Jack Bernard’s book How to Become a Saint is quite a treasure as far as books on the Christian life go. His thoughts on humility are particularly helpful:
The downfall of attempts to become humble is that they are usually driven by the desire to become superior. . . . If you set out to get rid of pride or to develop humility you are going to fall flat on your face. If you are fortunate, you will fail at it in such a way that you can see not only that you have failed, but that you have within yourself no potential to do otherwise! The key word here is “potential.” The standard trick of pride is to protect oneself from facing reality by always claiming unrealized potential. We say to ourselves, “I could do it if only . . .” Therefore actual failures at spiritual achievement are not accepted as a true reflection of self. Before we can actually live in reality and advance in the spiritual life, we must rid ourselves of the notion that we have potential. We do not. We are spiritually bankrupt. Only deliverance from outside of ourselves will keep us out of the pit. (p. 38, 39)
Long story short: if you find yourself desiring to become humble, there’s a good chance you’re on the wrong track. What we should desire is simply the truth. Humility is simply recognizing and living in a manner that is consistent with what is true about us. Desiring to become humble in itself is usually a sign that we are still trying to shield ourselves from truth.
Very profound. I had never considered that, and I’ve certainly spent a lot of time on the hamster-wheel of pridefully seeking humility. Thanks for sharing this advice.
This post reminds me of another blog which was talking about our desire to stop sinning can actually be motivated by our desire to appear strong in our own eyes – the sorrow we feel at having sinned being a form of hurt pride! Here, if you don’t mind, is the full quote:
I notice in myself that a big part of why I hate sinning is that it humbles me, shows me I’m not a righteous, self-sufficient wage-earner and reveals my desperate need for Jesus. So much of my hatred of sin is actually the flesh talking.
You can get the flesh to hate sin. And hate it a very great deal. But the flesh does not hate sin for the right reasons. The flesh hates sin because it leads to brokenness and dependency (or it ought to).
Therefore what can often sound like a very holy determination “never to sin again” is actually a determination never to need Jesus again, never to fall at His feet and confess our desperate depravity, never to have to plead His mercy. It can actually be code for ‘I never want to live by His grace, only by my righteousness.’
http://christthetruth.wordpress.com/2009/06/20/i-wish-i-never-sinned/
C. S. Lewis is at his very best in The Screwtape Letters, and on humility (chapter 14) he is particularly astute.
“My dear Wormwood,
… You must therefore conceal from the patient the true end of Humility. Let him think of it not as self-forgetfulness but as a certain kind of opinion (namely, a low opinion) of his own talents and character. Some talents, I gather, he really has. Fix in his mind the idea that humility consists in trying to believe those talents to be less valuable than he believes them to be. No doubt they are in fact less valuable than he believes, but that is not the point. The great thing is to make him value an opinion for some quality other than truth, thus introducing an element of dishonesty and make-believe into the heart of what otherwise threatens to become a virtue…. The Enemy wants him, in the end, to be so free from any bias in his own favour that he can rejoice in his own talents as frankly and gratefully as in his neighbour’s talents – or in a sunrise, an elephant, or a waterfall. He wants each man, in the long run, to be able to recognise all creatures (even himself) as glorious and excellent things. He wants to kill their animal self-love as soon as possible; but it is His long-term policy, I fear, to restore to them a new kind of self-love – a charity and gratitude for all selves, including their own; when they have really learned to love their neighbours as themselves, they will be allowed to love themselves as their neighbours.”
Yes, Kim!
er…per jack.
yes. love the screwtape letters. i’ll piggy back on them and say that unusually I found that false humility is the inverse of pride, where we lie to ourselves that we are not really good at something or deserving of something. this is not humility, but merely pride inverted through keeping up appearance, or as you said, it is perpetuating a lie.
also, deep pride in one area is usually a defense against deep insecurity in another area, both springing from not knowing (or deliberately avoiding) the truth about oneself.
There is a recent study that says that the success of a person’s ‘ministry’ is the degree of self-awareness one has…i.e. humility.
Is self-awareness a synonym of self-forgetfulness (eg in Lewis)?
might it be better to say that the humility coming from self-awareness is synonymous with not self-forgetfulness but self-knowing in God/Christ?
A distinctly Augustinian (and Pauline) definition, I’d say.
I really like the way you explained humility as a fruit of truth, not ambition.
That’ll preach.
Halden, you are (potentially) the loudest braying jackass in this sea of lemonade known as the Internets. Luckily you are also (potentially) the Kung fu applesmith of the theological blogosphere, last bastion of hope, and creator of zombies.
I am but your humble servant, mighty Valdenkor.
Ha ha Mighty V braying jackass in the sea of lemonade. good one.
But no..,. Halden has no gift for creating zombies.