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Humbleness

The latest inspirational column from Rev. Dr. John Kreutzwieser
JohnKreutzwieser-17
Word Wisdom

On July 13-15 Hillcrest Golf Club hosted the Saskatchewan Junior Provincial Golf Tournament. On the final day I volunteered to walk around the course scoring for three young golfers: TJ Baker (Waskesiu), Darien Herlick (Weyburn), and Davin Karst (Assiniboia). It was a very humbling experience. At ages 18, 15, and 16 they hit the ball much further than I am able to hit it, even after playing the sport for 55 years. Their scores over the three days were lower than most of my three-day totals. All three young men are remarkable golfers now and will be in the future. While I, on the other hand, seem to hit the ball shorter distances each year. I was humbled.

In the Bible one of the Hebrew words translated “humble” is awnaw. Deuteronomy 8:2 records, “And you shall remember the whole way that the LORD your God has led you these forty years in the wilderness, that he might humble you, testing you to know what was in your heart.” Here the word humble has the sense of afflicting or abasing. The wandering Israelites went through great hardship and struggle to assess their true personalities. God humbled (awnaw) them to find out what they were really like. It is often only under duress, humbling experiences, that we discover what are our actual characteristics.

So under the abasement of the comparative talent of those young golfers to myself, how would I react? It was a test, so to speak, of how I deal with my own talent, or lack thereof. I was certainly humbled and hopefully dealt with it appropriately. As Jesus said, “For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled.” I thought I was doing well this golfing season with the distance of my drives and the average score of my games, given my advancing years. But I was fittingly humbled by this experience of watching junior golfers.

The Greek word often translated as “to humble” is tapeinoo. The root meaning of this word is to lower, as levelling a mountain or high place. One might say being humbled is being put into a proper perspective of one’s talent, one’s place in life. St. Paul wrote, “And being found in human form, Jesus humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.” (Philippians 8:2) Jesus lowered himself by becoming one like us, even though he was omnipotent and ever-living. Joined with human flesh the Son of God allowed himself to be powerless and subject to death, a humbling experience. Becoming one with us flawed, imperfect people, Jesus was afflicted and assumed our end result of life. He was humble for us.

In the dictionary definition of humble the meanings are expressed in more negative concepts, such as, not proud or haughty, not arrogant or assertive, expressing a spirit of deference or submission, and being unpretentious. To be a humble person is attempting to stop living in certain ways with particular attitudes. I believe the Bible’s encouragement is well worth considering, “Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. 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.” 

I think that a humble attitude can be of great benefit in living with others in our families and in our communities. Rather than trying to do something to be humble it is more about avoiding negative characteristics. As the song by Mac Davis puts it, “Oh Lord it's hard to be humble, when you're perfect in every way. I can't wait to look in the mirror cause I get better looking each day. To know me is to love me, I must be a hell of a man. Oh Lord, It's hard to be humble, But I'm doing the best that I can.”

It took a humbling experience to remind me of this important concept.

The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author, and do not necessarily reflect the position of this publication.  

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