Christian Counseling Service -- Devotions

Confident humility on the downward path

Thursday, February 28, 2013

Jeremiah 17:9-10
The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it? The Lord alone probes the mind and tests the heart.

Luke 16:19-21
Jesus said to the Pharisees, "There was a rich man who dressed in purple garments and fine linen and dined sumptuously each day. And lying at his door was a poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores, who would gladly have eaten his fill of the scraps that fell from the rich man's table. Dogs even used to come and lick his sores."

The pope will resign today. Benedict XVI, formerly Cardinal Ratzinger, formerly Father Josef, formerly (perhaps in his childhood) Jupp or Pepi will henceforth be called the Pope Emeritus. He was the 265th pope since Jesus' death and resurrection. He is the first Pope Emeritus.

I think about how strange it must be during Lent for a priest, or a pope, to be "dressed in purple garments and fine linen and to eat (relatively) sumptuously each day." Two films about the papacy, The Shoes of the Fisherman and We Have a Pope, send their papal protagonists disguised into the public. There are days when they "just can't take it anymore," when they feel their humility being replaced by hypocrisy, when they recognize their Lazarus position even if others do not.

Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Actually, that is NOT in the Bible.* Instead, Jesus says, "Whoever wants to be great among you must be your servant. Whoever wants to be first must be your slave." Then, when Jesus invites us to take up our crosses like he took up his, he shows us the next step. We move down, not up. Greatness is never triumphalism. It is crucifixion.

The heady air of resurrection glory entices me into some kind of servanthood. (If I serve now, then someday I will be great, and be happy. I just have to wait out these miserable dog-licked days.) But just as those cinematic popes knew they weren't triumphant and infallible saviors, so I must also know I'm not intended to abase and despise my true self.

Truly the ego heart, the ego mind, is deceitful above all things. But crucifixion does do emptying very well. Helplessness finally teaches my old mind to rest from its self-protective maneuvering. In this ego vacuum, finally the Lord's "probing and testing" bear fruit.

God isn't probing for cancer, though. I think he is stirring me up to love and good deeds, beguiling me back into the river of humanity, where I can stop drying up and start sharing all I've been given. Then comes the resurrection glory. Then comes the joy.

We are blessed who hope in you, Lord, like trees planted near running water, like willows dipping in the stream, caught in your current, caught and transformed by your love.

* Lord Acton, a 19th century Catholic British historian, said "Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely." He also said, less famously, "There is no worse heresy than that the office sanctifies the holder of it." And less famously still, ""The strong man with the dagger is followed by the weak man with the sponge."

Devotions Archive

Confident humility on the downward path

Thursday, February 28, 2013