"Humility"
Rev. Paul Mitchell
Vashon United Methodist Church
June 10, 2018
Psalm 131; Matthew 6:24-34
Let’s
start with the premise that we are all humble people here. At least humble
enough, considering that humility is profoundly countercultural in our world
today. Western culture in general, and American culture in particular, is built
upon a foundation of pride rather than humility. It presumes that our people –
or at least the people most like us – are inherently and appropriately better,
and thus more deserving, than others – those who are not like us. There is some
dissonance in this. We generally think of the American experiment in democracy
as having been rooted in core principles of Christian ethics and commitments.
At the same time, we often interpret the cause of the expulsion from the Garden
as pride – the sin of pride – of being “proud” – of standing out – of
presumption. Pride is not a Christian value – though many who call themselves
Christians cling to it. “Humble” literally means “from
the dirt” or “upon the ground.”

right?
We noted
last week that part of the message of the Psalms comes in their poetry. Psalm
134 – about blessing – underscores that meaning with threefold repetition of
the word.
Blessing.
Blessing. Blessing. Like waves on the sand.
In Psalm
131, the threefold repetition is more like a withdrawal – a backing down – a
diminution. Here the repetition is negation.
Not.
Not. Not. My heart is not lifted up. My eyes are not raised too
high.
I do not
occupy myself with things too great and marvelous for me.
One
implication is that we do tend to do these things. The heart lifted up –
at least when we do it alone – is a proud heart. It is a way of self-promotion
above all else – the Hebrew word for heart also means the whole self – the core
identity of the person – even the soul. The eyes raised too high are haughty,
superior, disdainful of the dignity of others. To occupy one’s self with things
too great and marvelous is to give over the internal life to something other
than the breath of life – the Spirit breathed into our bodies made from the earth.
The
pilgrim’s heart is not proud.
The
pilgrim’s countenance is not proud.
The
pilgrim’s soul is not proud.
The
pilgrim’s feet are grounded.
Psalm
131 is about humility, and Eugene Peterson tells us that in it he sees a
moderating or mediating message. Like a just-weaned infant, the pilgrim is in
the moment between the insatiable hunger of the newborn and the willful demands
of the toddler. God is the mother who has weaned her children, perhaps a little
emptied of power and reluctant to control, but expectant and hopeful for her
offspring – that they will remain rooted in the earth of her love. Every mother
wants her children to thrive, but not at the cost of thriving for her other
children. One wonders how she sorrows as she watches children taken from their
parents at the borders of our nation – supposedly a nation rooted in Christian ethics
and commitments.
The
Message paraphrase of Psalm 131 says we should not meddle where we have no
business – and so it would be well to be clear about where our business lies –
as individual pilgrims as well as a pilgrim people – on our way to the City of
the Peace of God. On this bold and never quite completed journey of faith – at
least not from what we have seen in this life – we pass through regions of hurt
and hunger as well as justice and joy. Nowadays the regions of hurt and hunger
seem closer to our path. Perhaps the paths we have chosen as individuals and as
a people have generated some or most of the hurt and the hunger. If we are so
intent upon marching to Zion – the state of perfection beyond our earthly cares
– we are unlikely to tarry in those hungry hurting places. And if we care too
much for our life, for what we will eat or drink, or about our body, what we
will wear, we may not even set out on the journey. As followers of Jesus, our
business is with the with those close to the ground. The journey of faith is
not an easy one – not always pleasant – often challenging.
In the past
week or so we have been tragically reminded that the journey of life is
difficult as well. Two celebrities have taken their own lives – one whose
genius was to celebrate our lives through what we eat and drink – the other
whose genius was to celebrate our bodies through what we wear. Each of them
would seem to have no cause to worry. They had made it. Perhaps they were
proud. Perhaps like newborns they had an insatiable hunger. Perhaps like
toddlers they had willful demands that overreached, causing hurt in themselves
as well as in those around them. Perhaps they woke up one day with the aching
realization that their achievement, appearance, and affluence did not enhance
their joy, their beauty, and their love. Perhaps they were clinically
depressed, and the way of life that we have created together does not
accommodate those who are lost in pathless regions of hurt and hunger.
Suicide
is frightening. And like many things that frighten us, we want to hold it as
far away as possible. We want to stigmatize it and condemn it. Suicide is a
disease, but it is not communicable. It does not infect people one by one, but
like alcoholism, it is a disease of a community. Its presenting symptoms
manifest primarily in individuals. These symptoms are exacerbated by our pride
and our worry about our individual life, what we will eat or what we will
drink, about our body, what we will wear – not only our clothing, but the ways
in which we dress ourselves for the world. The cause of suicide is not
pride, but more often the loss of pride – the realization that we cannot live
up to the illusions and expectations of a culture of acquisition, control, and
privilege. The cause of suicide is a desperately lonely and unquiet soul. We
trust that God never wants us to suffer; God wants fulness of life for each and
all of us.
Eugene
Peterson encourages us to cut away these overweening concerns through
soul-pruning. He says, “… pruning…
reduces the distance between our hearts and their roots in God…. The two things
that Psalm 131 prunes away are unruly ambition and infantile dependency, what
we might call getting too big for our britches and refusing to cut the apron
strings. Both of these tendencies can easily be supposed to be virtues,
especially by those who are not conversant with Christian ways. If we are not
careful, we will be encouraging the very things that ruin us. We are in special
and constant need of expert correction. We need pruning.”[i]
Psalm
131 tells us that these two things come together: humility and the quiet soul.
It’s not clear that one comes before the other. Perhaps the quiet soul can be
entered through the gate of humility just as well as humility can be entered
through the gate of the quiet soul. Or perhaps, like much of Hebrew poetry, the
psalmist deliberately sets up a parallelism – each thought is a reinforcement
or illustration of the other – humility and the quiet soul are somehow
synonymous.
At the
risk of being repetitive, I believe the underlying message of Psalm 131 for us
here today is the same as the message for us of Psalm 134. And so, humbly I
offer it to you again. We, as individual followers of Jesus, and our community of faith will thrive as each of
us nurtures an ever more intimate relationship with God – one in which we
whisper God’s name constantly in our heart – and God calls us by name into the
rhythm and swirl of life. If you don’t already set aside 20 minutes every
evening for centering prayer, start now. Make it a prayer of one word only –
your own intimate, unpronounceable name for God – a name you never dare to
speak aloud. If you can’t sit still, walk as you pray. Quiet your soul. Ground
yourself. Prune away the worries of yesterday and tomorrow. Allow yourself to
rest in that place between worry and demand. Do it alone or together. Maybe even
lift your hands in blessing. And as you pray, follow your upward path toward
the City of the Peace of God, where God’s servants await you.
[i]
Eugene Peterson, A Long Obedience in the
Same Direction: Discipleship in an instant Society (Downers Grove:
Intervarsity Press, 2000), 149-150.
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