Abide – Humility
Welcome one and all to Abide, a time to just pull away and take care of ourselves, take care of our inner being, to awaken some things, to grow some things, and to really open up to the Spirit and how the Spirit might want to continue the good work that's already started in us. So, I hope you found a place to pull away, and I certainly have a cup of tea and a shawl on as it's cold here. And today, if you've joined me before, I'm going to do things in slightly different order where we're going to do some of our readings and quotations and pauses first, and then we'll move through some reflections for our own life, and then we'll finish off with our gratitude practice. So just to give you a heads up with that, so it's sort of the idea of moving, starting with our minds, our brains, our beautiful head spaces. Then we get to trickle it all down, moving into our heart spaces, and into our physical body spaces so we can really embody this time.
And I hope that you feel that this time it's not just me talking, but it's a conversation. A conversation between you and me and the Spirit of God, and the music, and it's just creating a really organic space for us all to commune with God and commune with each other.
So let's just get settled in by taking a nice deep breath, noticing our full bodies, and exhaling out. And we just want to let go of the day thus far, all the things that we've already done and the concerns that we have for the rest of the day, we just want to put those aside and trust them to God again, our assignments, the emails, the chores, and we want to just offer this time up to God and to one another.
We're in a series of virtues, and if you haven't noticed already, the virtues aren't very popular in the world today. For instance, last time we studied chastity, whereas the world says “Have what you want when you want it and as much as you want.” Gorge yourself on all things and somehow that's going to satisfy you. Another trip, another meal, another viewing of that, another buying of this, and we all know that that is just, it doesn't work, it doesn't work. And today is the virtue of humility, which again, is very counter-cultural. The world says, “Promote yourself, succeed, get lots of views, lots of likes, strive, get ahead, be the best.” And we know that none of that ever satisfies. And yet we still live in the world with all of the pulls to, to follow in those footsteps. And so this is the time where we can pull back, we can look at these virtues and really find life, and life everlasting, and how God actually designed us to work in the world and to give us fullness.
And so just to start with, you know, what is humility, a definition of humility. You know, humility is an understanding of our proper place, and I've been quoting Karen Swallow Prior quite often, and so I'll quote her again. She writes: “Humility is not, therefore, simply a low regard for oneself. Rather, it is a proper view of one's self, that is low in comparison to God, and in recognition of our own fallenness. Humility is thinking less about yourself, not thinking less of yourself.” [End quote] So that's just a really helpful one for me, is, humility is not thinking bad about yourself and “I'm not good” and “I'll never be good” and “I'm low-low.” So it's not thinking less of who you are, but thinking less about yourself all the time which we know is kind of our number one, we love to just continually think about ourselves, and so this is, this is needed for us.
Karen also speaks about humility: that it is the fullness of all these other virtues, and that the word humility means earth or ground. Eugene Peterson writes that this is the Genesis origin of who we are, dust to dust, that the Lord God used to make us a human being.
Karen writes: “To cultivate a lively sense of our origin and nurture a sense of continuity with it, who knows? Maybe we will acquire humility.” So we need to find a sense of our origin and the proper place that we have in this world. We all come from dust and to dust, we will return.
Humility, literally and figuratively, means grounded, the ground. And the word human is linked with humility, it’s the same root. And that none of us are God: remembering our position as earthly creatures, who are not gods, is the essence of humility.
It's an accurate assessment of one's self.
So this is really good work for us to do today: to notice in ourselves what is our proper place. How are we to be in this world? How are we to carry ourselves in and through our days and our responsibilities?
In 1942, C.S. Lewis had a radio broadcast, and those broadcasts were put into a book entitled ‘Christian Behaviour’, and so I'm going to just read you a little bit of it and maybe we'll feel like we are back in the 40s, 1940s, with this broadcast, but it's meant to be spoken. And C.S. Lewis can give us another picture, we're trying to get a holistic picture of what humility can look like.
He writes: “First of all, don't think pride is something God forbids because he's offended at it. Or that humility is something he demands, as due to his own dignity, as if God himself was proud. He is not in the least worried about his dignity. The point is, he wants you to know him, wants to give you himself. And he and you are two kinds of such a kind that if you really get into any kind of touch with him, you will in fact be humble, delightfully humble. Feeling the infinite relief of having, for once, got rid of all the silly nonsense about your dignity which has made you restless and unhappy all your life. He is trying to make you humble in order to make this moment possible, trying to take off a lot of silly, ugly fancy dress in which we have all got ourselves up, and are strutting about like the little idiots we are. I wish I had got a bit further with humility myself. If I had, I could probably tell you more about the relief, the comfort of taking the fancy dress off and getting rid of the false self with all its ‘Look at me’ and ‘Aren't I a good boy?’ and all its posing and posturing. To get even near it, even for a moment, is like a drink of cold water to a man in a desert.”
I'm just going to pause there for a moment. Just thinking upon how Christ wants to give himself to us and we to him, and that we would be delighted in that union, and that from that, humility would arise. And that once we take all the fancy dress off of “Look at me”, all the posing and posturing, that if we can get nearer to a God that loves us and created us and a proper ordering, that it will feel like a drink of cold water in the desert.
Lewis goes on to write: “The second point is this: Don't imagine that if you meet a really humble man, he will be what most people call humble nowadays. He won't be a sort of greasy, smarmy person who is always telling you that, of course, he's nobody. Probably all you'll think about him is that he seemed a cheerful, intelligent chap who took a real interest in what you said to him. If you do dislike him, it will be because you feel a little envious of anyone who seems to enjoy life so easily. He won't be thinking about humility. He won't be thinking about himself at all.”
We pause here, just getting a sense of what that man or woman would be like, that would be humble, that would enjoy their life and be free. Free to invest in others. Free to listen.
We're going to move into the Scriptures now and our main scripture will be from the Gospel of John 3:22-31.
“After this, Jesus and his disciples went out into the Judean countryside, where he spent some time with them, and baptized. Now John also was baptizing at Aenon near Salim, because there was plenty of water, and people were coming and being baptized. (This was before John was put in prison.) An argument developed between some of John's disciples and a certain Jew over the matter of ceremonial washing. They came to John and said to him, ‘Rabbi, that man who was with you on the other side of the Jordan—the one you testified about—look, he’s baptizing and everyone’s going to him.’”
To this John replied, ‘A person can receive only what is given them from heaven. You yourselves can testify that I said, “I am not the Messiah, but I am sent ahead of him.” The bride belongs to the bridegroom. The friend who attends the bridegroom waits and listens for him, and is full of joy when he hears the bridegroom's voice. That joy is mine, and it is now complete. He must become greater; I must become less.’
The one who comes from above is above all; the one who is from the earth belongs to the earth, and speaks as one from the earth. The one who comes from heaven is above all.”
Do you sense John's humility here? He knows that he's come from the earth. He knows that God has given him all of his – the works, the breath, the life, the ministry – all comes from God. We sense that John isn’t ever belittling himself, but fully being self, with his burlap and eating locusts and his eccentric being. But he has a purpose: for another to shine and not himself, and yet enjoying being that, that person that allows another to shine. Such a healthy, humble ordering in his life that he is not the Christ, but he is pointing to Christ.
And so I just want to give us a moment here to pause and, and see in our own worlds and lives and beings where we sense God giving us our gifts to serve the world, as we sense John here has been given a gift to baptize, to minister, to speak the word of God to people and knowing that that gift comes from God and that he's embodying it in a humble way. I'm just wondering if we can all, with the Spirit's help, notice in our lives where we've been given gifts to offer the world. Talents, abilities. And maybe just remembering where they come from.
And again, just putting the virtue of humility into these gifts, knowing that there's a proper ordering. There's a proper place where we receive the gift and offer it, but it does not come from us.
So spend some time with God now, just looking over the gifts God's given you, to express, to enjoy. And maybe if there's any refining or new ways of looking at the gifts you offer, that the Spirit could speak to you now about that.
Our second reading comes from Philippians 2:1-5.
“Therefore if you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any common sharing in the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and [of] one mind. Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourself, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the other[s].
In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus.”
Do you see humility in Paul's voice here? How we receive everything from God, love, joy; and these things are meant to be shared.
And a way in which we can take this Scripture from our head into our hearts and into our bodies is where in our lives can we consider others’ needs before ourselves? We realize that everything has come from God, and that we can slow down, we can look around our environment, we can allow others to go first, we can celebrate where each of us are at.
And so I just give you this time to think about the different spaces in your life and where you might consider others’ needs before yourself.
I'd like us to listen to a quote from, again from Karen Swallow Prior, and she's in this chapter she's talking about Flannery O'Connor, who's a writer, and it's such a beautiful passage which will move us into our gratitude practice today.
And Karen writes: “Before O'Connor knew for certain who she was and what she was good at, when she was struggling to learn this along with the craft of writing, she kept a prayer journal at school and in it she wrote this prayer: ‘But dear God, please give me some place, no matter how small. But let me know it and keep it. If I am the one to wash the second step every day, let me know it and let me wash it and let my heart overflow with love washing it.”
Humility is taking our place, no matter how small or big, and fulfilling that place with a heart overflowing with love. The good life begins and ends with humility.
And so friends, in our gratitude let us think of spaces in our lives or tasks or things we get to participate in that really give us joy. You know, like O'Connor writes, “Just give me a step, one step to wash, and do it well, and know it well, and may my heart overflow with love washing it.”
And maybe the things you do in a day need to be refreshed to actually enjoy what you're doing and enjoy God with you in it, rather than seeking success or likes or people noticing or getting to be the best. Maybe you've missed the whole point, which is to take up your place in the world, by God's guiding, to work it, to enjoy it, to know it, and to allow a heart of love to overflow.
[What] a beautiful image. So let's just take time to be grateful for this outlook of humility and of finding our proper place in enjoying life, enjoying God, enjoying our friends, the people around us and really trusting that we are all made from God, we all have a place. And we’re meant to celebrate it and overflow in love and commune with God. And this will be humility.
So take this time now just to ponder with God, those spaces in your life that you're just grateful you get to be a part of.
And in these spaces, Lord, would you reorient our focus, our focus to be on you and on the work we get to be a part of, and just the overflow of love in being your sons and daughters, and that we would be less and less concerned of who's watching and how good it is, but just be caught up in the love of you, being alive.
Thank you for these words from these friends: C.S. Lewis, John the Baptist, Paul, Karen Swallow, Flannery O'Connor. All these sojourners in the world that are being themselves. May we too fully be ourselves. Trust it and offer it, and may it be an overflow of love. Go in peace, my friends, to journey more fully in humility.
