Pulling from both sides: Humility and Pride

There's a well known phrase which describes the futility of a life lived in solitude - "no man is an island". I suppose there are numerous ways to interpret this though - man needs community to survive or find his meaning; man cannot fulfil his ambitions or enjoy life's fruit without interacting with others; or simply that selfishness is not only wrong, but foolish. At the core of much of human tradition and culture, however, is something virtually opposite to this - "I can do it myself".

We live in a culture that lives with the consequences of an individualised, consumerist worldview - what's right for you isn't necessarily right for me; I am what I consume; I know best - that proves that community doesn't work unless we raise our eyes beyond our own immediate surroundings and needs, look to the needs of others, look to reach out and connect with other human beings, and accept the help of others when it's there. In Britain we supposedly live within the most 'tolerant' society in the world. If tolerance is merely accepting the existence of other cultures and world views, but not having anything to do with them, and remaining as tribal and closed minded as we always were, then I'm not sure what we gain, except a fragmented society.

A lot of us find accepting help, or criticism (however constructive), or advice a strangely difficult thing to go through: there's this sense that it displays weakness, and that weakness is wrong, shows us up to be something we don't want to be. Or it shows that we didn't know best after all. The mad rush that encapsulates most of modern living - anger vented at missing the 'one every 2 minutes' tube trains, snatching lunch in front of the laptop, barely time to take onboard the information needed to make an important decision, yet making it anyway, a lack of quality time with immediate family let alone more distant relatives - it all seems to come from this sense that to stop and contemplate, or sit back and reflect, is somehow a second rate activity.

Perhaps I'm painting a slightly extreme picture. But all of the above points towards a society that is built on pride. Sometimes, like on programmes likes The Apprentice, that pride, or confidence in the self, is a conscious, deliberate choice that is made, explicitly sold as a virtue that allows one to climb the ladder of life and success. For others, this pride is less obvious, and permeates more of our existence than we realise, because we don't have time to stop and think about it - we cling onto 'my rights', 'my time', 'my life'.

The opposite of pride is humility, to be humble. Humility says "I can't! I need help: I don't know how life is supposed to be lived best. All my striving and straining has come to nothing." It's an admission that discovering life's true joys lies outside of the ability of humans to discern, let alone live out, without some sort of assistance.

How wonderful, how humbling, to know that this is where God wants us to be. He alone knows how life is supposed to be led, and how community works best. At the centre is selflessness, sacrifice, the abandoning of our own rights and expectations, and instead focusing our efforts on others' needs, that noone might be left out. The strong help the weak, and the weak teach the strong that its ok to be weak. But before all of this, comes the realisation that we have the perfect model for humility - Jesus, the Word become flesh, who chose to put aside his majesty and eternal rights, to become one of us, and ultimately to die on a cross for us, having identified with us in weakness.

The key that unlocks humility and surrender (the letting go of our 'rights') is the grace that God so richly provides, both in sending His Son to provide eternal hope to humanity, and in giving us the Holy Spirit, who lives in those who seek to follow Jesus, and who works to make us more like Him. But the problem of pride can still lay a trap for us - we still think that this process starts and ends with us. We recognise the change of direction in our lives, but still insist on carrying on in our own strength.

Yet God calls us to find our strength in Him. Ephesians 6:10 calls us to "be strong in the Lord and in His mighty power," not in our own abilities. And ultimately it's a wonderful promise - God not only calls us into this way of life, which looks so impossible (become like Jesus?!), but insists that we remain reliant on Him, the one who created the entire universe, to see it through to the end.

Both pride and humility both imply giving oneself a position relative to others. The difference between humility and piety is that the former seeks no recognition for its sacrifices and service, whereas the latter glories in its achievements, and is merely a religious form of pride. Humility for some is to accept that our role in this new life may be the equivalent of the receptionist, rather than the CEO in God's Kingdom: the person who serves the tea at the end of the service, rather than the one giving the stirring sermon from the front. Even if we don't want to be in the limelight (for whatever reason), we are tempted to look at ourselves and our role in God's plan through proud eyes - either explicitly thinking of ourselves as more important than others, or implicitly by holding onto what we see as our rights, before reaching out to the needs of others.

So I'd call you now to examine yourself for pride - ask God to reveal where it exists, and if you feel brave, ask Him to remove it from you. If you feel beaten down by the pressures and anxieties of this life, then step back and remind yourself that it is God who richly provides everything we need to achieve what He calls us to achieve, and does not ask us to walk alone.

Philippians 2:5-7

Your attitude should be the same as Christ Jesus:

Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped,

But made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness.

Lots to give thanks for

I wrote this blog almost 3 months ago (it's now actually November), but never got around to publishing it. It's interesting to look back on my writing and see what has changed - for me, it's even more to give thanks for, in terms of improved health, and a certain lady saying yes the question no guy wants to ask more than once...

"Recently, I was reminded of the need to give thanks. For me, personally, there have been few things to really complain about in the last couple of years: a good degree (and Masters), the opportunity to go travelling (and therefore escape the job that I got to earn the money to go), studying and living with some awesome guys in Africa for 4 months last year, and now, a good job in London, a wonderful girlfriend (got to mention her or there'll be trouble), a great flat, and church, and friends. It hasn't all been easy, but really, I'm doing better than most.

Yet how often do I give thanks, and to who do I give thanks when I remember it? I have a long list of people who deserve thanks for all the opportunities I've had: my parents and family, friends, girlfriend (two mentions!), even my tutors at university, the research department in Stellenbosch, and many more I've forgotten (sorry). I suppose, in a strange way, I should thank the Civil Service for giving me a job, although I guess I have a more general feeling of thankfulness for that situation, rather than being able to target a particular person.

And yet there are plenty of events that occur in our lives, which we don't see coming at all. Events totally out of our control, but which impact deeply on our lives, either directly, or indirectly through their effects on those around us. Getting glandular fever comes into this category - one week I was feeling great, getting settled into my job, finding a really good rhythm, and looking at how to get involved in more things with church, or in the community, and the next I'm barely able to stay awake. 4 months on, things have improved, but I guess my best laid plans have been laid low for a while: usually asleep by 10 at the latest, unable to make more than 2 days in the office in a week without feeling exhausted (thank God for working from home), declining social invitations left right and centre, unable to play basketball, go to the gym, or make the most of the glorious English weather - ok I made the last one up.

How do we react to these situations and those like it? When the foundations we leant so heavily on fall away, do we choose that moment to be thankful? I find it far too easy to focus in on the problem, which only serves to skew my perspective, unable to see the bigger picture. And yet I know there are plenty of people, millions, in far worse situations than me.

The apostle Paul was a man who knew a wide range of human experiences, some good and some bad. He knew what it felt like to have great power and authority, to be struck blind, listened to and ignored, looked after and abused, stoned and left for dead, shipwrecked and almost drowned, in prison and free, given great visions of the future and stuck with a thorn in the flesh that he didn't ask for. He knew what it meant to have plenty, and have little. And yet he was content in every situation. He is also the author of most of the New Testament letters, and the word thanks (or equivalents like thanksgiving) appear many, many times in his writing.

The Colossian church must have been an ungrateful bunch. Multiple times, in a few short chapters, Paul urges them to gives thanks. Firstly, he tells them he gives thanks to God for them (1:3). Then he urges them to give thanks to the Father. Why? Because he has "qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in the kingdom of light" (1:12). What does that mean? In order to explain why this is good, Paul then contrasts the situation before his readers became Christians, to the situation now: "For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins" (1:13-14).

The God of heaven, rescuing us (all of us) from darkness, and bringing us into light, through Jesus His Son. In dying on the cross, Jesus makes it possible for us to know God, because through him our sins are forgiven, the slate wiped clean and forever unable to be marked again, and life as it was meant to be lived can be lived.

So our thanksgiving is meant to be centred on what God has done for us through Jesus! The ultimate impact of this sacrifice won't be felt in this life: eternal life starts now, but true perfection, without sickness or death or disease or human selfishness or pride, is a promise that hangs over our lives until Jesus comes back again to deal with this world and make it new. This means that, ultimately, we always have a reason to give thanks, because of what Jesus has done. Even our sufferings are a reason to give thanks, because through them, as James says, "the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything." The whole of human life takes on a new perspective, because of what Jesus did, and promises us hope, both for now and the future.

So what does this mean for me, in my life? It means thanking God in every situation, that He does not do anything without reason. He seeks our completeness, our wholeness, in all that He does. It means thanking others for the small things in life that He does for me, noticing things that I would normally take for granted, and not grumbling over the insignificant bits that frustrate and annoy me. It means allowing this new perspective of Christ's death for me to transform all of my experiences. Paul exhorts the followers in Colosse to have the following attitude:

"So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live in him, rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught, overflowing with thankfulness". (2:6-7)

Health and Wealth we help ourselves, a big fat belly underneath our belts

There's this problem that's been playing on my mind recently - in fact, not so recently, but for quite a long time. I guess it began to bubble to the surface when I went to the Sustainable Development seminar last year when I'd just started my job, but I couldn't quite find the words to express the thoughts I was having. Then the man who's book was mentioned at the seminar (Tim Jackson, "Prosperity Without Growth", which I got for Christmas but haven't had the time to read) came to speak at work. Then tonight I watched a film called "Age of Stupid", which despite being a little bit muddled and certainly at the extreme end of the spectrum when it comes to the impacts of climate change, despite not properly setting out the evidence for this conclusion, reiterated some of the things I've been thinking about.

Perhaps I still can't express what I think at the moment, but I'm going to try. At the core of Tim's argument was this basic premise that our current economic model in the West - which developing nations are trying to copy - is flawed. Mainly because it assumes that growth in economic (GDP) terms is the best way to value prosperity, and that there are no limits to growth. These are both complete nonsense - the world does not have infinite resources, so growth must have a limit. Yet we live like this isn't true. We're basically saying - hey, you poor countries, come and be like us! We're going to grow and grow and grow, building more buildings and driving bigger cars and flying more and having more stuff, and you can be like this too. We raise the bar and ask those lower down to try and jump higher and higher.

You can see the effects of this all over the developing world - being rich and famous is the aspiration for many stuck in poverty, to be like the rich West. We continue to base our economy on oil and its products (e.g., petrol and plastic), which is horrendously damaging to the environment, and we don't seem to be willing to take the action needed to change it.

The bottom line for all of this lies with us, I fear. This is the big word of this blog: consumption. We consume so much! In Age of Stupid, the statistic was quoted that if everyone consumed as much as we do in Europe, we'd need 3 planets to sustain the Earth's population. If we were like America, it would be more like 6, and if the population of the Earth grows to 9 billion like it's projected to, then we'd need something like 10! Think about it for a second - 1 bn people in the world are obese, and 1 bn people live on less than a dollar a day. It's crazy! We think it's a right to have a mobile phone, and an iPod, a laptop, a big tv, a car, to fly in planes from Southampton to Newcastle because we don't have time to take the train (and because it's cheaper, which doesn't make it the best choice).

The solution seems simple, but actually isn't. In theory, it's just about redressing the balance - giving more to those who need it, by those who have it voluntarily giving it up. For me this means that we who have much need to be content with less than we have. And in this country, the majority of us have a lot. But even for those who have little by British standards, we have a lot by the world's standards. True, economics means that many in this country struggle to live a decent life, and the problem definitely goes beyond our individual choices to consume less - it's about the systems which we live by, economically, socially, and environmentally.

But the basic premise is still the same. We need to give, and giving is good. In fact, Jesus said that is "better to give than receive". Do we truly believe that? Can we trust God that if we forego the material things of this life, and give generously to those in need, that we will be blessed. We only have to look to the example God gave for us to follow. Here is the mighty King of the Universe, the One who spoke the universe into existence, becoming one of us, sharing in our humanity and sufferings, and also in our joy, giving Himself up for us. God gave His Son for us! He knows what it means to be generous:

"If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Heavenly Father give good gifts to those who ask him!" Matthew 7:11.

So let's make the hard choices, to consume less, and to consume intelligently. And above all of that, let's be generous - with our time, so that we get to know those around us better, and with our money, so that others can live life in a dignified way. Let's look beyond the consumerist lifestyle sold to us by the media and all these companies trying to get you to buy the next big thing, and let's enjoy the things that make it awesome to be human - friends, family, enjoyment in the little things, the simple things of life.

I know I haven't even done a tiny bit of justice to the ideas I've tried to get across, but if anyone of this gets through, act on it! Make an impact, because changing the way the world thinks and acts takes individual choices by individual people, all acting together.

In The Jungle, The Mighty Jungle...

Yes, I'm about to attempt to dissect (without ruining), one of my generations best loved Disney films. I just went to see the Lion King musical on Friday at the Lyceum theatre in Oxford - I had an awesome time, and really enjoyed myself. The sets were absolutely brilliant, the acting/singing fantastic in general, and they even managed to pull off the stampede scene (I was thinking, how on earth will they manage that???). And they managed to change little bits about the story, and add a couple of new songs, without distracting from the nostalgia - it even made it a little unpredictable, and better viewing in my opinion.

Such is my personality that I can't now watch a film or listen to a song or go to the theatre without consciously critiquing it in my head. It doesn't detract from my enjoyment of the object in question; in fact, I enjoy a story more if it has good dialogue, decent scripting, a coherent story and good morals or messages behind it. Too often we blindly watch/listen/read things without actually analysing it in our heads, without thinking "what message is this bit of media trying to get across to me?" It's there in everything we are subjected to every day, including advertising (I think it's the worst offender sometimes).

So here's my critique of Lion King! In general, the story encourages good character, it has a good message. The idea that everyone and everything has its' place in the Circle of Life, that nothing is actually more important than anything else because we all rely on other parts of the system to survive (the lions eat the antelope, but can't just eat what they want because otherwise they'd run out of food), looks quite similiar to the New Testament of church, where each role and responsibility in the church is no more or less important than another. As someone said recently, there may be those with higher "skilled" jobs than others, but is a doctor or a lawyer actually more important than a binman or a sewage worker or the guy in your local Post Office? If you think the answer is "yes", wait until your bins haven't been collected in 3 months and answer that question again!

Responsibility is the other main theme in the Lion King. Granted, Simba is tricked by Scar and believes he has messed up big time, but even when Nala finds him and tries to convince him to return, he shirks his responsibility as King. I've been thinking about this recently in relation to my own work - am I taking responsibility for the fact that I have a part to play? If I don't play my part, I'm actually letting others down by making them work harder, and I'm robbing them of the gifts and skills God has given me to serve them with. Most people spend most of their waking lives in some sort of work (not necessarily paid, voluntary is important too, or raising a family, etc), so we should make sure we have a correct attitude towards it, that we're treating it as it commands - being responsible with our work is part of a fulfilling life. Timone and Pumba have the phrase "Hakuna Matata" or "NO WORRIES" as their personal mantra - they don't actually contribute anything to the wider world, and whilst it's fun for a while, Simba (and his sidekicks) eventually realise they have to take up their responsibility and fight for what's important.

Closely linked to fulfilment is the idea of destiny, and important to that is identity. Perhaps we don't believe in fate (I don't), but I do believe God has given us specific purpose in our lives, to complete certain tasks and live our lives in a certain way, which brings him glory and gives us fulfilment. Our identity is important to that - are we just random accidents in space? If so perhaps the only real incentive to work is for our own benefit, and perhaps those that we personally love (but why do we love, if we're accidents, apart from to satisfy our own desires and needs, ie, loving someone for selfish reasons? I'm being a little facetious here, because it's not immoral to gain something from loving others, to feel good about it, and I doubt anyone lives for purely selfish reasons; in fact, that's probably my point!). If in fact our identity is found in God, as lost children who are welcomed back into the arms of a loving Father, and set free to live according to His will for the glory of His name and for our satisfaction, peace, and joy, then identity is important as to why we work - it's for God, for others, for our own joy! In other words, we find part of life's real fulfilment in working hard, taking on responsibility.

Fatherhood is another strong theme in the Lion King. Simba believes his father has left him, that although he said he'd always be there, he feels alone. I'm sure many Christians feel like that sometimes. I'm sure that many in Haiti are wondering if God really exists right this minute. God's response to this question isn't to say "Get on with it whatever you think of me," but to say, "I am here! Just not in the way you thought I would be." Jesus didn't die to leave us alone here to fend for ourselves, but to give us a Helper, Counsellor and powerful Friend in the Holy Spirit to give us the ability to follow God and live his way. If he didn't leave, the Holy Spirit (who is like having Jesus 24/7 wherever we are, rather than Jesus confined to a physical body) wouldn't have come.

One negative thought though. Because the Lion King is based on African culture, it does mean that it involves the idea of ancestor worship - the kings of the past up there in the skies, looking down on us, who we can talk to but only through certain wise soothsayers and shamans (ie, Rafiki, who is my favourite character despite being the centre of this idea). I came across this in Namibia, where the tribe I visited believed in one God, but we could only know Him through the ancestors, who had to be contacted through traditions and superstitions dating back hundreds, maybe thousands of years. The Bible's claim is very different - God can be accessed, personally, at any time, anywhere, directly, because of Jesus. The Jews believe God is too holy for us to come into His presence, and yet the New Testament claimed that we can walk right into His presence, only because of what Jesus did on the cross. Without His death, we are counted as sinful, and unable to enjoy that friendship with a perfect God. With it, we are made pure as snow, and able to enjoy everlasting friendship with God, starting now, and "ending" ultimately with perfect access in Heaven, enjoying Him forever. What a claim! We don't need traditions to access God like he can be tricked into thinking we're not sinful for a while: in Jesus, God faced our sin head on, didn't shy away from it, but dealt with it, condemning it to the grave forever and offering new life to all those who would recognise that He is in fact that one in control of the whole universe and the only source of true life, the one to be followed, not to gain a place in heaven, but because it is by worshipping (praising/enjoying) and following him (and discovering his will for our lives) that we find fulfilment! What a promise.