30.01 | Growing Down

Matthew 18:1-20

“At that time the disciples came to Jesus, saying, “Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?” And calling to him a child, he put him in the midst of them and said, “Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.”

Matthew 18:1-3

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I’m not a big fan of social media.

It’s not that I don’t think it has genuine potential—to entertain, inform, connect, communicate. It’s more that when I’ve spent time on social media, I sometimes leave it in a worse headspace than when I went on. 

I remember a number of years ago, going through a time in ministry that was tough. Relationships were tough, connection with vision was tough, and I was often tired and feeling discouraged. Our family finances were also challenging, and, with three young children, I felt stretched too far in pretty much every direction.

And yet, during this time, I kept being presented on social media with the happy celebrations of others in ministry across the world, who seemed to have all decided to go on writing retreats in scenic cabins at the same time. Handmade ceramic cups held artistically made coffees, steaming away on weathered wooden desks, a pile of interesting books sitting beside their Apple laptops, with a view through a picturesque window of a beautiful wilderness scene before them, catching the sunrise of their utopian day. #blessed.

I did not feel #blessed to see this. My cup of tea on a second hand dining table, marked with the scribbles of my youngest daughter, facing peeling wallpaper on the wall of a house that felt cold. A list of administrative tasks on my second-hand laptop screen sneered at me. 

The frustration raises a question.

Why?

Why should the moments of peace, withdrawal, and depth experienced by colleagues evoke jealousy in me rather than gratitude?

Why should an image of beauty and creativity make me feel bitter rather than hopeful?

Why should the creativity of others stir in me a feeling of deficiency and being left out, rather than celebrating participation in a shared mission?

Yesterday’s reading described us as so often living upside down. Twisted the wrong way. Today’s passage, using the exact opposite word, describes the essential nature of life turned back the right way around again. Jesus wraps it around one word and one example.

The example is a child.

The word is humility.

Without becoming like this, Jesus says, we cannot enter the Kingdom.

Most of us know that the opposite of humility is pride. Many great Christian thinkers, from C.S. Lewis to St Augustine, have told us that pride is a life focused upon the self. Pride, therefore, is the root of both egotistical narcissism, but also of fearful insecurity. Pride is essentially competitive, always looking to measure our value in comparison to others, rather than knowing our value as something already utterly secure in God. Pride turns us inwards when we were created to face upwards and outwards. Pride lets us see others thriving on social media, and leave our screens feeling jealous rather than generous.

Humility is the precise opposite. It is a life turned back the right way around again. It is a turning of attention away from the self, in order to allow our attention to rest simply on God and on others. 

And it is humility that Jesus defines as life that is back the right way up. 

Who is the greatest in the Kingdom?

It is the person who has become so absorbed in the face of the King and His love for a broken humanity that they are no longer obsessed with their greatness. It is the person who has turned out from the constant analysis of self into the freedom of self-forgetfulness.

It is the person who has become again like a child. 

Free from lives anxiously obsessed with a manicured self-image.

Free to abandon our ego projects in favour of simple obedience.

Free to live my story rather than someone else’s.

Free to live to settle, with hair astray and jam on our cheeks, on the lap of the Father, full of His love and awaiting His instructions.

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Reflect:

What are our concerns today? Do they reflect our anxious need to be seen as valuable? Or are they coming into alignment with simple obedience to the Father whose love gives us more value than we could ever imagine?

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Pray:

Father,

The things I worry about

Are often rather silly.

I worry about minor things in my appearance

My resumé; my reputation; my wardrobe; my status symbols;

And the social capital of my relationships.

My heart runs so quickly into foolishness.

But I ask you today for your restoring power:

Free me from the need to compete;

Liberate me from the endless obsession with me;

And allow me to settle rested eyes

On yours;

Because when I loose myself,

And gain you,

Only there do I find myself to be truly living,

And truly available for your cause.

In Jesus’ Name,

Amen.

Old Testament: 

For those also reading the Old Testament this year, your additional readings are here:

Exodus 11:1-13:16 | Proverbs 4:10-19