The first reason that Scripture gives us for humility is that God hates pride (Proverbs 6:16–17; Luke 16:15) but gives grace to the humble (Luke 16:15; Proverbs 3:34; James 4:6; 1 Peter 5:5).
But we know that humility is also much better for us than pride and ambition. Pride makes us aim for things that lie above our reach. We exhaust ourselves for the sake of proving that our ideas, our work, our church, and our political party are the best. The Teacher of Ecclesiastes notes, “Then I saw that all toil and all skill in work come from a man's envy of his neighbor. This also is vanity and a striving after wind” (Ecclesiastes 4:4).
In the kingdom of God, the greatest person is the one who serves. The person who exalts himself will be brought low, while the person who is lowly will be exalted (Matthew 23:11–12). He who fears the Lord without seeking glory for himself (Philippians 2:3) will find that he can deal with the world and its frustrations without becoming frustrated himself.
For reasons such as these, it is indeed “better to be of a lowly spirit with the poor than to divide the spoil with the proud.”
19 It is better to be of a lowly spirit with the poor than to divide the spoil with the proud.