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Proper 21

Philippians 2
2make my joy complete: be of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. 3Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility regard others as better than yourselves. 4Let each of you look not to your own interests, but to the interests of others. 5Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus, 6who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, 7but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, 8he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death— even death on a cross. 9Therefore God also highly exalted him and gave him the name that is above every name, 10so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bend, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

12Therefore, my beloved, just as you have always obeyed me, not only in my presence, but much more now in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling; 13for it is God who is at work in you, enabling you both to will and to work for his good pleasure.


This morning’s advantage goes to trivia buffs, fans of Brad Pitt and former Roman Catholics: What are the “seven deadly sins?”

Lust
Gluttony
Greed
Sloth
Wrath
Envy
Pride

Now, I’ve never been one for the sermon series, but it’s awfully tempting to spend seven weeks really getting into those sins. Luckily for you, sloth keeps me from doing it: It sounds like too much work to collect all those sins and talk about them week by week.

What about the opposite? Back in the Middle Ages, one of the most popular books was an ancient one called the "Contest of the Soul.” Written in the fifth century, the work described the epic contest between the seven deadly sins and the seven “heavenly” virtues. Suddenly we have two lists:

Lust Chastity
Gluttony Temperance
Greed Charity
Sloth Diligence
Wrath Patience
Envy Kindness
Pride Humility

At this point I expect the former Roman Catholics to say “wait a minute, Michael, didn’t St. Thomas Aquinas lift up the four cardinal virtues of justice, fortitude, prudence and temperance?” And I would say, of course, but at some point we have just too many lists going at once. And really I only want to talk about number seven on second list.

Put your hands up if you are humble.

People fall into that trap every time. Would the humble really put up their hands? In fact, they might, since the cardinal virtue of fortitude demands that we bravely claim our virtues at the risk of embarrassing ourselves. Well done, humble ones.

So what is humility? According to the Catholic Encyclopedia, humility “is that by which a man [or woman] has a modest estimate of his own worth, and submits himself [or herself] to others.” Now I don’t have to tell you that this runs contrary to every single trend in the world that surrounds us.

Somewhere back in the 1970’s educators decided that there was a connection between self-esteem and grades. If the children feel better about themselves, the theory goes, then they will do better in school. Suddenly the idea of correcting mistakes when out the window, because to correct a mistake could somehow damage fragile self-esteem. Of course I’m giving an oversimplification of the theory, but it was the beginning of a trend where ideas like “self-realization” and “self-acceptance” became much more important than self-criticism or having a realistic sense of self.

Luckily, researchers have largely discredited the self-esteem “movement.” In some ways, however, the damage is done because many continue to imagine that self-esteem is something fragile that needs protection rather than one more aspect of our personality that may or may not get in the way of having a realistic sense of self. When I supervise students for the ministry the first thing I have them do is draw up a list of the things that scare them about ministry or the things they know they don’t do well. This is where theological education begins.

***

Hidden in Paul’s letter this morning is an ancient hymn, a fragment of older poetry found inside one of the oldest letters of Paul. If you want to know what the very earliest followers of Jesus were singing or saying, it goes something like this:

Let the same mind be in you
that was in Christ Jesus, who,
though he was in the form of God,
did not regard equality with God
as something to be exploited,
but emptied himself,
taking the form of a slave,
being born in human likeness.
And being found in human form,
he humbled himself
and became obedient to the point of death
—even death on a cross.

The tune is long gone, although many hymn writers have formed and reformed these words into the hymns we now sing. But back on the day this letter arrived in Philippi, the first readers would have known this hymn and hummed along as they received Paul’s teaching. They had the tune.

One of the great misconceptions of the Christian life is that there is virtue in suffering. I checked the list, and suffering is not there. We know that as we follow “the way” of Jesus suffering may come, but we are not to welcome it and we are certainly not to pursue it. “Pick up your cross and follow me” did not mean go and find a cross, but rather this: should a cross arrive, do not hesitate to pick it up and know that Christ will be with you in your suffering.

The way of humility, the way the virtue is best expressed and found in the very first life of the ancient hymn: “Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus.” This is the goal of the Christian life: to understand the mind and meaning of Jesus and find it in you. And how can we know the mind of Jesus and cast his mind in our own? By telling the story:

Jesus loved small things: smallest seed, smallest coin, smallest child.
Jesus healed people with dirt and spittle, the most humble medicine of all.
Jesus was more worried about thieves to his left and to his right than he was for himself.
Jesus does things everyone should know but says “tell no one.”
Jesus washes hands and feet and every human heart.
Jesus touched wounds and invited others to touch his.

How is it that this Jesus, present at the very moment of creation, the eternal Word, the King of Kings, can empty himself to enter our world and live as we live? How could Creator become creature? How could he take flesh and walk among us? The only answer is humility. He gave up equality with God to live with us, to see what we see, to experience the full range of human experience including suffering and including death. He did this only for us, not for himself, but for us: so that God could know in the most intimate way what it means to be human.

More wisdom from the desert fathers and mothers: A brother asked Abba Tithoes, "Which way leads to humility?" The old man said, "The way of humility is this: self-control, prayer, and thinking yourself inferior to all creatures." (Ward, p. 237)

What if we truly imagined we were inferior to all creatures: how would we live? How would we receive the news that the population of the most common North America birds has dropped by half in the last forty years? Would we humble ourselves and listen to the birds? How would we hear the news that fully a third of all frog species are threatened with extinction? Would we listen to the frogs? Can we live in the way of humility and listen to the birds and the frogs and the tune of the earth?

The most ancient of words found in the Christian Bible is a hymn to humility, a hymn to the goal of the Christian life. What’s missing, of course, is the tune, the very tune that the believers in Philippi and Corinth and Rome and Ephesus would have called to mind as they read Paul’s words. The tune was lost in time. Or was it? We have the words, printed there on the page, and the tune – the tune is you and me. We are the tune that makes the words sing, we are the tune that allows God’s song to be heard, we are the tune that is one in mind with Christ Jesus. May you sing with courage and hope, in a loud voice, the song of God with all you meet. Amen.

posted by michael jacob kooiman @ 7:35 AM