Walk humbly - 31 July 2015

Walk humbly is the third requirement, says the Prophet Micah. What does the Lord require of you but to do justice, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with God. While I still wonder what walking with God actually means, it does seem to be clear that really walking humbly in the world is in one way or another walking with God – I mean, even if you’re an atheist or don’t know what you are. Walking arrogantly, on the other hand, or as the proprietor of all we survey, or as one of the world’s bullies, however religious we may believe we are, is not walking with God. Moreover, I rather suspect that someone who really walks humbly will tend to do justice and to love mercy. Humility, however, as we know, is a very tricky thing. ‘umbleness, Uriah Heep called it in David Copperfield. C S Lewis wrote that humility is not thinking less of yourself – it is thinking of yourself less. That may be one of the keys to it. You can’t be humble if you’re preoccupied with yourself – even if, like Uriah Heep the preoccupation is about how ‘umble you are. Perhaps there are three things to say, and the first follows from C S Lewis’s insight. Thinking of yourself less… One of the evident gifts of contemplative life and prayer is the steady retreat of the ego. This ego is the self which is principally concerned with itself – the ways in which I think I am perceived by others. I am constantly aware of what I believe is my reputation, or my outward appearance, my curriculum vitae (however fictitious). I am constantly checking my safety, my prospects, my plans and agendas, my family which is a credit to me… and the list goes on for ever. Behind and below and beyond all this is the self God sees and knows and loves, and created, the true self -- and in the silence and stillness we practise it is as though it is able steadily to emerge. That self is humble and grateful. Above all, in this process of grace, an inhabitant of 2015 might say, we get over ourselves. Walking humbly with God means an end to defending and promoting ourselves. The second point about humility is that it is a gift. It is not something we can ever generate within ourselves. The gift is from God, and it implies our willingness to be still and receive it cordially and gratefully. It is expressed beautifully in the opening verses of Psalm 42, picturing the vulnerable, spindly-legged deer coming to drink at the river: As the deer thirsts for water, so I yearn for you, my God… It is another preoccupation than myself. And thirdly, this gift of humility seems to be more easily received in our later years. Of course, if there was some way of finding out, we might well discover that plenty of younger adults do in fact have humble hearts – but of necessity in the worlds they inhabit they are obliged to exercise a sort of shadow side of proud achievement or ambition, simply in order to get things done as expected. It may come as a huge relief to find one day that we don’t have to do that anymore.