The Invitation to Humility as We Age

One of the things I love most about the Bible is that it is so honest. It teaches us, inspires us, and challenges us. But it does not placate us. In fact, as we age, we may be uncomfortable with these words in the Old Testament:

“In old age, your body no longer serves you so well. Muscles slacken, grip weakens, joints stiffen. . . . You can’t come and go at will. Things grind to a halt.” (Ecclesiastes 12:3,4, MSG)

This certainly does not sound like good news! Thankfully, the Bible also says:

“Even to your old age and gray hairs I am he, I am he who will sustain you. I have made you and I will carry you; I will sustain you and I will rescue you.” (Isaiah 46:4, NIV)

“My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.” (Psalm 73:26, NRSV)

I find myself living between these different biblical truths about the realities of getting older. One describes aging as a difficult and unpleasant experience. The other promises that God will be with me and give me strength. The older I get, the more I vacillate between the fear that one description will be true and the hope that the other one will be. How do we live within these polar opposites as we get older every day? God’s invitation to humility is a good place to start.

The Humility of Growing Older

Humility is a word that describes God’s gift to us when we let go of our feelings of entitlement. As we age, we find out that we cannot be everything we want to be or have everything we want to have. We also learn that we do not need everything we think we need. Humility does not just “happen” to us. We learn it through humbling experiences.

Humility is a word that describes God’s gift to us when we let go of our feelings of entitlement.

Getting older is full of humbling experiences that most of us do not like. As we get older, we can see ahead to the truths of Ecclesiastes. We also see in our current lives more subtle humilities that others may not be aware of.  We are humbled by our decreasing sense of importance, by our diminishing energy, and by the loss of the opportunities we had in our younger years. If we are attentive, we might notice the Holy Spirit’s whisper to receive the gifts of humility in the midst of these losses.

My own humbling moments usually surprise me, and I often do not see the grace in them until later. Recently, I was with a group of young people. I was sad when I realized that I felt invisible—not because I wasn’t loved and not because I didn’t want to be there. I was sad and felt invisible because I had no idea what they were laughing about. They seemed to be talking a different language!

I didn’t see the gift in that humble moment until the next day. I remembered that John the Baptist said that Jesus must increase and he must decrease (John 3:26-30, NRSV). John’s words reminded me that I am not the Messiah. I am only a friend of the bridegroom. The grace in that humbling moment was in remembering that Jesus is and will be more than I can ever be for my younger friends.

Other people do not know about most of our quiet, humble moments. I rarely talk about how much I miss the conversations around our dinner table now that I don’t have the energy to invite people over or how sad I am to miss meetings and events that I used to enjoy. Few people know how humbling it is to have to ask for rides when I don’t feel up to driving on our local expressway. Experiences like these sometimes remind me of the words of Ecclesiastes, but they also remind me of a story Jesus told that helps me interpret these humbling experiences differently.

In the Gospel of Luke, Jesus told about people arriving at a wedding banquet. As they arrived, the guests rushed to take the seats of honor, only to be disgraced because others who arrived later were offered the very seats the earlier guests had claimed. (Luke 14:7-11, NRSV).

Jesus told this story long ago and in a different cultural context, but his parable can speak to us in these times in life when we struggle with the loss of the familiar ways we lived when we were younger. Jesus told his listeners that instead of rushing to the seats they thought they were entitled to, they would do well to be honest, self-aware, and humble, ending up in different places than they expected. Jesus’ conclusion was, “If you’re content to be simply yourself you will become more than yourself” (Luke 14:11, MSG).

This is a life-giving perspective God offers us, at any age. When we learn to simply be ourselves, by God’s grace we become more than ourselves. This is the invitation of humility.

Sober Judgment As We Age

Paul wrote to the Romans:

“For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think of yourself more highly than you ought to think but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned.” (Romans 12:3, NRSV)

As I grow older, God reminds me again and again not to think too highly of myself. My default perspective is to think of myself as I was ten or twenty years ago. With sober judgment, I admit that much has changed in my life and my body since then. God reminds me to think with “sober judgment” about who I am now, not who I used to be.

God reminds me to think with “sober judgment” about who I am now, not who I used to be.

Another way to translate “sober judgment” is “pure grace” (Romans 12:3, MSG). On my better days, I remember that it is by grace that I am not the person I used to be. I may wish I could do some of the things I used to be able to do, but God continues to transform me into the person he wants me to be.

As I reflect on the “measure of faith” God is giving to me, I can see that “the only accurate way to understand ourselves is by what God is and by what he does for us, not by what we are and what we do for him” (Romans 12:3 MSG). Even as my diminishing body holds me back from doing all I would like to do, my faith in God’s work can deepen.

As we process the pure grace of this season of life, we can be reassured “whenever our hearts condemn us; for God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything” (I John 3:20, NRSV). God is not asking me to resist getting older or to judge myself for my limitations. God is greater than the condemnations of my heart. God knows everything that is happening as I get older. God, in short, has a different view of my humilities than I do.

Humility and Wisdom

Proverbs tells us, “Wisdom is with the humble” (Proverbs 11:2, NRSV). On the days when I do not feel very wise, I am grateful for that promise. Growing old is living in a liminal space, where so much is unknown. I need to pray for wisdom to know what things to let go of in my life. I need wisdom to know how to plan my days with my limited energy. I pray regularly to be wise as I think about the future.

Apparently, according to Proverbs, the humbling experience of not being as wise as we think we should be is in itself a source of wisdom. God is not only generous with his wisdom, he does not fault us for needing it. James wrote, “If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to you” James 1:5, NIV).

As I grow older, I hope to hold on to God’s gracious generosity in giving me wisdom, even if it comes through humbling experiences.

Humility and Anxiety

Peter, in his letter to the early church, wrote words that may speak to us as we age:

All of you must clothe yourselves with humility in your dealings with one another, for “God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.” Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God. . . , Cast all your anxiety on him.” (Peter 5:5-7, NRSV)

In other words, Peter links humility in our relationships with the level of our anxiety. I have to admit that much of my anxiety is related to what I think other people think of me now that I am old. If I can live with more humility and let go of the pride surrounding my concerns about other people’s opinions, then perhaps my anxiety will decrease. The Message Bible says this even more bluntly:

“So be content with who you are, and don’t put on airs. God’s strong hand is on you; he’ll promote you at the right time. Live carefree before God; he is most careful with you” (I Peter 5:6,7, MSG)

Perhaps God allows us to be humbled to help lessen our anxiety a bit each day.

Becoming like Jesus

One of the most compelling reasons to receive humility is that Jesus himself lived in humility. Paul instructed the early Christians in Philippi to “let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus. . . . He humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death—even death on a cross” (Philippians 2:5-8, NRSV).

Paul said that becoming human was for Jesus “an incredibly humbling process” (Philippians 2:7,8, MSG). When we, as aging human beings, have our own humbling experiences, we are only doing what Jesus did. We can remember that Jesus washed the disciples’ feet, even though he knew he was God (John 13:3-5, NRSV). We can remember that Jesus prayed that he would not have to experience the cross, even though he said he was willing (Matthew 26:39, NRSV). And we can remember that when Jesus was on the cross, he was able to say, “It is finished,” even though there was still work to be done (John 19:30, NRSV).

When we, as aging human beings, have our own humbling experiences, we are only doing what Jesus did.

As we age, we may feel that we are asked to do things that are “beneath” us, or that we don’t want to live with the fears of what is looming ahead, or that we are going to die with jobs still undone. As we learn to embrace these humbling experiences with “grace and truth,” we are following in the footsteps of Jesus (John 1:14, NRSV).

Many older people say that they hope they will “end well.” Reflecting on the life of Jesus, I think we could also say that we hope we can “be humbled well.”

With that in mind, I can circle back to another piece of good news in Scripture about this season of life:

“O God, from my youth you have taught me, and I still proclaim your wondrous deeds. So even to old age and grey hairs, O God, do not forsake me, until I proclaim your might to all the generations to come” (Psalm 71:17-19, NRSV).

In some ways this is all we need to know. Getting older is hard, but God invites us to receive the gifts buried in our humbling experiences so that we can proclaim God’s truth and love to future generations.