"The Virtue of Humility"
One of the most overlooked virtues of human beings is that of humility. Humility is more of a religious virtue, rather than a Greek philosophical one, owing greatly to religious communities that practice penitence and forgiveness. For Christians humility is the virtuous result of examining ourselves before God and knowing we fall short of God’s intentions for us and need forgiveness. We understand Jesus’ example of humility as the basis of, as well as the model for our own. As Paul writes in Philippians 2 (quoting a familiar hymn): “Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility regard others as better than yourselves. Let each of you look not to your own interests, but to the interests of others. ‘Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death— even death on a cross.’” To follow Jesus' example of humility human beings need God's grace, the power of God's Holy Spirit.
Lifting up humility has historically been misused in the church and in the world. It has often been made by the strong and powerful in order to keep those who under them in their place. So they are encouraged, even religiously, to realize that they are blessed because they are humble and meek. Or it has been used to reconcile a sense of low self-esteem with the Christian faith. But if Paul was among us, as someone proud of his religiously zealous background as a Pharisee, he would not see the need to have a low opinion of one's self, nor to loathe one's self. Furthermore, is not a lifting up of those who have no choice than serving in making their way in the world. Understood rightly, it is a reminder that although God chooses to make something out of us human beings, we are imperfect, finite creatures and rightly see our role before God in the posture of kneeling.
Today is Ash Wednesday, a day to experience humility. Christians are called to practice Lent, a forty-day period of penitence. It is a time to realize how we are often full of conceit, prideful in ourselves, and in need of forgiveness. This call to humility is made with the use of the gospel from Matthew 6, which speaks of not making too much of our religious practices, but having an interior relationship of humility before God. But the effectiveness of Ash Wednesday to remind us of humility is not really the gospel for the day. Rather, it is the imposition of ashes, which in most churches who still relate to the early history of Christianity now practice. As you receive a cross of ashes made by the minister, you are called to remembrance: “remember you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”
The call to remembrance is deeply rooted in the penitence of the Hebrew Bible. After losing everything in his life, Job sat in dust and ashes in penitence. But it is also a reminder that in life as we know it, all people will die. It is the ultimate humbling experience in the face of all of our earthly projects and our personal hubris. Before God we are not worthy to make a claim of anything. We need to repent amid dust and ashes, which in effect, is what our earthly lives will come to—nothing but dust and ashes. Eternity rests totally in God's hands.
The Judeo-Christian tradition is not along in valuing the virtue of humility. Other religions—east and west—prize it, and many of them keep a special time to lift it up. But in our growing secular world, the value of humility has largely been lost. For example, we have political leaders who are, if anything, quite proud of themselves and their accomplishments. They claim to be self-made men and women and “regard themselves more highly than they ought.” Perhaps this year as the Christian world enters Lent we should make it a time to intercede for those who, despite themselves, need humility.
We often pray on Good Friday for those who have not yet come to the faith. So today, as well as throughout Lent, we can pray for prideful people, both secular and religious, to come to an acknowledgement of humility. We may relate the need for humility, as it is done in the Twelve Steps of Alcoholics Anonymous, to the need for a higher power. We may relate it to doing a moral inventory of our lives. When we do, we will discover we cannot do it alone. When we are dependent only upon ourselves, we “fall flat on our faces.” That is the humility that many of us will experience today—as we receive the ashes and realize, both experientially and intellectually, that we are human, and not God. It is the first step on the road to having sense of humility solely through the grace of God.
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