Humility
Humility can be a very odd virtue. Here’s what I mean by that, we live in a cultural moment where we are drawn to people who are at the same time confident in themselves but not too confident so as to be arrogant. That is, we esteem people who are both confident and humble at the same time. Frankly, this is a difficult balance. Why? Because we tend to be very inward-focused and in need of affirmation which can lead us quickly to a place of a puffed ego, growing too big for our britches, or getting a big head… to name a few cultural expressions for arrogance. But, our desire and need for affirmation isn’t necessarily bad. Pastor Scott Sauls explains, “This longing we all have to receive affirmation from others is tricky, because its origin comes from a good place. While the longing for approval can manifest in dysfunctional ways like the scribe and the Pharisee, the original source of the longing is our identity as people made in the image of God, whose very essence and nature is to receive praise.
The image of God in us is the reason why we desire more healthy forms of affirmation and praise: a pat on the back for a job well done, an affectionate “I love you” from a spouse or loved one, or hearing the words, “I’m so proud of you!” from Mom or Dad.”
Confidence is simply being aware of and grateful for your giftings and talents that have been given to you by God. And desiring affirmation for those things as Scott Sauls notes is not bad or wrong. This is where humility comes in, it is using your gifts and talents to help others see and be affirmed in theirs. In other words, humility is not thinking less of yourself but thinking of yourself less often. Scott Sauls goes on to describe that others-centered mindset this way, “We would be better off pursuing what Henri Nouwen called “downward mobility.” Nouwen, who spent several years writing and speaking and being celebrated as a teacher at esteemed universities including Notre Dame, Yale, and Harvard, forsook his ascending celebrity at its peak. At the urging of his friend, Jean Vanier, Nouwen would instead spend the rest of his life pastoring a small community of mentally disabled men and women called L’Arche. Nouwen’s rationale for this radical, “downward” move was as follows:
“Scripture reveals…that real and total freedom is only found through downward mobility…The divine way is indeed the downward way…[Jesus] moved from power to powerlessness, from greatness to smallness, from success to failure, from strength to weakness, from glory to ignominy. The whole life of Jesus of Nazareth…resisted upward mobility.”[1]
For Henri Nouwen and for us all, greatness is not found in being well liked and respected by others, not in striving to reverse the negative verdicts, not in making a name for ourselves. Instead, greatness is found as we become more boastful about Jesus and more shy about ourselves…and in a life increasingly poured out for Jesus and others.
How do people like Henri Nouwen become so free? How to they find strength to renounce emotional neediness and the craving to be well liked and respected by others, and to instead pour their lives out in love for others…even those who can give nothing in return? I dare say that this ability to become self-forgetful, this ability to divert their eyes away from toward God and neighbor, was fueled and sustained by the daily voice of their Heavenly Father and ours—whose love through Jesus is always unfailing, always secure, and always triumphant over negative verdicts—saying to them, “Keep going, kid.”
The way up is the way down. When we walk the path of downward mobility, we are lifted up by the “Well done” of our Father in heaven.
What could be better than this?”[2]
[1] As quoted from Jamin Goggin and Kyle Strobel, The Way of the Dragon or the Way of the Lamb, p. 122.
[2] Excerpts via the full article: https://scottsauls.com/blog/2019/07/19/humility-and-greatness/#_ftnref1