By Fr. Roy Cimagala
“THE greatest among you must be your servant. Whoever exalts himself will be humbled; but whoever humbles himself will be exalted.” (Mt 23,11-12)
Words of Christ, addressed to his disciples and now to us, that clearly tell us about the crucial role of humility in our life. It’s the virtue that would truly make us great, since it would liken us to Christ who made himself a servant of all of us, and whose humility, expressed all the way to the cross, led to the victory of his resurrection, opening the door of our salvation.
We need to do everything to keep ourselves humble, especially in these rapidly changing times when all sorts of complexities and complications keep growing. Humility enables us to be flexible and adaptable to the varying environments and circumstances of our life, while anchoring us in the foundation of our Christian faith.
Indeed, humility fosters our capacity to be more keenly discerning in a world that is becoming less and less black and white, and more and more grey and multi-colored, with all sorts of shades and nuances to contend with.
With humility, we would be willing, like Christ, to be misunderstood, to suffer, etc., if only to keep ourselves in the hold of charity and mercy that in the end are what truly matter in our life.
In other words, humility assures us to have the righteousness proper to us, the righteousness that channels the very righteousness of God, and not the righteousness akin to that of the scribes and Pharisees of old.
It’s a humility that enables us to be slow to judge as well as to anger, but quick to forgive and even willing to bear the consequences of whatever mistakes, injustices and all sorts of evil that others may inflict on us. It’s even willing to repair whatever damage is caused by the mistakes of others. It’s what makes us generous and magnanimous in our relation with others, irrespective of how they are to us.
In helps us to be constant and persevering in pursuing our real goals in life despite some adverse or unfavorable situations and circumstances, knowing what and how to give up certain things that may need to be given up, but never sacrificing what is truly essential in life which, in the end, is to be charitable with everyone.
Yes, humility helps preserve whatever goodness we have, whatever we have received from God. And if we happen to lose that goodness, it is also what helps us to recover it, since it facilitates our asking for forgiveness and our trust in God’s ever-available mercy. It keeps us always hopeful and confident, despite our limitations and our errors.
We need to understand that humility involves giving our will to the will of God. It is a giving away that actually is not a loss at all but an immense gain for us. That’s because that is how we have been created, how we have been designed. Without God, like a branch cut off from the vine, we just die and are capable only of doing evil.
And precisely because Christ did only what his Father commanded him to do, he managed to recover us from the state of sin and restore us to the state of grace. How truly important it is to be humble! It is what would enable us to obey God’s will, and to do so irrespective of the great cost in terms of suffering it may involve.
(NOTE: The author, Fr. Roy Cimagala, is a Chaplain from the Center for Industrial Technology and Enterprise (CITE), in Talamban, Cebu City. For reactions, you reach him thru his e-mail address: roycimagala@gmail.com)
