The STEPS TO GENUINE HUMILITY are not steps we take down to arrive at a relationship with our Heavenly Father. Peter is writing to the church. His readers are Christians. These steps we take, however, are actually God's way of helping us as His children to deal with life moment by moment. Genuine humility is not a quality of life or frame of mind you can attain permanently with no danger of losing it. Genuine humility is God using His People, His Power and His Purpose to help us acknowledge the truth that He is the final authority for the lives of His children. God desires for my life to demonstrate this wonderful truth. He will go to extremes to build this character quality of humility into our lives. It is for our good.

THE FIRST STEP DOWN TO GENUINE HUMILITY

1. SUBMIT TO THE PEOPLE OF GOD - 1 Peter 5:5
   Likewise, ye younger, submit yourselves unto the elder.
   -This demonstrates my attitude toward AUTHORITY. Peter says, "We should submit ourselves to the elder." Genuine Humility begins with a proper attitude toward my Pastor. God expects me to respect my Pastor and submit to his authority. This is the application directly implied by this verse. However, Parents are authorities in our lives also. Submission should be demonstrated at church and in the home. Submission to authority involves every area of our lives. God intends to work through our authorities to make us what He wants us to be. Voluntarily putting ourselves under Pastoral authority and Parental authority does not come naturally. However, it is a necessary step toward genuine humility.
   
   Yea, all of you be subject one to another, and be clothed with humility:
   -This will demonstrate my attitude toward MYSELF. Peter then tells us to "Be subject one to one another." I must submit to my friends at church.  Again, this is what we understand this verse to mean in its context. We should put ourselves under those we worship with but we should also apply this verse to those in our family. The church is the place where families demonstrate what they've learned at home. Whether we are at church or at home all through the day everyday God gives us many opportunities to show Him what we think of ourselves. Paul tells us in Philippians 2:3-4, "Let nothing be done through strife or vainglory; but in lowliness of mind let each esteem other better than themselves. Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others." This is the attitude demonstrated by those who voluntarily place themselves under others. Most of what we call personality conflicts or relational barriers are simply God's way of showing us that we need to be "clothed with humility." Real humility, according to Peter, is a change of clothes. We must take off the armor of pride. Pride is the armor of the flesh. It is the natural way to protect ourselves. Being clothed with humility makes us very vulnerable to others but it places us under God's protection.
   
   God will use my Pastor and Parents and Friends and Family to bring me to a place where I voluntarily place myself under the People of God as Peter instructs in verse 5. He is patiently working to remove me from the position of final authority of my life. The result of Submitting to the People of God is that He will give grace. "For God resisteth the proud, and giveth grace to the humble." God knows me better than I know myself. He knows that as long as I am the final authority of my life I will struggle with Submitting to the People of God and I will not Submit to Him.  
   
   
2. THE SECOND STEP DOWN TO GENUINE HUMILITY 
                                                         (Continued next post!)
   

 This is my first post on my Xanga site. I am trying to think of something to say. I've been adding photos and I found out I didn't do it right so now I have to do them all over again. But, "Once burnt, a lesson learnt," "One mistake, a better cake," "Once bit, best forget." Sounds good but this is very time consuming. I wish I'd done it right the first time. Most of what I've learned throughout my life I've learned by experience. This is a good way to learn especially when you're learning how to do a Xanga site. However, it is not the best way to learn the important lessons of life. God's Word should be the number one source of our instruction where we learn to avoid many unacceptable consequences by following God's ways. Following God's ways will help us face the mistakes we make with the right attitude. So, with a smile on face and joy in my heart I'm posting my photos the correct way and redoing all that work over again that took hours to do but I'm happy about it because I've learned a lesson that I won't have to learn again in this life because I don't think there will be Xanga in heaven and I know this is a run on sentence, for all you grammarians but this is my blog and according to other Xanga sites I've looked at grammer doesn't really matter so this is my first post. I call it a Lesson Learnt!

Our Christmas Get-a-way!
On Thursday, December 6th, Nancy and I were able to take a wonderful Christmas-dream trip to the Opryland Hotel in Nashville, TN. The get-a-way was a special anniversary gift from our children. Our 30th Anniversary was on July 30th and they knew we would enjoy Christmas at the Opryland Hotel. They were right. Here are some
pictures to remember the wonderful time we had.

 

Here we are in our room standing on the balcony
overlooking the beautifully decorated Cascade
section of the Opryland Hotel.

Ricardo the Dad alias Richard M. Gilley!

 

Nancy, the love of my life! The beautiful reason
I desire to be what my Heavenly Father wants
me to be.

 

Behind us is a beautiful Christmas tree made out
of poinsettias. Someone caught a picture of me
with my arm around the most beautiful package
under the tree.

 

Nancy and I found a good place to cuddle
and someone snapped our picture.

 

It looked like a winter-wonderland of lights outside the
Magnolia Entrance to the Opryland Hotel.

 

The carriage ride was a lot of fun. It was so cold!

 

We were so cold and we didn't wear our coats.
Fortunately we had our love to keep us warm!

 

The lights and decorations are so beautiful inside the
Opryland Hotel.