Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He might exalt you in due time, casting all your care upon Him, for He cares for you. NKJ
Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that He may lift you up in due time. Cast all your anxiety upon Him, for he cares for you. NIV
If you humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, in His good time He will lift you up. Let Him have all your worries and cares, for He is always thinking about you and watching everything that concerns you. TLB
Humble- Used when the Nile river was in it’s low stage. It runs low. “Not rising far from the ground.”
Humble yourselves- passive voice. The humbling wasn’t to be done by the Christians, but they were to not resist it. It was God who was doing the acting of humbling. They were to allow God to cause them to be brought low.
Literally- be humbled, or, allow yourself to be humbled.
The humbling process was the persecution and suffering these Christians were going through.
God was using hardship to bring them into more humility.
… that He might exalt you in due time.
The good news- Humility from the hand of God is a prerequisite for exaltation and lifting up. In that we find comfort and hope. Before the lifting up must come the bringing low.
“He must take a low place before God, who would take a high place among men.”
…casting all your care upon Him…– These Christians had many opportunities to worry and be anxious. While the humbling process was going on, they were to cast all their cares upon God.
cast- “having deposited with”. Direct and once for all committal to God. Not just “throw” your cares upon God. A definite act of the will in committing those things to God, and to His care.
.…for He cares for you... for you are his concern.
Anxiety is a self-contradiction to true humility.
Unbelief is, in a sense, an exalting of self against God in that one is depending upon self and failing to trust God.
Why worry therefore, if we are his concern?
The humbling process has come to us to accomplish His purposes.
Our well-being is the concern of God.
He has it in His control, and we are under His care and concern. Why worry?
I can’t control that power, I can only take the risk that it’s there. Dr. Bruce Baloian