Choosing Humility

Exposition:

In 1953, Edmond Hillary and Tenzing Norgay became the first people to successfully reach the summit of Mount Everest.  [SLIDE]. Upon returning home to New Zealand, Hillary was immediately bombarded with fame and prestige for what he’d been able to accomplish.  Later that year he was Knighted by the by the Queen of England.  He was appointed as New Zealand’s Highest commissioner to India, Nepal and Bangladesh…and was admitted to the Order of Garter which is is the third highest award given out in the U.K.  (of which there are only 24 members).

With his newfound fame and influence, Edmond Hillary went on to establish the Himalayan Trust, building schools, hospitals, and airfields as a way to give back to the Himalayan people who had contributed so much to his fame.

PAUSE

But there is a particularly interesting story about him that highlights more about his character than any one of the awards he won, societies he established, or the fame of his success.

During one of his trips back to the Himalayas, a group a climbers preparing for the ascent up to Everest spotted him, and recognizing who he was, scrambled together to get a picture with him! They wanted proof that they had met the first man to climb Everest!  They gave him an ice pick to hold during the picture to look the part.  But before they snapped the photo, another climber walked by and saw that Hillary wasn’t holding the pick and, not knowing who he was, came over and corrected him saying, “Excuse me, that’s not how you hold an ice pick.  Let me show you.”  Everyone else almost held their breath waiting for Hillary to respond…and yet Hillary merely thanked the man and went on with the picture!  

Now I’m willing to bet that even as I tell that story, some of you just feel uncomfortable for the man who corrected him, right?!  You want to cringe at it!  But there is something very attractive about Hillary’s response, isn’t there? Something almost liberating in the way that he’s able to just roll with whatever that guy said and move right along, right?  See the other thing that Sir Edmund Hillary is regularly recognized for is his unusual display of humility.

And yet, humility itself remains this elusive idea that we can’t quite pinpoint…except to know when other people aren’t humble!  So I guess the question for us is, ‘What is humility?’ And it’s a phenomenally important question for us in the season we now find ourselves in as a church.

[EXPAND]

And as I have been praying and preparing for, not only today, but the next many years together, I have been gripped by this seemingly forgotten virtue.

Dr. John Dickson from University of Sydney spent years studying the concept of humility from a historical perspective offers this definition of humility: The noble choice to forgo your status, deploy your resources or use your influence for the good of others before yourself.  That is a pretty interesting definition, isn’t it?  That humility is a noble choice…to do what?  1.  Forgo your status…meaning you are willing to give up the opportunities your status affords you…. so that you can use YOUR resources—that is your time, money, abilities, any other tangible thing you have, OR even the influence you have because of your status…and use all of these things FOR THE GOOD OF OTHERS before you use them for the good of yourself.

Take a second to think about that.

It’s a little intense, isn’t it?

And immediately, most of us will have some problems with this definition, right? Something inside of each one of us hears that and we just have this sense that it’s just a bit too idyllic, right?  That if that really is what humility is, then it’s asking a little too much for it to be of any use in real life.

And yet before we think of humility as always being some grand gesture of self sacrifice, we need to consider that most of the time, humility is far more likely to be completely unnoticed by anyone else.

C.S. Lewis, the famed literary critic, author, and philosopher shared that when you do meet a person who is truly humble, you don’t think about their humility…you just think you’ve met a nice person who is has a real interest in you…they’re not even thinking about humility… they’re not thinking of themselves at all.

Think back for a moment about the story of Sir Edmund Hillary and his response to a naive climber who didn’t recognize him for who he was…I think the reason that story is such a fantastic example of humility is because of how ordinary the situation is, right?

I mean, how easy would it have been for Sir Edmund Hillary to just make one quick comment to put this guy in his place, right?! No one would have thought of him as arrogant. This moment would probably have gone completely unremembered like the countless number of stories we’ve never heard about someone who did not respond in humility.

And yet what’s interesting is that because of his humble response, this ordinary moment of Hillary’s life, has been remembered as one of the defining examples of his character.

So I really like this definition of humility. I think it's a helpful framework for us to use in thinking about humility in everyday circumstances because it is in every day circumstances that we will relentlessly be bombarded with the temptation to focus on ourselves, our preferences, and what one author called, “the cult of ‘me-ism’.  

And just for a moment, I want us to feel how vital it is for us to get this as the bedrock ethic of our church. EXPAND

And so here’s how we’re going to use our time this morning.  

We’re going to look at what is probably the most profound example of humility in the bible. In the book of Philippians, Paul, the author, shows us three things about humility.

He shows us what humility requires

what humility does,

and what humility looks like.

So if you have a bible with you, you can open up to Philippians, chapter 2…and we’re going to look at the first eleven verses this morning.  Let me read the text, I’ll pray, and then we’ll get started.

Pray

Philippians 2:1–11 (CSB)

1 If, then, there is any encouragement in Christ, if any consolation of love, if any fellowship with the Spirit, if any affection and mercy, 2 make my joy complete by thinking the same way, having the same love, united in spirit, intent on one purpose. 3 Do nothing out of selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility consider others as more important than yourselves. 4 Everyone should look not to his own interests, but rather to the interests of others.

5 Adopt the same attitude as that of Christ Jesus, 6 who, existing in the form of God, did not consider equality with God as something to be exploited. 7 Instead he emptied himself by assuming the form of a servant, taking on the likeness of humanity. And when he had come as a man, 8 he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death—even to death on a cross. 9 For this reason God highly exalted him and gave him the name that is above every name, 10 so that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow—in heaven and on earth and under the earth—11 and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

Rising Action:

Alright, let’s get started.  Paul is writing to a church in the city of Philippi, a wealthy port city of the Roman empire.

He’s written a letter to them because he’s got to deal with a few problems they’re really struggling as a community…people in the church are fighting…refusing to work with each other…and Paul’s got to address this because if they can’t figure things out, it looks like everything’s gonna fall apart. And so Paul spends a lot of this letter talking about unity.

And he starts this way—look with me at vv. 1 (Phil. 2:1-2).

Philippians 2:1–2 CSB

1 If, then, there is any encouragement in Christ, if any consolation of love, if any fellowship with the Spirit, if any affection and mercy, 2 make my joy complete by thinking the same way, having the same love, united in spirit, intent on one purpose.

And what he’s getting at here is this idea of unity within their community.  But then he goes on to explain what they need to do in order to get to this kind of unity.  And it’s in this context, as Paul is talking about unity that he launches into this profound explanation of humility. And the starts be talking about what humility requires.

What Humility Requires:

Look what he says in the first half of v. 3, (Phil. 2:3)

Philippians 2:3 (CSB)

3 Do nothing out of selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility consider others as more important than yourselves.

This is what humility requires of us—that we give up ‘selfish ambition’ and ‘conceit’. Now we don’t often use words like that today, so what’s Paul talking about here?

Both these words are actually pretty rare for Paul to use…but a lot of people in Paul’s day were using them…and what’s interesting is that they were almost exclusively used to describe political figures! Basically, the idea is that they’d do something with ulterior motives…you know, like manipulating things so they works out in their favor. This is selfish ambition.  It’s this this drive…to do something that ultimately benefits you! Even if it doesn’t look like it on the surface! It’s good for your career…your connections…your professional goals.

But if we’re honest, this lives in all of us…the problem is that it’s a little more covert than we realize…it’s subtle, right? It’s those seemingly innocent statements that don’t directly throw someone else under the buss…but if your boss actually knew it was you and not your coworker who did a majority of the work…then it might play out in your favor.

I’ll tell you how this works out in my life at home…Courtney and I have 3 kids.  And I absolutely love bing a dad.  Love it.  But one of the things that happens when you have kids is that the idea of free-time becomes this vague memory of something you used to have!  And so spending time even with close friends just takes on a bit more complexity! Any way…if I want to take an evening to go hang out with some of my guy friends…I very rarely assume that Courtney wants me to take time to do that (even though she’s WONDERFUL)! And so what happens is that I become (for a few hours) an AWESOME husband.  Trash gets taken out…every diaper gets changed without her even asking…the bathroom is clean.  Dishes done. Dinner is getting ready.  I’m awesome.  And then I drop the bomb.  ‘Would you mind if I head out to spend some time with Aaron tonight, sweetheart?’  See what becomes pretty clear is that I did NOT do all of these things because I love my wife…but because I believe that if I do them, then she’ll pretty much have to let me go!

This is selfish ambition.  It’s doing what I need to do, in order to manipulate you to get what I want!  And the scary thing about this is that we don’t just do this to strangers or people who don’t really know, right! I mean that’s me with my wife…and if shows up there, how much more is it going to show up with people I don’t know all?

Selfish ambition will show up in this church. We would be foolish to think that we automatically check it at the door when we walk into this building or into our Lifegroups. The messed up part about being messed up people is that we’re gonna try to manipulate each other.

You might be cool with some things changing today or over the next couple of months…but happens a year from now…when you’re ready to get back to what it used to be like. See what I mean? [EXPAND]

What Paul is getting across here is that humility requires we give up selfish ambition…it other words, humility requires we give up living only for ourselves…only for OUR goals…only for OUR good…only for OUR preferences. This is what humility requires! That we give up living only for ourselves…but that’s not all because Paul goes on to tell us what does humility does!

What Humility Does:

Look with me at the second half of v. 3, (Phil. 2:3-4)

Philippians 2:3–4 CSB

3 Do nothing out of selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility consider others as more important than yourselves. 4 Everyone should look not to his own interests, but rather to the interests of others.

And this is where Paul really starts to turn up the heat.

He says humility compels us to look beyond ourselves and see the issues…experiences…and difficulties that other people face.

Friends humility is not so much posture, or even just a mindset, as it is a call to action! that we cannot just think about the things that directly affect us…but humility compels us to be concerned with what affects people around us too! It means that we seek to understand the experiences of other people…experiences that might be different from what we’re used to…that might even make us feel uncomfortable. He says, “…look not only to your own interests…but also to the interests of others…

And to do that will take hard work on our end. It means we can’t just be listening to the voices that we already agree with, but should be open to hearing the perspective of people that we don’t agree with. That means you watch Fox and Listen to NPR….It will make us feel uncomfortable. It will reveal prejudice. It will expose ignorance…it will be painful. And as if it wasn’t hard enough, Paul is not just talking about doing this for people we already care about, but even for people we don’t yet know! Humility does the hard work of trying to understand where other people are coming from! And friends, we live in a world that will rarely take the time to do this.

We live in a world of sound bites and snap judgments…because that is easier to deal with than conversation.

And yet, humility does more than just looking at the interests of others, remember how Paul started this section! Look back with me at v. 3, “…but in humility count others more significant than yourselves.”

Climax:

Friends, that means the issues my Lifegroup members are facing cannot be out of sight, out of mind…they are my issues. As followers of Jesus, humility is a call to action to give up living for only for ourselves and we are called to step into the issues of my community!

And when we start to put the pieces together here of what Paul has been saying, what we see is that he is ultimately driving us to the understand the importance of what humility requires, and what humility does!—that it requires the radical idea we no longer live only for ourselves…and that it compels us to do the hard work of walking in someone else’s shoes! Ultimately what Paul is saying in this passage this morning is, In community, followers of Jesus choose humility! In community, choose humility. This is what Paul wants us to walk away thinking about this morning.

Imagine what this place would look like…

Falling Action:

And yet, there is something about this idea of humility and the way Paul talks about it that just seems a little hard to believe, isn’t there? If we’re honest with ourselves here, humility sounds like a good thing…and we might even agree that in some cases, like with the story of Sir Edmund Hillary, humility can be beautiful. But I guarantee that every single one of us, if we’re not thinking about it right now, will eventually start playing out scenarios in our mind about what Paul says humility requires and what humility does and it just seems like absurd response in our world today. And again, if we’re honest, many of us don’t really believe that humility actually works in the real world…maybe not even in the church...

Why should we look out for someone else…I don’t trust any one to look out for me…And so what we believe instead is that we just need to look out for number one…we need to look out for ourselves…Why? Because nobody else is gonna to do it. We don’t believe we can afford to be humble. And so humility sounds nice…looks like a good gesture sometimes—but when push comes to shove, we need to take care of ourselves…and our interests.

Friends, at the end of the day, we don’t think we can afford to give up living for ourselves because what we’re able to do with our resources…that’s all we’ve got! We can’t afford to give up our status…because in our minds, it’s our status that makes us valuable! We can’t give away our resources…we can’t give away our influence …those are the only thing that will truly make us great. And so to give these things up, is really to give up everything we’ve worked for…everything we believe we’ve earned…

Friends, choosing humility will inevitably be an act of aggression against ourselves. To choose humility will cause us to sacrifice what we have convinced ourselves makes us great. And so even in the most mundane moments of everyday life…it feels like humility asks of us more than we can give.

Gospel:

But when you keep reading in our text this morning, it’s almost like Paul anticipates all of this push back, he immediately reminds us of the story of the Gospel. After showing us what humility requires and what humility does, Paul shows us exactly what humility looks like. Look with me starting at v. 5, “Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.”

He reminds us that in the Gospel, it’s Jesus who first gave up his status as he emptied himself of all of what we would seen as valuable and though he was the Creator of all things, he became a servant! That it’s in the Gospel that Jesus did not live for himself, but he lived for us, he lived the life we should have, but couldn’t live! Paul reminds us that as Jesus stepped down as a human…that he first stepped into our shoes. It’s in the Gospel that Jesus takes on our problems…he takes our our issues…friends he takes on our sin…and Paul reminds us that it was Jesus who first humbled himself for us…so that He could experience the most shameful death…death on a cross. It’s the gospel that reminds us that Jesus humbled himself FOR US…dying IN OUR PLACE, FOR OUR SIN. Taking on the judgement that we deserve in our pride and rebellion against God.

And when he died our death, he was raised to back to life showing that being truly humble does not mean being defeated…and with His life comes the promise of a new life for anyone who trusts the humble work of Jesus on the cross! See Paul says here that followers of Jesus can choose humility because Jesus first became humble for us. And so to follow Jesus, means to be humble like Jesus! Because humility itself is a picture of the Gospel itself!

You see, in true humility, we are actually liberated from the endless pursuit of desperately trying to find our value, our worth, and our identity in the the small amount of influence and treasure we’re able to accumulate up for ourselves!

Resolution:

And what’s most amazing, is that Jesus’ humility results in his Triumph and his exaltation. See, it is his Humility that ultimately shows his true greatness. Look with me at v. 9, “Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”

Friends, this morning, I can’t tell you what humility will look like for you. I can’t give a step by step guide on how to become more humble. But what Paul reminds us here is that in community, choose humility. Choose humility. It takes great patience just in the ordinary situations of life to respond in humility…it means we have to remind ourselves of the Gospel over and over again…that Jesus first responded to us in humility. That Jesus first gave up HIS status for our good. And he sends us out as people who are to do the same. Let’s pray.