When you are invited by anyone to a marriage feast, don’t sit in the best seat, since perhaps someone more honorable than you might be invited by him, and he who invited both of you would come and tell you, ‘Make room for this person.’ Then you would begin, with shame, to take the lowest place. But when you are invited, go and sit in the lowest place, so that when he who invited you comes, he may tell you, ‘Friend, move up higher.’ Then you will be honored in the presence of all who sit at the table with you. For “everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted.”
Humility is the absence of pride. We are taught to think pride is a good thing. But pride functions only when comparing others to yourself. Don’t base your self-worth on how you stack up to others. Instead, focus on yourself and how you can improve. William Temple puts the definition of humility succinctly, “Humility does not mean thinking less of yourself than of other people, nor does it mean having a low opinion of your own gifts. It means freedom from thinking about yourself at all.” A humble soul is emptied of all swelling thoughts of himself and has a low esteem of his duties.
Humility is not about deprivation. Humility is about more, not less. A humble heart gives more, has more room, sees more good, and is more generous. Humility does not bring itself down. It raises others up higher yet. A humble heart can hold up a chin. For a heart to do less would be to devalue everyone. Humility is about giving value, not taking it away.
Humility is not false. It doesn’t pretend to something it’s not. It doesn’t deny the truth about what is good. A star needs to shine fully bright to remain a star. A humble star knows that shining is what it does well and is generous with its light. Falsehoods in any form are not humility. They are a denial of the truth, that’s something else.
Pride is apt to breed in our holy things as the worm breeds in the sweetest fruit. Pride gets no pleasure out of having something, only out of having more of it than the next man. We say that people are proud of being rich, or clever, or good-looking, but they are not. They are proud of being richer, or cleverer, or better-looking than others. If everyone else became equally rich, or clever, or good-looking, there would be nothing to be proud about. It is the comparison that makes you proud: the pleasure of being above the rest. Once the element of competition has gone, pride has gone.
Pride is a prison; it can creep into a man’s heart and imprison the man from even a shadow of humility. Pride makes decisions based upon wants and desires of our human nature. It does not take into account the righteousness or the spiritual worth of the decision or choice but rather the earthly gain. It does not consider the ill effects of the desire upon those it will entail.
In their quest to be humble, people often confuse humility with false modesty. I think we’ve all been guilty of this at one time or another. When we are recognized for a great accomplishment, we act as though what we did really wasn’t that important or that big of a deal. For example, we spend many hours meticulously putting together an excellent presentation for work, and when people praise us we say, “Oh, it was just something I threw together.” We have a tendency to devalue what we’ve done under the pretense of humility. In fact, people often take on the guise of false humility for the sake of receiving more praise and adulation from others. You want people to think “Wow, he said he just threw that together! Imagine what he could do if he had spent hours on it.” When you do something well, don’t toot your own horn excessively, but truthfully acknowledge what you accomplished.
Prideful men want everyone to know when they do a charitable act. They drop the amount of money they donated to a cause into conversation. They post pictures of their service to Facebook, and they never miss a chance to remind someone they served of their generosity towards them. They are obviously doing service for the wrong reason: to stoke their ego and gain acclamation. Real charity is not self-seeking and is done solely for the benefit of others. Next time you do something nice; try keeping it completely to yourself. It’s a tough test of your manly humility.
We have undoubtedly crossed paths with those who were so proud that they oozed with false humility. Many religious leaders in the world today openly appear this way, as they wax eloquent on their televised programs.
It is nicely said, “A humble man can do great things with an uncommon perfection because he is no longer concerned about incidentals, like his own interests and his own reputation, and therefore he no longer needs to waste his efforts in defending them.
For a humble man is not afraid of failure. In fact, he is not afraid of anything, even of himself, since perfect humility implies perfect confidence in the power of God before Whom no other power has any meaning and for Whom there is no such thing as an obstacle. Humility is the surest sign of strength.”
No doubt, one will be naturally attracted to the charming character of a humble man. Moreover, humility reflects our sincere act to God. Hence, let’s swallow our pride and practice humility in our daily life.