The Grace of Humility

In Luke 14:7-11 Jesus tells a parable about how guests often tend to choose the places of honor at the banquet table. Jesus counsels us: "When you are invited by someone to a wedding banquet, do not sit down at the place of honor....But when you are invited, go and sit down at the lowest place, so that when your host comes, he may say to you, 'Friend, move up higher'....For all who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted."

Jeremy Taylor (1613-1667) was educated in Cambridge, England and gained fame as an outstanding scholar. He was ordained in 1633 and became the chaplain to Charles 1. Later in his illustrious career, he was consecrated bishop of Down and Connor, Ireland. Taylor was a prolific writer with deep insights into human behavior. In this blog I am drawing heavily on excerpts from his book: "The Rule and Exercises of Holy Living."

Christ calls us to learn to live our lives in humility. Humility is a grace with which God gifts our hearts. This grace must become our habit of life. We can live the grace of humility in the following ways:

1. Maintain a realistic opinion of ourself. This means recognizing that we are spiritually unworthy persons. This suggests we should not judge ourselves according to outward circumstances or what happens to us. All the goodness we experience is God's gracious gifting for our benefit and for the benefit of others. We are merely human--and fallen humans at that. The only thing we can offer that merits worth is our making good choices. But we are not the source--we continue to be hungry when we go without food. When we accept that we are flawed and not fully wise, we should not be angry if someone else agrees! When we know we are unworthy, no one can undervalue or hurt us.

2. Do good things in secret. We will find great satisfaction in being content to go without praise. Let's nurture a love of doing good things in secret. Goodness is its own reward!

3. Never be ashamed. There is no shame regarding our parents, our occupation or present employment, or any reality of our life. Do not be shy about who you really are--speak openly the truth with an indifference to what others might think of you. It is said that Primislaus, the first king of Bohemia kept his old work shoes by his side so that he would always remember his humble upbringing. Do not let praise for yourself be the design of your conversations.

4. Reflect it back to God. Always give God thanks for making you an instrument of his glory for the benefit of others. Be like Moses, whose face shined brightly for others to see, but he did not make it a looking-glass for himself.

5. Focus on the strengths of others. Never compare yourself with others unless it advances your impression of them and appropriately adjusts your impression of yourself. St. Paul encouraged us to think more highly of others than we do of ourselves. It is healthy to focus on the strengths of those around us in order to see our own weaknesses more clearly. In this process we can work to strengthen those areas that are weaker, and we become increasingly whole. Knowing our own weaknesses helps us forgive the weaknesses of others.

6. Enjoy the success of others. It is told of Cyrus that he would never compete in any sport with his friends in which he knew himself to be superior to them. Instead, he would always compete in sports in which he was less skillful than his opponents. He did not want to prove his superiority by winning. He placed more importance on learning from those who were more skilled while at the same time sharing in the joy of their success.

7. The Grace of Humility increases with exercise. Humility always begins as a gift from God, but we can increase our use of this precious gift through exercising the development of a habit of humility. The habit of humility is strengthened through exercise. This exercise includes confessing our sins often to God. This exercise recognizes our impatience, anger, lust and pride as not an occasionally scattered offense in the course of our long life, but rather as one continuous representation of our fallen state. If all our faults and failings were placed next to one another (rather than spaced throughout our long life) we would clearly see the vicious misery of our natural self. This awareness can help when applied as an exercise to the soul, to increase our habit of living the grace of humility.

Our world today hungers for the presence of people who are genuinely humble, because a genuinely humble person is a genuine person! To be humble is to be real. As we learn the habit of living the grace of humility our relationships will become more constructive, healthy, and positive as we interact with one another in a new way of beautiful, life-giving holiness.

With love,

Duff Gorle