Humility 3.19.23

During this Lenten Season, our Church asked for volunteers to provide a reflection on the Lenten Gospel Readings. We were told to keep the reflection to less than 200 words.  Being loquacious, both verbally and with the written word, I entered this holy endeavor intent on listening, reflecting, and finding one message, out of the many in this passage, that resonated with me.

Elizabeth volunteered to provide a reflection on today’s reading, March 19^th.  So, together we read the Gospel of John, Chapter 9, where Jesus heals a man born blind. I invite you to read all 41 verses after reading the following reflection.

Worldviews are dear to us.  During Jesus’ time people believed that suffering was a result of living in sin.  The Pharisees make this clear when they dismiss the cured man by stating “You were steeped in sin at birth; how dare you lecture us!” The Pharisees represent the spiritually blind, due in large part to their self-assured hubris, which is constantly juxtaposed with emotional effect with the humility of the cured man.

The book The Road Less Travelled states, “Only a fortunate few continue until the moment of death exploring the mystery of reality, ever redefining their understanding of what is true.” Those fortunate few have humility, and they see.  The word humility literally comes from the Latin word for dirt, humus. So, the mud that Jesus uses to cure the man’s blindness represents the humility required to overcome spiritual blindness.

During this season of lent, let humility guide us, so that we listen, learn, and even celebrate the gifts of others. And to recognize that we cannot solve or control all aspects of life.  We need others……

As our Church Lenten Literature states, “Sometimes, in our Lenten introspection, we accidentally focus too much on ourselves and forget to think about bringing the reign of God into our lives, and into our community.”  Again, this takes a bit of humility. And as one of the pillars of joy, humility allows us to focus on others, and not ourselves.

Several years ago, a very dear friend gave me Frederick Buechner’s daily devotional Listening to Your Life. The book contains a reflection on humility.  Buechner asserts that gentlemanly self-deprecation, conscious or otherwise, is a form of gamesmanship.  And being proud of admitting your shortfalls is a form of low comedy. He believes that true humility does not consist of thinking ill of yourself but is rather “the capacity for being no more and no less pleased when you play your own hand well than when your opponents do.”  Many of us slip off of this tightrope between pride and self-loathing continuously.  And we get bruised up when we fall.  But when we climb back on, we have better balance, and we make it a little further before falling off again.  It is those open to change, that are willing to walk that tightrope again and again, even as others watch them fall, that are truly brave.