ut thine, be done"! We are commanded to submit ourselves one to another.
When we demand that all the submission be on the part of the other person,
it shows that we are self-willed, that we care more about having things go
our way than we do about having them go right, or than we care to manifest
a Christlike disposition.

Still another thing that prevents our being easily entreated is pride. A
lady was recently talking with me about a conversation she had just had
with some other ladies. She had been advocating a certain doctrine which
they did not receive. In speaking of it she said: "I grew a little warm in
the discussion of it. I did not mean to let them best me." So many people
have this disposition. They will not be "bested." They will hold to their
position even when they are in the wrong, and know it. If they did not
take such a position, they might acknowledge the other to be right; but
when they have taken the stand, they will not yield. What is the trouble?
Pride in the heart is the secret. This disposition always has its root in
pride; humility never acts in this way. Pride keeps people from
acknowledging truth; it keeps them from changing their attitude. Pride of
opinion keeps them from being willing to listen patiently to others who
differ with them. Pride is at the root of many church and personal
troubles; pride is what they feed on, and the only way to cure them is to
get rid of the pride.

The minister who would settle such troubles has need to look for one or
more of these three things. He may expect a search to disclose either
selfishness, self-will, or pride; for if the trouble is not easily
settled, he may be assured that some or all of them are in the way. His
task, then, is not so much to get at what seems to be the trouble, as to
give attention to these underlying things which are the life of the
trouble. No trouble is truly settled till these elements are purged out of
the heart.

O brethren! what we need in all the churches and in every heart is that
"wisdom that is from above" (Jas. 3: 17). We are told that it is "first
pure." By wisdom James does not here mean what we usually mean by that
term, but in it he includes the whole of the gift of God that comes to us
in our salvation. It is "first pure," then as a natural consequence of
that purity it is "peaceable." It loves peace; it seeks to be at peace
with all. It is "gentle." That gentleness which was manifested in the life
of Jesus reveal