Tag: humility

Never been a fashion icon nor with any desire to try that path. Gayle can dress me easily – all she needs to do is arrange what is in the top of a drawer as I pick the first thing every morning (tempted to make this a ‘no-comment’ post). Way back in time, 1996/7 I was meditating a lot on sack-cloth and sensed that one day I would need to add it to my great range of clothing… BTW one of my heroes Gustavo Gutiérrez once travelled in the USA and in one place his host noticed that each day he was wearing the same clothes and was evidently washing them each night. They bought him a new shirt which he gratefully received with the words ‘Thank you so much I know a brother back home who really needs a new shirt’.

Back in the 90s I used to run reasonable distances with a stop-watch (I still run now but am on the edge of ditching the stop-watch for a calendar, feeling good if I can complete 5kms the same day that I started) and I could still go back to the same part of the road when I ‘heard’, ‘it is time to get the sack cloth’. I managed to track some down and Kay (neighbour over the road) quickly put a make shift shirt and shorts together. My new wardrobe.

Within weeks there was a leadership conference for a certain movement (from memory almost 1000 leaders?). I was always due to attend and showed up, changed into the new wardrobe and joined in all the meetings. A number of questions were asked (understandably so) but I did not respond beyond – just felt the right thing to do. Without asking the host of the conference gave me the platform at the end of the conference.

It is time for new clothing, the clothing of repentance and humility is the clothing that we have to wear. We see walls that have been built but have to take responsibility for the building of the walls. We must go beyond our walls and will meet others on the ground of humility. Tonight the ‘train’ that brought us here has terminated and is not moving, we have to get out of the train of convention and find new transport to take us forward. Relationships for the sake of identity have to give way to relationships for the sake of territory.

That was the summary of what I brought.

Some time later I met with a couple who were talking to me about that evening and suddenly she had an outburst… (excuse the language) ‘They have bloody well started to move the scenery behind the train to give the appearance the train is still on the move’.

1998 – the date of the conference – to 2025 and a lot of water has gone under the bridge since then; probably if I revisited that ‘word’ I might well express it somewhat differently. But clothing is so important.

I had a woman in Chiswick, London come to me at the end of a meeting asking if I would pray for her and her work. She said she was a fashion designer. I did not reply with ‘you’ve come to the right person’, but with ‘you are in a field of work that is so ideal for a believer… clothing is a sign of the resurrection’. Paul, talking of the resurrection body described it like clothing and he said the one aspect regarding death was he did not want to appear naked. Clothing is not simply for warmth and modesty but to express who we are. I said to that woman if you can feel the pull of the resurrection you will design clothes that when there is a show models will want to wear your design for they will feel good about themselves.

Maybe we need a ‘revival’ in the fashion industry, with great designs… and some sack-cloth?

Humility is so necessary. It is the major protective clothing against the devouring work of the adversary:

And all of you must clothe yourselves with humility in your dealings with one another, for
“God opposes the proud
but gives grace to the humble.”
Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God, so that he may exalt you in due time. Cast all your anxiety on him, because he cares for you. Discipline yourselves; keep alert. Like a roaring lion your adversary the devil prowls around, looking for someone to devour (1 Peter 5:5-8).

But God gives all the more grace; therefore it says,
“God opposes the proud
but gives grace to the humble.”
Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you (Jas. 4:6-7).

I say to everyone among you not to think of yourself more highly than you ought to think but to think with sober judgment (Rom. 12:3)… For if those who are nothing think they are something, they deceive themselves (Gal. 6:3).

The sack cloth is no longer in the wardrobe, but the clothing of humility should not be discarded, and we must avoid moving the background scenery to give an impression of movement.

God is a short word but what we fill the word with makes a huge difference. Is ‘Allah’ God is a strange question for Allah means ‘God’. The bigger issue is whether my God is truly the God of Israel and the Father of our Lord Jesus, or in simpler and very relevant language – is my God a Christlike God? None of us have a perfect vision / understanding of God, for it is when ‘he is revealed, we will be like him, for we will see him as he is’ (1 John 3:2). There is a ‘test’ we can apply (oooooffff it is a tough one) we are more like God the clearer I see God / Jesus. So I have a way to go!

What words do you immediately associate with God (as revealed in Jesus). Maybe all-powerful, loving, accepting, harsh, tough… One of the words I associate with God is that of humility. Jesus being in the form of God (NOT IN SPITE OF) humbled himself – Jesus takes the God path. In a parable he suggests that in the age to come the one throwing the party will get up from the table and serve; while alive he gave us the instruction not to lord it over others.

Genesis and the tower of Babel (same word as Babylon) presents a humanity on a different path to the God-path. ‘We will be great’ being the banner.

Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves; otherwise we shall be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth.” (Genesis 11:4).

The next verse is full of irony. A tower that truly reached heaven would be visible to the one who inhabits heaven, but we read that the God who can see all things came down to see the tower – obviously so did not reach heaven!!

Humility is the cloak of invisibility to the Slanderer; it is deeply set in the Lord’s prayer with the request that we be not led into temptation.

Big years globally lie ahead. Many rough waters to be traversed; many times the Lord will come down to see. While reading Genesis I have also been reading Matthew and in chapter 25 we might well have a reflection on the nations in the immediate post-70 AD/CE scenario but the application probably goes beyond that and it is expressed as a judgement of the nations. In separating the goats from the sheep the response was the same from the two separate groups:

Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry and gave you food or thirsty and gave you something to drink? And when was it that we saw you a stranger and welcomed you or naked and gave you clothing? And when was it that we saw you sick or in prison and visited you?’
Then they also will answer, ‘Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison and did not take care of you?’ (Matt. 25: 37-39, 44).

How you treated / reacted to the least of those that Jesus identifies as ‘family’ was the response.

Humility. I have been too close to movements that have thought they are the movement that will change the world. No, I don’t think so… I should put that stronger – no you are not! If God has given us something we should live and act as if the world will be deeply impoverished (oppressed) if we do not fulfil what has been entrusted to us, but we also realise that it might be the smallest contribution to the future. I (probably!!) have less years left than I have already had but be they few or many I aspire that humility will be part of my clothing and there will be no attempt at, or participation in, building a tower that reaches heaven… but if I have ‘two coins’ that I will knowingly or even accidentally throw them so that the impressive edifices come down.