Humility is entering into the life of Christ through a radical God-dependence. It is an inner orientation of actively receiving from God and acknowledging our need. The humble Christian is the Christian who takes literally Christ's words: Apart from me you can do nothing. Andrew Murray nails humility when he calls it the displacement of self by the enthronement of God.
Calvin and Augustine both agreed that humility is evidenced when one feels that he has no refuge except in humility. They mean that the Christian has shifted from a human-centered faith to a God-centered faith; that the root, fruit, and maintenance of his walk is dependent on God's work, favor, and God's strength. He not only knows this, he acknowledges this and lives by this in a practical way.
Humility is the disposition that makes us available to be blessed by God. The Psalms seem obsessed with God's eagerness to reach out to the humble: God saves the humble, guides the humble, sustains the humble, and even crowns the humble. Notice that everything flows from God to the humble servant.
Pride seeks to reverse this. Pride is self-reliance and self-dependence. Arrogance seeks to obligate God instead of receive from Him.
Gary Thomas, The Glorious Pursuit, pages 49-50.
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