THE LAST RIVER MILE

“Humility stands alone among the virtues in that as soon as you think you have it, you probably don’t.” – John Dickson.

Historian and faith leader John Dickson defines humility as follows: It is a choice to forgo status, deploy resources, or use influence to benefit others before self. Honestly, how often do we see that happen, purely, in the world in which we live now?

Sure, we give lip service to humility as a core value. In fact, though, I believe we stand in a long historic line of disdain for humility. Our Euro-dominant culture in North America is rooted in the Greco-Roman world over two millennia ago. In that world, humility was anything but a virtue. People then saw humility as a weakness, or character flaw. The goal then was to seek honor and pride, and to avoid shame. Humility was associated with shame. Humility was something that happened to you, not something you sought.

Little has changed. Think of our culture’s endless addiction to competition, constantly seeking to prove who is best. Facebook, Instagram, Tik Tok, etc. provide a continual parade of those whose life, children, awards, achievements, trips, meals, whatever are the absolute best. Humility itself is used pridefully in the cyberworld art of the “humblebrag.” In the vocation of which I was a part, pastoring churches, humility is preached, while we measure each other by whose church has the most participants, whose church is growing the most, and whose church has the highest profile. Current leadership in our nation unabashedly models anything but humility. (Many think that the most genuinely humble president of the last half century was the worst chief executive, while they think the most prideful, egocentric president of that period was the best.)

This makes following Jesus even more counter-cultural. There are at least eighty positive references to humility in the Bible. Centrally, there’s this one: “And being found in appearance as a men, he (Jesus) humbled himself by becoming obedient to death, even death on a cross.” (Philippians 2:8.) Jesus didn’t just accept ultimate humility; he sought it. And get ready for this…to exemplify and offer Jesus, we must, “Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of your to the interests of others.” (Philippians 2:3-4.) That, friends, is swimming against the flow.

Awash in an anti-humility world as we are now, what would it look like to actually practice Jesus-centered humility?

I’ll see you around the next bend in the river.