Hans R. Waldvogel emphasizes the significance of humility in the Christian life, urging believers to examine themselves rather than others. He highlights that true discipleship requires a mindset like Christ's, characterized by meekness and lowliness. Waldvogel warns against the dangers of pride and self-seeking, advocating for a transformation of the mind through Christ. He illustrates that embracing humility leads to spiritual renewal and a deeper relationship with God, ultimately allowing believers to reflect Christ's glory through their actions. The sermon calls for a radical shift in perspective, where the challenges and criticisms faced are seen as opportunities for growth in humility.

Selected Verses: Matthew 11:29. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. Philippians 2:5. Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus. Luke 14:26. If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple. Romans 12:2. And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God. Opening: The Bible says, “Examine yourselves.” That doesn’t mean that I should examine somebody else. It’s a bad, bad sign when I examine everybody else—shows that I haven’t seen myself, I have lost sight of my own great need. You know, that’s the mark of true Christian. He examines himself in the presence of God and he judges no man. Jesus was like that. But it would be good, and it is good, and it must be good for us to examine ourselves, or to let God examine us. “Examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith, whether Christ be in you.” I’ve been sitting here praying for this one thing: that God might help in these days for us to see our great need. What is our need? Well, we’re a perishing lot—perishing. “Woe is me. I am undone. I’m a man of unclean lips, and I dwell among a people of unclean lips.” I’m in a poisonous atmosphere. “Who shall deliver me from the body of this death?” There’s no deliverance except the thing that our brother spoke of: to be made new, absolutely new. As long as we try to fix up the old, we’ll only make an awful job out of it. But, oh, if Jesus Christ has His way, he’ll go His way—we will go His way. And His way is just one way: “Learn of Me. I am meek and lowly in heart.” Oh, is that my desire? … Selected Quotes: And if I want to find the way of life, there’s only one way: “Learn of Me, for I am meek and lowly in heart.” “Let this mind be in you.” What is that mind? Why, Jesus wanted to humble Himself. “When He was reviled, He reviled not again.” Why, we don’t do that either; we’re too cultured. But we get sour on the inside. We don’t like it. Jesus liked it. He said, “I delight to do Thy will, O God.” … Oh, to have that mind in me which was also in Christ Jesus! That’s a wonderful monitor that will guide me in the right direction. It’ll guide me down—where I find Jesus, where I breathe the heavenly atmosphere, and I’m not choked by the poisonous gasses of pride and conceit and self-seeking and self-made spirituality. … I found out that one can be very spiritual on the outside and still have a sour heart, and still have a root of bitterness in the heart. My, there was a time when I chafed under it. I couldn’t deliver myself, I couldn’t get out of it. It was choking me. The only thing to do was to get down, really get down, and I mean get down. I had to go to people that had harmed me, that had hurt me, that had sinned against me, and humble myself before them. That did it. That helped me. Oh, when that “mind that is also in Christ Jesus” controls me! Beloved, that’s not my own mind. It’s His mind. And Jesus Christ offers to think for me, to feel for me, to be my own life also. “He that hateth not his own life also…” Why, beloved, when we do that, we will welcome vicissitudes. We will welcome… Someone has said we ought to consider the people that harm us and that do evil and ill to us—we ought to consider them our very best friends. It isn’t praise that blesses me, and lifts me, but blame. Blame is far better than praise. … It was during the depression when the men had no work, and so they spent eight hours a day in prayer, and sometimes twelve hours. It didn’t do them any harm. … And oh, the vision that God gave me at that time, the awful, awful condition! Why, that is salvation: when we realize how “deceitful above all things and desperately wicked” our own hearts are. … And if God Almighty can get His people down—with a transformed mind, with the renewal of the mind, when Jesus Christ can possess the minds of His people—then Satan will be in the pit. That’s where Satan reigns: in the church. That’s where the “man of sin” spreads himself: in the church—in the place where it ought to be “Christ and Christ alone.” And if it isn’t “Christ alone,” I will never make the grade. I will never find that throne-room of heaven. … What does He mean when He says, “Blessed are the poor in spirit: theirs is the kingdom of heaven”? God has a “kingdom prepared before the foundation of the world,” but He has no takers. That kingdom is not going to be given to the old Adam, nor to his sons, but to the Last Adam, who is made the Lord from heaven, who said, “All things are delivered unto Me of My Father.” And He says, “Now, come, learn of Me for I am meek and lowly in heart.” “Oh, to be like Thee, blessed redeemer.” We think of the glory of heaven, and how we’re going to be “transformed into the same image from glory to glory.” But we don’t realize that that “glory of the only begotten of the Father” was “full of grace and truth.” It was His humility that constituted His glory—His lowliness, His utter meekness: “Not My will, but Thy will be done.” That’s where the Father was glorified in the Son. That’s where the veil was rent and the way was opened for you and for me to become sons of God. … When I am minded like Jesus Christ was minded, I’ll be on the way. I’ll not deviate. I will not seek myself, nor the things that satisfy the flesh—and then blame the Lord and blame all the holy angels in heaven for having led me that way. But I will “follow the Lamb whithersoever He goeth.” That will be my guide. It’ll be the cross of Christ. … Illustrations: Undoing bad habits when learning the violin. “‘Boy,’ he said, ‘that’s rotten…’ He made me start all over on new principles. That was the best thing that ever happened to me.” (from 2:11) The story of two or three saved from a fire by getting down. “If I’m choking because of the atmosphere ’round about me… why, I haven’t gotten down.” (from 3:24) An example of a deliverance from pride. “Oh the transformation God had wrought in my soul! The more they railed on me, the more I rejoiced… I knew that wasn’t myself. I knew that I could never have done it. Up to that time, I would get inwardly very wild and mad. And now, so sweet, so loving. (from 13:44) The kitchen sink, a throne room: the story of a sister who had fasted five days, joyfully washing others’ dishes in the Faith Home. “Sweetly singing, she did the dishes, never letting on at all. I tell you, that sink became a throne room of the King.” (from 17:35) References: Oh to be like Thee, a hymn by Thomas O. Chisholm, 1897. The School by Gerhard Tersteegen (Matthew 18:3) Where is the school for each and all, Where men become as children small, And little ones are great? Where love is all the task and rule, The fee our all, and all at school, Small, poor, of low estate? Where to unlearn all things I learn, From self and from all others turn, One Master hear and see? I learn and do one thing alone, And wholly give myself to One Who gives Himself to me. My task, possessing nought, to give; No life to have, yet ever live— And ever losing, gain; To follow, knowing not the way; If He shall call, to answer, “Yea— All hail all shame and pain!” Where silent in His Holy Place I look enraptured on His Face In glory undefiled; And know the heaven of His kiss, The doing nought, the simple bliss Of being but a child. Where find the school, to men unknown, Where time and place are past and gone, The hour is ever NOW? O soul! thou needest ask no more; God tells thee of His open door: Still, hearken thou!