Hubris and Humility (A Sermon on Luke 18:9-14)

Hello, friends!

Here is a sermon I preached yesterday (10/23) at Multnomah Presbyterian Church. Its focus is on humility, and it's drawn from Luke 18:9-14, the parable of the Pharisee and the tax collector. Attached is a video. The sermon starts right around the 38:30 mark. I've also included a transcript here.

Humility is an underrated virtue, but it is shown to be highly correlated with better health, better relationships, and a better overall quality of living. Jesus was onto something...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JrxEHdUWmbY

Good morning, Multnomah Presbyterian Church! My name is Matt Heisler and I am the Director of Ministry with Youth and their Families at Lake Grove Presbyterian Church. It is so great to be back with you. The last time I was able to worship with you all was April 2021, when worship was still remote and I preached into a computer screen.

This morning, we’ll explore Luke 18:9-14 a bit, but before we do, would you pray with me?

God of great mercy, you are exalted over all, yet you came to us as baby in a manger, in humility. Would you speak to us today through your Word, illuminating what is unclear to us so that we can follow you more closely? We pray this in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.

Friends, hear the word of the Lord:

Luke 18:9-14

9 He also told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous and regarded others with contempt: 10 “Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. 11 The Pharisee, standing by himself, was praying thus, ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other people: thieves, rogues, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. 12 I fast twice a week; I give a tenth of all my income.’ 13 But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven but was beating his breast and saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’ 14 I tell you, this man went down to his home justified rather than the other, for all who exalt themselves will be humbled, but all who humble themselves will be exalted.”

This is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God.

The parable we just read comes on the heels of another story about a widow and an unjust judge. At the beginning of chapter 18 we read about a widow who is seeking justice. She keeps bugging the unjust judge to rule in her favor. Finally, out of exasperation, the wicked judge vindicates the widow, not out of the goodness of his heart, but because he just couldn’t take it anymore. The point, it seems, is that God who is actually just, and who cares passionately about people, will of course see that justice is done.

The very next story, the one we read today, seems like a totally different tale, but it’s actually connected! The Pharisee creates a contest of prayers by comparing his own goodness to thieves, rogues, adulterers, and even the tax collector who was at the temple to pray as well. God, like a judge, hears both the Pharisee’s prayer and the tax collector’s prayer and, shockingly, chooses the tax collector! For some of us, we’ve heard this story so many times, we’re not shocked by it, but, make no mistake, this would have been absolutely scandalous to Jesus’ audience. You see, Pharisees were considered the most pious people in Palestinian Jewish society and people assumed that they were accepted by God. Tax collectors, on the other hand, were considered the most despicable, often regarded as traitors to their own people, because they would collect taxes for the oppressors of Israel and oftentimes skim some off the top for themselves.

We don’t have tax collectors or Pharisees in our culture in the same way today, but we might be able to imagine what this parable is saying by thinking instead of the most active deacon or Sunday-school teacher and comparing them to a drug dealer or a crooked politician. Wouldn’t we be scandalized too to hear that God favored such an unsavory character over a, in our eyes, genuinely good person?

These sorts of stories really mess up our moral scorecards, but their message is at the heart of the teachings of Jesus. “Those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.” Isn’t this, in fact, the story of Jesus himself? God himself came as a baby, born into a manger to a refugee family. The One who should have been most exalted humbled himself to the lowest station - this was true even as Jesus neared the end of his life, he was treated like a common criminal, humiliated, tortured, and crucified. Yet, the audacious end of the story is of course, Jesus’ resurrection on Easter. The one who humbled himself is lifted up and, in the Ascension, seated at the right hand of God. As Christians, this humble God is our namesake. We, too, who have answered the call to follow Jesus are called into a life of humility. We are not to be like the Pharisee, propping ourselves up from Sunday to Sunday with our moral feel-goods. We are supposed to instead take the posture of humility.

Paul puts it this way in Philippians 2:3-4:

“Do nothing from selfish ambition or empty conceit, but in humility regard others as better than yourselves. Let each of you look not to your own interests but to the interests of others. Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus…” the one who repeatedly said that “those who exalt themselves will be humbled and those who humble themselves will be exalted.”

OK, so this is all clear enough I think, but what does this kind of humility look like today? How can we actually live lives like this, resting in God’s grace for us, instead of our own accomplishments or sense of moral superiority?

Before we answer those questions, I wanted to share some research findings about humility. Modern psychologists tend to define humility in two dimensions - intrapersonal and interpersonal. On the intrapersonal level, humility involves an accurate view of the self. This basically means you can acknowledge your strengths and shortcomings - you know what and who you are. You can see your warts and name them, too. On the interpersonal level, which is how Scripture tends to talk about humility, modern psychologists have asserted that humility involves a stance that is other-oriented rather than self-focused.

Unlike the stereotypes of humility, humble people don’t constantly feel terrible about themselves, and they’re not passive or insecure. According to psychological research, humble people tend to have a positive self-view and good self-esteem, and increased gratitude, forgiveness, and general health. They tend to be more helpful and agreeable, have greater emotional wellness, self-regulation, and resilience, and are less impacted by depression and trauma. The bad news is that the opposite of humility, narcissism, seems to be on the rise in our culture. The book The Narcissism Epidemic: Living in the Age of Entitlement argues that there are more people in society with narcissistic traits and an increase in narcissism in our broader culture, including more materialism, self-promotion, entitlement, and public aggression.

If this is true, then Jesus’ call to be humble is as much counter-cultural in our day and age, as it was in the first century. That means we will have to swim upstream if we want to model our lives after Christ and embrace humility as our posture in the world. How can we do this?

Let’s start where Pauls tells us to start in Philippians: “Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus…” This can begin with a prayer and invitation to God, just like the tax collector’s humble prayer. We can begin simply with asking for God’s mercy to cover us and to draw us into a deeper humility.

Here are some other simple, day-by-day practices that can help nurture humility in our lives:

1. Confess your sin regularly. I did not grow up in the Presbyterian tradition - I grew up in evangelical, Pentecostal settings. There was not really a place for confessing sins in our liturgy or in our day-to-day Christian life, yet I remember being riddled with guilt with no practices to help me deal with it. One thing I have loved about Presbyterian liturgy is the corporate prayer of confession. Weekly time to sit in silence, to welcome the Holy Spirit to examine your life and to voice those areas where we’ve fallen short to God - this is a very healthy and life-giving exercise, and the amazing thing is that God’s grace is always ready to receive us in this place of confession.

2. Practice gratitude. We all get to those points in life where our vision darkens and we can’t see anything good going on in our lives. It may just be a rough week, or maybe we’ve been hit hard by the storms of life and we find ourselves discouraged, embittered, and angry. It’s good to voice what’s wrong in prayer, to a therapist, with trusted friends. AND, it’s also good to keep tabs on the beauty in our lives. Taking time to voice what is good in our lives helps us to realize there’s more to be grateful for than we might first realize.

3. Serve other people. Find a place to serve others. It can be easy to slip into a self-focused mode of life when we don’t intentionally put ourselves in a place of regularly serving others. Join a soup kitchen, volunteer at youth group, check in with your neighbors. These things have a way of opening up our worlds and shaking us out of a self-centered life. Richard J. Foster, in his famous book Celebration of Discipline, says that “more than any other single way, the grace of humility is worked into our lives through the discipline of service.”

   1. He writes this about the outcome of service to others: “Humility will slip in upon us unawares. Though we do not sense its presence, we are aware of a fresh zest and exhilaration with living. We wonder at the new sense of confidence that marks our activities…People whom we once only envied we now view with compassion, for we see not only their position but their pain. People whom we would have passed over before we now ‘see’ and find to be delightful individuals. Joyous hidden service to others is an acted prayer of thanksgiving. We seem to be directed by a new control Center - and so we are.”

4. Listen well. In college, I read a book called The Lost Art of Listening. The authors describe ways to improve our listening skills and to build relationships even across differences. I remember my Counseling professor describing how much of American conversation is like a tennis match. You say something and then I say something back, like hitting a ball back and forth. Seldom do we take time to empathize with and reflect back to others what they are saying, but this is the pathway to deeper understanding. Oh, and it builds up humility too, because the focus in our conversations becomes more about what others are sharing with us than about what we say back to them.

5. Finally, be willing to ask for help. I struggle with this one, especially in areas I think I should be competent already. Receiving help is a great humility-builder, though. It helps us acknowledge that we don’t know everything and that we have weaknesses. At the same time, it opens us up to deeper relationship with another as they show us the way forward. One of the hardest and most fruitful things I did in college was start to go to therapy. I noticed that I was feeling a lot of anxiety, and I figured that if I wanted to help others, I should probably be willing to be helped as well. My eyes were opened in so many ways as I let someone into my inner life. It was actually the primary way God spoke to me during that season of my life and felt like a mirror was held up to me. I looked upon myself, warts and all, and was invited to accept the grace of God there.

The road to humility is not an easy one. It comes through service to others, through suffering, through being willing to see ourselves as we are, not as we wish we would be. But, the humble life is one that is truly a joyful one - our days are punctuated with a beautiful transparency - we do not need to be anything but who we are, knowing that who we are is deeply loved by God with no need for us to perform to earn that love. Brennan Manning, who wrote the beautiful book The Ragamuffin Gospel, put it this way: “My deepest awareness of myself is that I am deeply loved by Jesus Christ and I have done nothing to earn it or deserve it.” And that, my friends, is the essence of humility - to see ourselves as we are and to receive the love of God leads us to a posture of humility, because we see that all of life is a gift, and that we really can do nothing to earn it or deserve it. Amen.

Benediction (after Closing Song, “Love Divine, All Loves Excelling”)

Friends, now receive the benediction, a Jesuit prayer:

May we have too deep a sense of humor to be proud. May we know our absurdity before we act absurdly. And may we realize that when we are humble we are most human, most truthful, and most worthy of God’s serious consideration. Amen.