Humility & Ego
The ego diverts your attention from anything that would ask you to change, to righteous causes that invariably ask others to change. Richard Rohr
Gregg’s Reflection
Sometimes I have trouble letting God be God. I've been working with Mark Ritchie, a spiritual director for nearly fifteen years. He has a similar background, spending decades in a family business and leaving to become a spiritual director, and now, helping train spiritual directors at the Haden Institute. He's also Lutheran with a real passion for discipleship. It's been a pleasure working with him.
In each of our spiritual direction sessions, we settle on a question to take to the Spirit. I had been working for years to create a leadership initiative in the Lutheran church ELCA. In a session I told Mark, "I'm trying to follow the path God lays out, and this work equipping disciple-making leaders is a leading of the Spirit. I just keep wondering, why is it so hard?” He asked, "Is that your question?" I responded positively, and we began our session.
As I went through a litany of difficulties, one after another, Mark listened. Each time, he asked me what I learned from the experience. He asked whether I was glad to have the knowledge and wisdom that came from the challenge. As I considered whether it had been a good thing to have gone through and learned these things. Each time, the answer was yes.
By the end of our session, the question that formed in my mind was "What's your complaint?" I thought back to the book of Job. Job has everything taken away, is accused by his best friends of bringing it all on himself by his sin, and Job weathers it all while maintaining his steadfast faith in God. Job recounts all that he has done to walk righteously in the path of the Lord, and he can't understand why disaster has befallen him. Finally, God responds to Job's questioning in Verse 40: The LORD said to Job: "Will the one who contends with the Almighty correct him? Let him who accuses God answer him!"
In small group, we had viewed Rob Bell's video, Whirlwind. In the teaching, Bell looks at Job and works through this text in a very compelling way. As you listen to him recite God's response to Job, the answer is obvious. This is a question of sovereignty and respect for the majesty and mystery of God. We cannot understand, we can just trust.
At the end of my session with Mark, I was left with the question, "Am I going to let God be God?" That was the question that the Spirit had for me that day. If I am really committing something into God's hands, I have to trust His timing. If we are indeed following the leading of the Spirit, it will happen when the time is right. Quit whining about it. God doesn't speak whinese.
Humility: a painful lesson to learn. As a lay person learning leadership in the business world, I did not have many role models who demonstrated humility. During my Lutheran project, I learned a powerful lesson in humility. I had a bulging disk painfully pressing against a nerve root. I got an epidural injection into my spine. I also began daily exercises designed to improve my condition. Within a few days, I was 80 percent better. Our normal routine is to spend a couple of months in Colorado in the winter, so we packed up and went back out in late January.
I was feeling good, and there was abundant fresh snow, and we love back country skiing. So in the first 10 days out there, I skied six times on the mountain behind the cabin. The last day, we pushed too far and too long. The next morning, my back gave out.
I was unable to sit, stand or walk for more than two minutes without the pain becoming unbearable. For a month, I did not leave the cabin except for Genie to haul me down the mountian to the doctor. This was my first experience with disability, and it was humbling. I could do very little for myself. I was totally dependent.
I realized that we experience everything for a reason, and that there is learning in each painful experience if we will look for it. So, rather than ask God to heal me each day, I simply experienced each day, and asked what I could learn. I won't deny I had some bad days. I tried Genie's patience at times. But, for the most part, spending time with God kept my attitude from tanking. I was quite surprised, actually.
It slowly dawned on me that it is hard to learn humility without a humbling experience. For a decade now I've been trying to live a servant leader's life, but humility has been a slow road.
Slowly, after a month, I could stand, walk and sit for longer and longer periods. I told Genie that as soon as I was well enough to ride in the car for the two days back to Atlanta, I wanted to leave. Sitting there watching her shovel snow off the steps and walkway, haul firewood into the house, and do every chore for me, was painful in itself. As someone who the last summer hiked up to the Continental Divide, gaining 2,000 feet in elevation, topping out over 12,000 feet, to be restricted in mobility was a real eye opener.
Before this experience, I've always found it difficult to spend time in prayer, or to sense God's presence during times of illness. It was quite a revelation to see how, in this very difficult time, I was able to find communion with God in the little things I was able to do. What could have been a totally wasted month turned into a time of learning and growth. I have learned the painful lesson that humility can be learned. I slowly understood that for me to be useful to God, humility was a prerequisite.
Journaling Prompts
How has God humbled you? What are you willing to suffer to see the dawning of humility? What are you learning from painful experience? How is God shaping you through suffering, trials and testing?
Scripture
When you have eaten your fill and have built fine houses and live in them, and all that you have is multiplied, then do not exalt yourself, forgetting the Lord your God... Remember the Lord your God, for it is He who gives you power to get wealth.
Deutoronmy 8:12-14,18
Deuteronomy warns to beware of the complacency of success. God blesses us, and we stop praying or caring about our relationship with God. We become self-sufficient. When life goes well, we forget God because we think we don’t need him. But, life is such that it isn’t too long before our complacency lands us in trouble and we desperately seek God again.
RENOVARE Bible notes on Deutronomy 8:12-18
He leads the humble in what is right.
Psalm 25:9
When pride comes, then comes disgrace; but wisdom is with the humble.
Proverbs 11:2
Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall.
Proverbs 16:18
The haughtiness of people shall be humbled, and the pride of everyone shall be brought low; and the Lord alone will be exalted on that day.
Isaiah 2:17
For I am gentle and humble of heart.
Matthew 11:29. Jesus models humility
All who exalt themselves will be humbled. All who humble themselves will be exalted.
Matthew 23:12
A certain ruler asked him, “Good teacher.” Jesus said to him, “ Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone.“
Luke 14: 18-19
You stand only by faith. So, do not become proud, but stand in awe.
Romans 11:20
Paul said, “I planted, Apollos watered, but only God brings the fruit.”
1 Corinthians 3:6
The quality of all spirituality rests in humble reliance on the Spirit.
RENOVARE Bible notes on 1 Corinthians 2:13
Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up. Anyone who claims to know something does not yet have the necessary knowledge; but anyone who loves God is known by Him.
1 Corinthians 8:1-3
I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me.
2 Corinthians 12:9-10
In your relationship with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus: who being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death, even death on a cross!
Philippians 2:5-9
The only way to deliver me from my self-centeredness is by winning my entire heart’s devotion, the total allegiance of my will to God and this can only be done by the Divine Love of God.
William Temple, RENOVARE Bible notes on Timothy, NT p. 383-384
God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble. Submit yourselves therefore to God. Draw near to God and he will draw near to you. Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will exalt you.
James 4:6-10
All of you must clothe yourselves with humility in your dealings with one another, for “God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.” Humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, so that he may exalt you in due time.
1 Peter 5:5-6
Ancient Writings
I would rather have nothing than have vanity.
Tertullian
Just as a treasure exposed is quickly spent, so also any virtue which becomes famous or well publicized vanishes. Just as wax is quickly melted by fire, so the soul is emptied by praise and loses firmness of virtue.
Amma Syncletica, Celtic Daily Prayer Book Two, p. 1430
Neither asceticism, nor vigils nor any kind of suffering are able to save, only true humility can do that.
Amma Syncletica, Celtic Daily Prayer Book Two, p. 1435
A man must breathe humility and the fear of God just as ceaselessly as he inhales and exhales.
Abbot Pastor, Thomas Merton, Wisdom of the Desert, p. 53
Humility is the land where God wants us to go and offer sacrifice.
Abbot Alonius, Thomas Merton, Wisdom of the Desert, p. 53
Humility is the recognition of the truth about God and ourselves.
Francis of Assisi, The Message of St Francis, ed by Sister Nan
It is better to have but little knowledge with humility and understanding, than great learning which might make you proud. For a person's merits are not to be estimated by having many visions, or by knowledge of the bible, or by being placed in a higher position; but by being grounded in true humility, and by seeking always, purely, and entirely, the honor of God.
Imaginary virtues are always accompanied by a certain arrogance. The virtues God gives us are unencumbered by pride.
St. Teresa of Ávila. Interior Castle, trans Mirabai Starr, p. 141
When learned men see the light of eternal nature as their own possession, nothing results but pride.
Jakob Böhme, 4th Treatise
You are who you are in the eyes of God, nothing more and nothing less.
St. Francis, St Francis of Assisi: Omnibus of Sources, Admonition 20
Modern Writings
We all have lifetime wounds
False Self: ego driven-feeds ego
True Self: soul inspired-feeds soul
Only when we feel truly safe can we live into True Self
When fears are triggered, old behaviors emerge
We flee situations by distracting ourselves
Ultimate love requires ultimate freedom.
Mark Ritchie Spiritual Director
Humility that runs deep is hard won. It requires a kind of death.
Celtic Daily Prayer, Book Two, p. 1493
The awareness of being a child of God tends to stabilize the ego and results in a new courage, fearlessness, and power.
Howard Thurman, Matthew Fox, Christian Mystics, p. 209
Nine-tenths of our suffering is caused by others not thinking so much of us as we think they ought.
Mary Lyon
When humility delivers a man from attachment to his own works and his own reputation, he discovers that perfect joy is possible only when we have completely forgotten ourselves. And it is only when we pay no more attention to our own deeds and our own reputation and our own excellence that we are at last completely free to serve God in perfection for His own sake alone.
Thomas Merton, Seeds of Contemplation, p. 58
Pride is, then, a false and evasive self-realization which is in actual fact no realization at all, but only the fabrication of an illusory image.
Thomas Merton, Inner Experience, p. 54
The mind that is the prisoner of conventional ideas, and the will that is captive of its own desire cannot accept the seeds of an unfamiliar truth and a supernatural desire. God cannot plant his liberty in me because I'm a prisoner and I don't even desire to be free. I must learn to ‘leave myself’ in order to find myself by yielding to the love of God.
Thomas Merton, New Seeds of Contemplation, p. 16
When a proud man thinks he is humble, his case is hopeless. It is a terrible thing when such a one gets the idea that he is a prophet or messenger from God or a man with a mission to reform the world. He is capable of destroying religion and making the name of God odious to men.
Thomas Merton, New Seeds of Contemplation, p. 49, 51
In humility is your greatest freedom. As long as you have to defend the imaginary self that you think is important, you lose your peace of heart. As soon as you compare that shadow with the shadows of other people, you lose all joy, because you have begun to trade in unrealities and there is no joy in things that do not exist.
Thomas Merton, New Seeds of Contemplation, p. 57
A man who is truly humble cannot despair, because in the humble man there is no longer any self pity. It is almost impossible to overestimate the value of true humility and its power in the spiritual life. For the beginning of humility is the beginning of blessedness and the consummation of humility is the perfection of all joy. Faith and humility are inseparable. In perfect humility all selfishness disappears, and your soul is lost and submerged in Him and transformed into Him.
Thomas Merton, New Seeds of Contemplation, p. 180-181
In the beginning, emotional hang ups are the chief obstacle to the growth of the new self, because they put our freedom into a straight jacket. Later, because of the subtle satisfaction that springs from self-control, spiritual pride becomes the chief obstacle. Finally, reflection of self becomes the chief obstacle because this hinders the innocence of Divine Union.
Thomas Keating, Open Hearts, p. 164
Humility begins when we understand ourselves to be mortal-odd creatures in whom heaven and earth meet. We savor the beginnings of joyous humility when we recognize that we did not bring ourselves into the world, nor did we bring creation into being.
Mary Earle, The Desert Mothers, p. 48
Real humility allows us to take ourselves lightly, to be less concerned with heroic endeavors always to be right, to be kind, to be 'the good person'.
The desert teachers understood that human life is a process of having the perseverance and the courage to admit faults, to clebrate our blessings, and to be honest about what we need to stop and then start over, while allowing our teacher, our Amma, to remind us of the love of God that will not let us go.
Mary Earle, Celtic Daily Prayer Book Two, p. 1435
Healthy humility is a necessary practice for spiritual growth. Humility is at heart about being well-grounded and rooted. Humility is also about
truth-telling and radical self-honesty.
Christine Valters Paintner, Abbey of the Arts
Humility is the fundamental recognition that we each draw our life and breath from the same source—the God who made us and calls us beloved. Humility prevents us from seeing ourselves as more deserving or graced than another person. It also compels us to recognize that we are no less deserving or graced than another. Humility draws us into mutual relation, through which we allow no abuse, no demeaning, no diminishment of others or of ourselves. Through humility we can let go of the quest for perfection.
Christine Valters Paintner, Lectio Divina, p. 104.
The self-emptied person is the true revolutionary in the world.
Henri Nouwen, Discernment, p. 90
Against my own best intentions, I find myself continually striving to acquire power. When I give advice, I want to know whether it is being followed; when I offer help, I want to be thanked; when I give money, I want it to be used my way; when I do something good, I want to be remembered.
Can I give without wanting anything in return, love without putting any conditions on my love? Considering my immense need for human recognition and affection, I realize that it will be a lifelong struggle. But I am also convinced that each time I step over this need and act free of my concern for return, I can trust that my life can truly bear the fruits of God’s Spirit.
Henri Nouwen, Nouwen Society Daily Devotion, 2/4/21
The Hidden Way
It is hard to believe that God would reveal his divine presence to us in the self-emptying, humble way of the man from Nazareth. So much in me seeks influence, power, success, and popularity. But the way of Jesus is the way of hiddenness, powerlessness, and littleness. It does not seem a very appealing way. Yet when I enter into true, deep communion with Jesus, I will find that it is this small way that leads to real peace and joy.
Henri Nouwen, Nouwen Society Daily Devotion, 12/10/22
We have been born into and shaped by a spiritually impoverished culture, a culture that worships many things other than Spirit.
Kathleen Singh, The Grace in Dying, p. 6
I believe in mystery and multiplicity…My very belief and experience of a loving and endlessly creative God has led me to trust in both.. …People who have really met the Holy are always humble. It's the people who don't know who usually pretend that they do.
People who've had any genuine spiritual experience always know they don't know. They are utterly humbled before mystery. They are in awe before the abyss of it all, in wonder at eternity and depth, and a Love, which is incomprehensible to the mind. It is a litmus test for authentic God experience, and is – quite sadly – absent from much of our religious conversation today. My belief and comfort is in the depths of Mystery, which should be the very task of religion.
Richard Rohr, Illuman Drumbeat, 4/24
The ego diverts your attention from anything that would ask you to change, to righteous causes that invariably ask others to change.
Richard Rohr, Naked Now, p. 94
Our suffering is the suffering of people who are comfortable on the outside but oppressed and empty within. This is a crisis of meaninglessness, which leads us to seek meaning in possessions, perks, prestige and power-all things that lie outside the self. The only way to stop seeking, needing, or abusing outer power is to find the real power within.
Richard Rohr, On the Threshold of Transformation, p. 95
The ego is formed by contraction; the soul is formed by expansion. The ego pulls into itself by comparing, competing, and separating itself from others: “I am not like that,” it says.
The soul, however, does exactly the opposite: “I am that.” It sees itself in God, the other, flowers and trees, animals, and even the enemy: similarity instead of separateness. It participates in the human dilemma instead of placing itself above and beyond all tensions.
The long journey of transformation leads us to ask new questions about our own goodness, and where goodness really lies; to recognize our own complicity with evil, and where evil really lies. It is humiliating.
Richard Rohr, “Questions versus Answers,” Radical Grace 25, no. 4, The Eight Core Principles (Fall 2012)
Great people are usually humble. They understand that they draw from another source; they are satisfied to be an instrument. Their genius is not of their own making but a gift. They understand that their life is not their own but has been entrusted to them.
Desmond Tutu told me that he and I were mere light bulbs. We seem to be shining brightly for all to see, but we both know that if this lightbulb was unscrewed from its source even for a moment, the brightness will immediately stop.
Richard Rohr, On the Threshold of Transformation, p. 352
Beware of becoming one who is smug in their beliefs.
Richard Rohr
The contemplative knows that truth held arrogantly will not bear the wonderful fruit of truth. Moral outrage at the ideas of another hardly ever serves God’s purposes, only our own.
Richard Rohr, Naked Now, p. 132
Radical egocentricity (“I” as the reference point) is all around us, taken for granted, taken for good, and well-nigh invisible until it is exposed by its inability to love and to suffer for those we love.
Richard Rohr, What Will We Do With Evil? p. 37
Whereas information will often inflate the ego, transformation utterly humbles us. In that moment, we know how much we have not known up to now, and still surely do not know! Such humility is a good and probably necessary starting place and, I would say, the very seat of Wisdom.
Richard Rohr CAC Morning Devotion, 2/21/20
Humility. How do we begin to grow in it? We are aware that humility is one of those things we cannot acquire by trying to acquire it! No, it comes indirectly. We receive the grace of humility by applying ourselves to other matters, matters which will place us in a more proper relationship with God, with others, and ultimately with ourselves. With regard to humility we learn:
To contemplate God’s greatness and goodness. This will place us in a more proper relationship with God.
To serve our family, neighbors, friends, colleagues, and even enemies. This will place us in a more proper relationship with each other.
To understand ourselves in light of these more proper relationships to God and others.
Richard Foster, On the Imitation of Christ
Like a storm tossed lake, our own waves and agitation get in the way of a clear picture. Training in wisdom has to do with purifying the heart and polishing the mirror of awareness, by gradually freeing it from domination by the small self ego. As the heart becomes undivided, a still and accurately reflecting mirror, it begins to be able to see and swim in the deeper waters of the Divine coming into form.
Cynthia Bourgeault, Wisdom Way of Knowing, p. 87-88
As we wander in a perpetual spiritual adolescence, attempting to fill the hunger in our hearts with our needs rather than the Divine need, creation itself pays the price.
Cynthia Bourgeault, Wisdom Way of Knowing, p. 43
All that we have, we’ve been given. And, we’ve been given it to give.
James Finley
Be assured that where there is humility, God will grant the peace that comes from being aligned with his will. The hummus of humility is the good soil in which the Word produces abundant fruit.
Father Bernardo Olivera, Basil Pennington, Lectio Divina, p. 156
If your mind is inflated by pride or seduced by worldly pleasures, positions, and honors, Or if you crave wealth, status, and the flattery of others, your God-given ability to reason is serving evil.
Carmen Acevedo Butcher, the Cloud of Unknowing, P. 27
Even though I call self-knowledge an imperfect humility, I value it highly. Because even if every saint, angel in heaven, and church member did nothing but constantly petition God on my behalf, asking that I grow in humility, their prayers would not help me achieve this growth as much as if I possess a real understanding of who I am. Self knowledge is the only way to get and keep the virtue of humility. When you get to know yourself better as the mortal human you are, your soul grows in humility, and you’ll know God as fully as possible on earth.
Carmen Acevedo Butcher, the Cloud of Unknowing, P. 39
Reputation is almost always about human concerns. Who is in charge of the measuring stick?
Mark Ritchie, Spiritual Director
Some of the reservations about humility are legitimate, especially for women. Abuse of humility can encourage passivity, low self-worth, and be used as a tool of oppression, imparting fear, guilt, or an abiding sense of failure, in an effort to remind people of their proper “place” and keeping them from rocking the boat or challenging institutions or those who hold power. There is also such a thing as false humility, when someone denies how good they are as a means to make themselves look even better.
The word humility is derived from humus which means earth. Humility is at heart about being well-grounded and rooted. Humility is also about truth-telling and radical self-honesty. It is about celebrating the gifts we have been uniquely given in service of others, as well as recognizing our limitations and woundedness.
Humility means to be profoundly earthed and to face up to truth about our human condition. Humility demands that we also celebrate our blessings as a part of truth-telling. It teaches us to recognize that our gifts are not of our own making but are gifts we receive and held in trust to give to our communities. Our gifts are not for ourselves alone. We are called to create not for our own satisfaction, but to participate in the co-creation of a more just and beautiful world.
Honoring our limits as creatures can be deeply liberating. Giving up our demanding inner perfectionism can be freeing. How often do I resist beginning a creative project because of my fear that it will not live up to the image in my mind? Humility invites me to release those expectations and enter into the call of my gift knowing that it may look very differently from my imagining. Recognizing our flaws in gentle and compassionate ways can bind us closer to others. We must have patience with the unfolding of our lives and the world. God’s kingdom unfolds in God’s own time. We discover that we are not solely responsible for saving the world. Acknowledging our limits, can liberate us from our compulsions and frantic busyness and lead us towards recognizing our interdependence. Each of our gifts contributes to the whole.
Humility is also about welcoming in those experiences which create a sense of resistance in us. Those places in say scripture text which make us wrestle are often the ones that bear the greatest fruit in terms of revealing our own hidden places of resistance and fear. The same can be said of the creative process, the thing we most fear doing has perhaps the most to teach us about our own places of restriction and block. Humility invites us to embrace the challenges as doorways toward deeper understanding of ourselves and God.
Humility is deeply rooted in the beginner’s mind. The poet Rainer Maria Rilke writes:
"If the Angel deigns to come it will because you have convinced her, not by tears but by your humble resolve to be always beginning; to be a beginner."
Bringing the mind and heart of a beginner to our lives helps us to discover the wisdom inherent in each moment. When we let go of our desire to be clever or successful or create beautiful things we may begin to open to the sacred truth of our experience as it is, not how we want it to be.
Christine Valter Paintner, Abbey of the Arts
This is the paradox of ego maturity: Just as the person reaches the peak of self-expression, he also becomes receptive to letting the self go.
Jenny Wade, Changes of Mind, p. 162
Spiritual maturity comes not from self-contempt, but self-forgetfulness, and the object of forgetting oneself is always to seek to be found in the heart of Divine Love.
Carl McColman, Christian Mystics, p. 190
Humility Is the cornerstone of great leaders.
Jim Collins
Holy wisdom is the wisdom of egoless living.
Almaas, Sandra Maitri, Spiritual Dimension of the Enneagram
Authentic Wisdom--to see God in all things--carries with it a sense of humility and reverence. The idea that reverence and humility are shown by lowering ourselves is rooted in our language: Humility comes from the Latin word for ‘earth’, which is humus. Meanwhile, to genuflect is to bend the knee in reverence and reflect. Reverence does not come from the head.
Matthew Fox, Christian Mystics, p. 67
The cultural ideal of the Western industrialized world is the self-made, self-sufficient, autonomous individual who stands by himself or herself, not needing anyone else . . . and not beholden to anyone for anything. . . .
This is the ideal that people live and work for. It is their goal in life, and they will sacrifice anything to achieve it. This is how you “get a life for yourself.” This is how you discover your identity. . . .
There have been plenty of people in the past with inflated egos kings, conquerors, and other dictators but in the Western world today the cultivation of the ego is seen as the ideal for everyone. Individualism permeates almost everything we do. It is a basic assumption. It is like a cult. We worship the ego.
Albert Nolan, Jesus Today: A Spirituality of Radical Freedom, p. 15, 16.
Humility is the foundation upon which everything else in the contemplative life rests. It is the beginning and end of wisdom, the highest virtue and yet the lowest status. Humility is like a delicate flower which shines with vibrant colour in the sunlight. It is the most precious jewel in the crown of the Prince of Peace. It is the fulfilment of all human striving. To be humble is to be rooted and grounded in love.
The humble soul sees the immensity of God and how small it is in comparison. It is content with very little and is nothing other than its authentic self. Humility is a state of being, an inner condition of truth. The humble soul always desires to grow in virtue. It never imagines that it has completed the race. It sees itself with a simple mind, it does not exaggerate its own greatness or its own smallness. It knows its own struggles and shortcomings and responds to them with wisdom. It does not fight with itself or anyone else. It rejoices in the love of God and participates in that love by its own patience and generosity. Humility makes us meek.
Meekness is always the shortest distance between two people. It listens to the wisdom of others and admits when it is wrong. It does not boast or brag, it does not imagine it is better than anyone else. It does not judge anyone or make presumptions. It forgives people before they are sorry. It is gentle with all people, even those who are violent. It eats what it is served without complaining. It works diligently and does not ask for any credit. It creates community by its love for others and the way it does not draw attention to itself. It has nothing to prove and therefore nothing to lose.
Without humility no other virtue can be said to be true. If we are charitable but do so for our own ego, then we are not truly charitable. If we compliment others but do so to win their favour, then we are not truly kind. If we are pious and devout but parade our righteousness all over social media, then we are not truly righteous. Pelagius described this exceedingly well when he said,
“Truly you must follow humility, not the kind that is displayed and simulated by bodily gesture or by subduing the utterance of one’s words but that which is expressed in the natural disposition of one’s heart. For it is one thing to pursue the shadow of things, another the reality. The pride which hides beneath outward signs of humility is made much more ugly thereby. For, by some means or other, vices are more unsightly when they are concealed behind an outward semblance of virtue.“ (Trans by Rees)
False humility only hurts us in the end. It deepens the wound of pride in our souls rather than healing it. True humility, on the other hand, accompanies every goodness. The first step in the pursuit of humility is to be vulnerable. Vulnerable with others and with ourselves. Vulnerability is the means by which true humility and false humility can be distinguished from one another.
False humility protects our wounds so that they are hidden from others, and even from ourselves. It is a pretence behind which we hide our brokenness. True humility, on the other hand, is an attitude of honesty and self awareness. One which speaks the truth rather than covering it up. We are vulnerable when we have the courage to name those things we are afraid to say out loud. When we step out of the shadows of shame, prejudice, vanity, and pride into the light of Christ.
Christ was supremely vulnerable. He chose to share the two most vulnerable moments of human life with us a birth and death and then taught us to be like little children and to pick up our crosses. To be hung from the cross is to be completely exposed. Yet, Christ was not shamed by his vulnerability, like his executioners had hoped he would be. Rather, his vulnerability led him to new life. We all begin in complete vulnerability as little babies dependent upon others. We begin in humility and we end in humility. This is why both birth and death are used to describe the mind of Christ. To put on the mind of Christ is to die before we die and also to be born again.
Justin Coutts, In Search of a New Eden, 8/13/23
Far from self-loathing and self-pity (and self-focus in general!), humility is evidenced by quiet confidence, attentive presence, authenticity, and the ability to serve without recognition. A humble person knows the immense worth of God and bows in worship. She also knows her worth to God, and thus can rest and rise in God’s care. Firmly rooted in reality and in truth, she sees things as they are, no more and no less. She knows her weakness but her mind is full more of God’s grace than her own shortcomings. Humility is attractive to those seeking truth. This is why so many were drawn to Jesus. Never was a person more confident in his identity and purpose in life. Never was someone more bold in faith and action. And never was someone more humble.
Brian Morykon, RENOVARE Weekly Digest 7/2/21
Knowing how valuable we are to God doesn’t puff us up; it settles us down. Knowing our God-given worth doesn’t make us proud; it makes us humble. Humility is to see things as they are. It isn’t to think of oneself as a worthless worm who God reluctantly redeemed. It is to fix our heart on God’s worth which is the literal definition of worship and know our worth in light of God's worth. Jesus could be lowly and humble of heart because he knew who and whose he was. He had nothing to prove, so he could come as a baby and grow into a man who loved freely.
Brian Morykon, RENOVARE Weekly, 12/9/22