"The Place of Humility" | The Rev. Heidi Thorsen | March 28, 2021 (Palm Sunday)

Palm Sunday, Year B

John 12:12-16 | Phil 2:5-11 | Mark 15:1-37

Title: The Place of Humility

On this Palm Sunday, I am thinking about humility.

The word appears in our reading today from Paul’s Letter to the Philippians. In this passage, which is widely thought to be a hymn of the early church, Paul lifts up Jesus as an example of humility. Paul writes about how Jesus did not regard himself an equal with God, about how Jesus took on the form of a slave, about how Jesus was born into human likeness, and about how Jesus “humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death - even death on a cross.” Paul indicates that this humility is something that we ought to aspire to, as he introduces this hymn with these words: “Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus.”

What does it mean for us to be humble today?

I am immediately reminded of what a twelve year old version of myself thought about humility. As a young person, I had a general understanding that humility was something to aspire to. And, at the same time, I wanted to be well liked. I remember seeking approval through many of the usual avenues - success at schoolwork, participation in sports, and of course trying to make friends.

I grew up during the heyday of disposable cameras - those small yellow cardboard apparatuses that could be purchased at a local drug store, where you also get your photos developed. It was somewhat of a tradition to bring one of those yellow cameras to class on the last day of school. I remember taking photos of myself and all my friends, as if taking a group photo would somehow solidify the friendships that had formed with stops and starts throughout the year.

I must have been satisfied when I walked away from school that day in elementary school. But weeks later, after recovering the footage from the local drug store, I was sorely disappointed. In one of those highly anticipated group photos, with everyone bunched together smiling with their arms around each other, I found myself there in the middle - eyes half shut, mouth half smiling, shoulders hunched in one of those slightly off-moment poses that we have completely eradicated, in the era of smartphones. There I was, in the midst of a group of young people I regarded as fun and smart and popular. There I was, looking (to my mind) absolutely off-kilter and foolish.

For some reason I latched onto this photo, because I remember keeping it for years. I used to look at it with feelings of embarrassment, or study it as a teenager when I felt grumpy or lonely or angsty, as teenagers are prone to feeling. At some point I had an ingenious idea for how to integrate this photo into my life in a different way. I tacked that very photo to a bulletin board in my room, taping underneath it a set of letters that I meticulously cut out of construction paper: H-U-M-I-L-I-T-Y. Humility. I told myself that I would remember to be humble whenever I walked past that bulletin board, and looked at that photo. It also had the added benefit of making me look very virtuous to my sister, who shared the room with me, and any other family members who passed by.

What do I conclude about myself from this awkward teenage story? First, I conclude that I was a very moralizing child. And second, I conclude that I had no idea about what true humility looks like. For me as a teenager, humility was some strange blend of self-abnegation and self-aggrandizement. Humility involved pinning a less than perfect image of myself to the wall, essentially bringing myself low for the sake of making myself seem holier than everyone around me. That is a pretty messed up version of humility. But then we are still left with the question: what does true humility look like?

Dr. Anna Katharina Schaffner, a scholar who writes about the history of psychology, describes humility in this way. She writes:

“At first sight, the ancient virtue of humility is not a particularly appealing one. Deriving from the word humus (earth), it appears to clash with our current valuation of self-worth and self-realization. But humility has nothing to do with meekness or weakness. And neither does it mean being self-effacing or submissive. Humility is an attitude of spiritual modesty that comes from understanding our place in the larger order of things. It entails not taking our desires, successes, or failings too seriously” (Schaffner, “What is Humility?” web).

A teenage version of myself, let alone the person I have grown into, has much to learn from this more mature definition of humility. By this definition, humility is a kind of Goldilocks virtue. It’s a matter of understanding our size and place in the order of things - not making ourselves out to be too big, or too small, but finding that space in the middle. That sense of self that is just right.

Schaffner’s definition resonates with my understanding of humility, as embodied in Jesus Christ. Jesus, after all, understood his place in the grand scheme of things - he understood his place in God’s plan for salvation. Jesus understood that he could not pass up the cup of suffering, as we read in the Gospel of John last week. But Jesus also understood that suffering was not his only role - as we see Jesus, in our reading for Palm Sunday, entering Jerusalem in a spirit of celebration, as the crowds wave palms and shout “Hosanna!” We might point to the fact that Jesus rode a donkey, rather than a horse or some more impressive animal, as an example of Christ’s humility. And yet it’s also important to remember that Jesus doesn’t shy away from recognition in this moment. Humility doesn’t entail perpetual sackcloth and ashes, or self-imposed obscurity. Instead, Jesus allows himself to be honored and adored by the people during this procession, because Jesus recognizes his place in the story. Jesus recognizes the hope that he represents to so many people longing for a messiah.

And so, I see the story of the passion as a perfect example of the kind of humility Schaffner describes - it is a story in which Jesus lowers himself, without diminishing himself. It is a story about knowing and living out one’s place in the universe. And yet Schaffner has a different take on the influence of Christianity on our understanding of humility. She writes, almost as an aside in her article, “Christian humility is linked to self-abnegation, shame, and sin and may therefore not be to everyone’s taste.”

As much as I want to argue with Schaffner there, I also think she has a point. Sometimes, in our desire to live as Jesus lived, we Christians over-emphasize the suffering - the self-lowering. We Christians have made humility all about self-denial, when that is only one half of the puzzle; only one half of “the mind that was in Christ Jesus.” Let’s take another look at today’s passage from the Letter to the Phillippians.

Yes, the first half of that ancient hymn describing the passion of Jesus Christ is about self-lowering. Jesus lowers himself, empties himself, dedicates himself to a cause that is bigger than his own life. Even the word for humility that is used here, the Greek verb ταπεινόω, means to “to lower,” to “make low.” This is not the humus, meaning earth, that we get from the Latin to make our English word “humility.” Looking at just these initial verses, it’s no surprise that Christians have taken scripture and fixated on self-denial, self-emptying, as the epitome of humility.

And yet the passage doesn’t stop there. Through that process of self-emptying, Jesus was exalted “above every name,” the passage says, “so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bend, in heaven and on earth and under the earth.” In other words, the kind of humility that Jesus embodied is not just about self-denial. There is a part of it that is about self-actualization - about Jesus living into his name, living into his calling. If we are to cultivate in ourselves the same mind that was in Christ Jesus, we can’t stop at self-denial. We have to move on to self-actualization - to self-love - to becoming the people that God intended us to be.

When I say “self-actualization” and “self-love” I don’t mean to defer to a kind of superficial, social media, trendy spirituality - like the kind that Rev. Peter Sipple examined in his sermon last week. Instead, I truly believe that Christianity is the way to finding our place in the scope of the universe. We are important, but the universe does not revolve around us. Our lives are a small piece of a cosmic patchwork, and yet God sees us individually - and knows us personally - and loves us completely. Our faith tradition is full of little reminders that help us find that place of humility, that place in the middle where we are most fully ourselves. When we stray too far into self-importance, we remember the words of scripture that we say at the beginning of Lent, “Remember you are dust, and to dust you shall return.” When we lose our sense of self, and fear that we are unworthy and unlovable, we remember the words of this prayer from the Psalms, “Keep me, O Lord, as the apple of your eye; hide me under the shadow of your wings.” Jesus continually calls us back to the center - to that place of humility where we are both empty and full. To that place where we are at home in creation, connected, porous, and free.

Today we begin the journey of Holy Week. I think it’s an important time to think about humility, as we try to understand our place in the story that is about to unfold. We are not Jesus, but we follow him closely. Sometimes we find ourselves in the place of the crowds in Jerusalem, waving palms and inviting Jesus into our city and into our hearts. Sometimes we are the disciples, gathered around the table with Jesus. Sometimes we are the crowd, shouting “crucify him, crucify him!” Sometimes we are Simon of Cyrene, carrying the cross of Jesus for another. Sometimes we are Peter, denying that we ever knew Jesus at all. Sometimes we are Jesus’ mother weeping at the foot of the cross. Sometimes we are Mary Magdalene, alone in the garden, not even knowing how amazingly her life is about to change when Jesus, risen, calls her name.

Humility calls us to understand our place in the world, and humility calls us to understand our place in this story. We are not Jesus. We are not our own saviors. But neither are we the scum of the earth. We are flawed enough that we need a savior. But we are holy enough that God thought it a worthy cause to enter into our very existence, sending Jesus to become flesh and live among us.

Holy Week can sometimes feel like a roller coaster of highs and lows - just as life can feel like a roller coaster of highs and lows. My prayer this week is that God would continue to draw us back to the center - to that place where we have an honest understanding of our imperfections and our gifts. To that place in the center where we are most open to God, and to other people. I pray that God would guide our feet on that narrow path between self-doubt and pride. Because that narrow path, the path of humility, is the place where we can be ourselves completely. It is the path of our salvation. Amen.

Works Referenced:

Anna Katharina Schaffner, “What is Humility? The Power of Humility with 5 Practical Exercises,” PositiviePsychology.com, 16 Nov. 2020, accessed 27 March 2021 <https://positivepsychology.com/humility/>.