Humility

I've been working a lot lately on being more humble. The other day, I was trying to gauge whether or not I am succeeding when it occurred to me that...I don't really know what it means to be humble. Humility is one of those buzz words that Christians throw around as a desirable goal and a necessity to being a good person. I think that we all have images inside of our head of what humble is or someone that we perceive as being humble. Often, when I think of humility, I think about a woman (I can't even remember her name!) that Laura is friends with. After she had her baby, Laura took me with her to drop of a present for the new spawn. While there, we were talking and Laura and she began talking about baby massages. I didn't know what they were talking about so I tuned out much of the conversation. Later, in the car, I remember Laura saying to me, "She is so humble- she knows much more about [baby massages] than I do and yet she let me explain to her everything I knew and asked questions as if she didn't know any of the answers." For me, that sort of became my image of "humble" and the goal. Unfortunately, I seem to be hardwired to try and have all of the answers rather than all of the questions, which sort of collides with the goal I had in mind. But I do think that humility is important. Heck, the word's mentioned often enough in the good book that it must be something that the Big Man cares about.

Like any good student, I decided to do some research so that I can create a more tangible goal and understanding. Here's what I found:

First off, I'm not humble. That one was easy.

I chose to focus the rest of my attention primarily on the word humble because a) it's an adjective, which means that it's an acquirable trait that can be applied to a person and b) humble is actually used more often in the bible than any other form of the word.

Humble has 5 different accepted definitions:

1. Not proud or arrogant; modest
2. Having a feeling of insignificance, inferiority, subservience, etc. 
3. Low in rank, importance, status, quality etc. 
4. Courteously respectful
5. Low in height or level; small in stature. 

Hmm. Well I am going to go ahead and discard definitions 2 and 3. Here's why: I know for a fact that God wants us to be a very best, regardless of what we're doing. He says so in 2 Corinthians 8:7: But as you excel in everything--in faith, in speech, in knowledge, and in all eagerness and in the love from us that is in you--make sure that you excel in this act of kindness too. And against in Colossians 3:23: Whatever you do, work at it with all your hear, as working for the Lord, not for human masters. So number 2 is out. God doesn't want us to be less than we can be, He wants us to be the best that we can be. We are strong through him, not insignificant. I'm throwing number 3 out for pretty much the same reason. God is blind to rank, status, and quality so I think that it's safe to say that simply by being poor or quitting my job and working as a servant, I won't automatically become humble. I'm sure that the experiences  could be humbling, but not the act or label in and of themselves.

Which leaves us with 1) Not proud or arrogant; modest; 4) courteously respectful; and, 5) low in height or level; small in statues. Well being 5'1, I'm going to say that I've got number 5 down PAT! Yahoo! So we'll go ahead and throw that one away as well (:

Not proud or arrogant; modest; and courteously respectful. These are good words. But it still doesn't feel like enough for me. I also can't believe that God threw the word into the Bible as often as He did because he was looking for someone that can be summed up in a few short words. It's a good starting point, though. Hopefully you agree because I'm going to swing at this from a slightly different direction now. I decided to go ahead and take a look at the most common contexts that the word humble is found in and, by looking at collocates, I found that humble is often associated with words like:

• servant
• quiet
• modest
• honest
• proud (as in, not)
• civic
• obedient 
• kings
• wise
• gratitude, polite, gentle, generous, apologetic, mighty, unassuming, hardworking, contrite, self effacing, meek, awed, grounded, blessed, charming, and so many, many more good, strong words. Also potato, because it can't be ignored. 

I like those words. Those words, for me, create an image. A woman that embodies those words is strong and powerful. She is wise and yet unassuming. She is modest, quiet, and obedient and also hardworking and grounded. She is contrite when she errs. She is awed by God, Jesus, and the world around her. She is blessed. She is charming and she laughs and loves and is honest. She sounds pretty amazing, right? If that's what humble is, what humble looks like, that's where I want to be. I want to be a woman that is wise and mighty and grounded; obedient and kingly.

I feel like I have a much better understanding of what humility looks like and now, when I read it in the Bible, it's a goal that actually means something to me. It's amazing and beautiful and any advice or direction that God can give me in terms of how to get there is much appreciated because I am not quite there yet (see: on the opposite side of the planet from there!).

In the same way, you who are younger, submit yourselves to your elders. All of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, because, “God opposes the proud but shows favor to the humble.”

[On humility:] For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the faith God has distributed to each of you.

I served the Lord with great humility and with tears and in the midst of severe testing by the plots of my Jewish opponents.

Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience

Ah man. Don't those just take on a whole new meaning now? They sure do for me. Humble. I've got a long journey ahead of me and I am so, so blessed that God will aid me in all of my shortcomings and walk the long walk with me.

Overall, I count this unpacking of humility a SUCCESS!

Ouch.

I just thought that I would share that I have a cut on my leg that is officially infected and poison ivy covering about 75% of my body. Yeah. Awesome Monday.

Something cool

I did something cool last night. I prayed about the future. This may seem commonplace for anyone else, but it is BIG NEWS for me. This is what I consider a BIG STEP. For real. I don't pray about the future because I want to think that I'm in control of the future. Refer to previous posts and recognize that this is something that I'm working on. BUT-last night, without really even thinking about it, I asked God what His opinion was. Not only that, but He was the first person that I asked! So far, I'm waiting for answers. I'm trying to open my eyes so that when He answers I'll recognize it. Even if He doesn't answer the way that I want Him to, I think that I'll still do it again.

 I'm happy. It's been awhile since I felt anything but blank, so happy is a good change. Content. It feels good. I think that it's the running. Maybe the praying, too (:

I'm just being

Damn, this woman just amazes me. As I spend my days worrying about whether or not I'll have time to eat before class (usually no), if I should change my major (which I've pretty much decided to do! Yikes!), and if I should buy a new pair of jeans before winter comes full force (yes, but where?!), she WON her battle against cancer! Her spirit just amazes me. I should have been the one encouraging her through her horrific journey and yet her patience, her grace, and her love of life and Jesus has continued to awe me in the months that I have been reading. Seriously, this woman has got a lot of God living inside of her heart. I have never even met her and I want to be more like her!

I take comfort and joy in the fact that God is giving me the struggles that He wants me to have. If He wanted me to fight cancer (I pray not), He would send it at me and give me the tools I need to deal with it. Fortunately for me, I'm thinking about jeans and work and majors and looking forward to the future. I still struggle with depression a lot of the time but I am so grateful that I spend a lot of my time just happy and being. I love just being. It's my absolute favorite state of mind. I love sitting down with a cup of coffee and just thinking about my accounting homework. I love running. I love that I have carved out a time to spend reading the Bible every evening and that the verses and words are sticking with me throughout the day. I love that I have a Bible verse written on my hand right now because I just couldn't leave my room this morning without taking it with me. I'm happy and I'm being. I'm living in the moment but looking forward to the future.

That's it. That's all I've got to say.

I'm going to start blogging more. I got caught in this trap that I should only blog if I have something "inspired" to say and then I realized that that's just dumb because I don't have time to be "inspired" and have deep thoughts. I'm too busy being. So I'm going to write more about how I'm being.

She is clothed in strength and dignity; she laughs at the future to come.

Romans 8:38-39

For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, ³⁹ neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord

For many years, I was crippled with doubt and filled with anguish. I sought after the Lord, but just didn't feel it. I knew that I was supposed to feel this mysterious it, this power of the Spirit, the swoosh of my God filling my heart- but I didn't know what that looked like or felt like. I just knew it was missing. Have you ever tried to understand something that cannot be explained? Something that even once you have it, cannot be described? I was wandering around int the dark, desperately patting the walls for a light switch, a match, anything. I knew that my God was out there somewhere, and I just couldn't find Him. I knew that the man called Jesus had died for the sins of the unworthy, and I knew that I was unworthy, but had He did for me? I didn't know. I understood the idea of God and Jesus in the abstract, was able to hold a decent conversation chronicling His attributes, and dutifully subscribed to an daily e-mail Bible reading assignment (and actually read the passages, most of the time), but I just wasn't there. I was not a Believer in the one place that mattered: my heart.

And then, for a reason I really can't remember now, I stumbled upon Romans 8:38-39. This was my "aha" moment. My life as I knew it was over. Gone was the doubt. Gone was the anguish. Looking back now, it's like God slipped His hand into my heart and brushed it all away with the swat of His palm. I read the verse and what I heard was "I am here. And I am here for YOU, Mary Emily Molly Herbert. I own your heart, regardless of what you think and do and now matter how many doubts you have, you are mine and I am yours and nothing will ever change that."

I'm sure that I have dramatized the moment in my memories. But really, I'm just saying that because I don't want to be the crazy person that admits to hearing voices. The truth is, that verse saved my life. That verse was God's way of cracking my heart open wide and setting me free. That day, I became a Believer. To this day, I read this verse regularly. Shockingly, I don't have it memorized-I've been working on that but I am the world's worst memorizer. Seriously-I'm like a gold fish. But every time I read that verse, I am rejuvenated. That verse is like a promise between God and myself: Through the thick and the thin, the happiness and the anger, the doubts and the hatred and the worries, we're in this together. Nothing will ever be able to separate us, absolutely nothing. Dang, I've got an amazing God. I worship Him and I am glad!

Complacency

Much of what the preacher at one of my old churches said used to simply go in one ear and out the other. What can I say: I have a very short attention span! I still remember one sermon, though, and I am often reminded of it at the most inopportune (read: necessary) times. The teaching was regarding how dangerous being comfortable and complacent can become for a Christian and I can't agree more. I have the type of personality that I just love being comfortable. There's nothing better for me than lounging on the couch in an air conditioned room, book in hand and Dr. Pepper to the side. Now there might be nothing wrong with that, at least until I gain a few hundred pounds and have a TLC feature made about me, except I tend to do similar things with my faith. I am so quick to suppress the Spirit and feel nice and comfy cozy in my sin. I wrap it around me, make room for it on the couch beside me, and turn up the volume on the television so I can't hear God pointing out my sin. In fact, I think that being comfortable is probably one of my greatest areas of weakness as a Christian. Working hard is...hard. It's difficult and exhausting and half the time the changes that God is calling me to make I just don't want to make. Sometimes Head Molly sounds just like a petulant toddler as she throws fits, screaming "NO NO NO I don't wanna!" (Head Molly differs from real Molly in that I don't actually throw fits...I only allow the Molly in my head to do that...and yes, I refer to her in the third person. We are separate entities. And yes, I worked all day, so I'm writing this primarily out of exhaustion).  Back to the point, though, I like being comfortable. And being a Christian is often the exact opposite. Being a Christian means stepping outside of your comfort zone and making the changes that are hard and uncomfortable because we love God more than we love ourselves and our sin.

I highly recommend this video. I was introduced to this shortly after I became a Believer and it still makes me cry every time I watch it. I identify with the conflict so clearly. I want to be chiseled, but I don't want the pain that that involves. And even though I resist, my God keeps going. He keeps chiseling because He loves me that much that even though I get comfortable in my sin, He keeps pointing it out because He wants to chisel me into the person that reflects Him. It's hard for me to be uncomfortable and then willingly step up to the plate for more, but I'm getting there.

For we are God’s masterpiece, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. -Ephesians 2:10. We are God's masterpiece. How incredible is that?

Changes

I was talking to the lovely Miss W the other day and I realized something amazing: I have changed! It's not often that I can look back at myself at a specific point in time and realize that my heart and/or attitude have grown in some significant way. In fact, it's happened like twice that I can think of. If this blog is good for nothing else, I am already grateful that it is giving me the opportunity to see the way the God is molding me.

Now, on to chronicling these changes! After talking to Whitney, I was inclined to go back and read my previous blog post about being single and realized that I wrote that post for a reason: I was unhappy with my single state and I was unhappy with my heart. My sisters read that post and they were inclined to discuss it with me, which gave me new things to think about and new things to pray over. And in just over a month, my attitude and outlook has been completely rewritten. I am not sure when it happened, but I am so, so glad that I became aware of it because I need these tangibles. I need the evidence that God is working with me because most of the time, I wouldn't blame Him one tiny bit if He decided to just start ignoring me. Here's where I am at now:

I still want to be married. I still desire a partner, someone that I can share my life with and someone that will challenge me as a person and a Christian. A man that will father my children. A husband that will teach me how to love and care for him and someone that I will teach how to love and care for me. I want that- and I really do believe that that is somewhere in my future. But right now, I am content. Rather than praying for a husband, I am praying about my husband. I pray that he is using this time to grow and mature. I pray that he is practicing at being a good man, because I know it isn't easy. I ask God to lighten his burdens and send people to help him when they become too heavy. I don't know who my dude is, but I know that he is out there and that this is the way that I can best care for him right now. I no longer beg for the guy to enter my life, because I recognize now that that's going to happen, ready or not, when God deems it time. I also spend a lot of time praying for myself (shocker, I'm selfish even in prayer!). I pray that God will continue to mold me so that when it is time for me to be married, my heart and spirit will be prepared for the emotional upheaval that will cause. I pray that God will aid me in eradicating my selfish desires and my self-centered thoughts, because those probably won't make marriage easy, and they're certainly making my current life much more difficult. I spend the bulk of my time, though, praying that God will use me in the way that He sees best now. That I can focus on the now and how I can be a servant to Him.

I've also realized what an amazing life I have right this very second. I'm sitting here, typing on my personal laptop, playing on facebook, and watching television. I have money in my bank account. I have no fear of diseases, or being shot, or walking around in the dark. I have a car outside on the driveway, and an amazing education under my belt. I have family- biological and spiritual, both of whom are amazing. I live in a place where I practice my religion freely and love my God openly. I have a God that satisfies my every need and want, and that calms my whimsy. I have a job that I am in love with and that challenges me and keeps me fit and tan (which my future husband will probably appreciate). I am, simply put, blessed. And I want to spend my time focusing on what I have, rather than what I want. God will satisfy my needs, in His own way, and in His own time. My time is better suited to taking care of the here and now and becoming the best person that I can be.

So that's where I am at. I'm far from perfect and typically not as content as I am right at this moment, but I no longer ache with want. I crave God, and God alone. Have no fear, though, I still have lots of other issues to be sorted through. The blog shall continue. I'm glad that I took the time to read back through my posts, though. Even though there's always something new to struggle and worry over, God seems to be movin' and shakin' in my life!