfectly and say, well, it didn't help to hear it imperfectly, but I am willing to humble myself.

A proud man hears criticism, thinks it's everyone else's fault, looks within himself, sees the gifts and graces God has given him, they're true, feeling that they weren't gifts, but something he worked up, in the midst of criticism, he just becomes even more proud.

One of the things that we love about going to conferences is being able to interact with people who have gone through the studies that we produce or seen the films that we make and hearing feedback from them about how those projects have impacted their families, their small groups, and their churches.

Eventually, we started asking them if we could record their stories so that we could share those with you. Nolan and Melissa are from Mississippi, and their church went through Behold Your God, Rethinking God Biblically.

We were fortunate enough to take some families through it with us along that journey, and like we had talked about earlier, it is an investment of time, and it was a 12-week study, but to watch not only other families, how it just transformed other families, and watched how God, through the Spirit, just transformed and knocked down these idols that they had built up in their life, and the God that they thought they worshiped of the Bible was different once they came out of this study.

They found themselves worshiping the one true God. And just the theology and the doctrine and watching it change these people's lives was something I don't think we'll ever forget.

Then to see them use it with their children and then them loan it out to other people and how it multiplied people being blessed through it, it was just amazing.

Pride and Humility Think and Speak Differently

So to summarize the first two points of Thomas Charles' essay on humility is that pride and humility think differently, and pride and humility speak differently.

Right, and we're not approaching this from the outside in, saying, hey, you want to be a humble person? Let me give you six things you need to start doing on the outside. You know, it's like if you don't want to be an angry person, count to ten before you respond.

Well, that might be a good thing to do, but really anger is a deeper issue than that. So when we say thinking differently, and especially speaking differently, a man can adjust his words and still be proud, and he can become very proud over the fact that he's really doing good, doing well adjusting his words.

So what Charles is really trying to drive home is the gracious nature of our relationship with God. That is, God in the purest form of undeserved friendship and love is giving and giving to His people.

And when we see that and we are in the grip of that reality, it changes the way I think about me. It changes the way I think about my brother who doesn't necessarily have the same knowledge or gifts that I have.

And so it's going to change the way that I talk.

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