Michelle DeRusha

Every Day Faith. Faith Every Day.

humility

How to Choose Humility over Humiliation

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A few weeks ago I prayed quietly to myself  just minutes before stepping up to the altar to speak. This is not unusual. I always pray before I speak. Typically I pray that the Holy Spirit will speak through me and that God will use my words to minister to his people in exactly the way he desires. I also pray that I won’t make a big, fat fool of myself.

This time, though, I unexpectedly prayed a different prayer. Before I even knew what I was saying, I prayed this:

“God, please humble me.”

What in the world? 

Who prays that death wish on a Sunday morning seconds before they step up to speak to a church full of strangers?

Sitting in that front pew, I knew one thing for sure: I absolutely did not want to be humbled. “Please, God, no, not that!” I beg-prayed, pressing my clammy hands into my skirt. “I didn’t mean it! I didn’t know what I was saying! Whatever you do, please don’t humble me!”

Twenty minutes later I discreetly breathed a sigh of relief as I stepped down from the pulpit and sank into the pew. The talk had gone just fine. For once I was glad God hadn’t answered my prayer.

A few minutes after the service, however,  I was approached by an older gentleman in the foyer. Turns out, he had a few preaching tips for me.

For starters, he noted, I talked too fast (my grandmother used to say the same thing; she blamed the French side of the family). I also spoke too quietly. My voice reverberated in a disconcerting echo off the rafters. I needed to slow down and enunciate my words more clearly.

Furthermore, I needn’t give so much detail about the Bible story I was relating, he continued. We’ve all read the Bible, we know the story, so it’s best to get right to the point, he advised.

“Don’t worry,” he encouraged, concluding his critique on a positive note. The more I practiced, the more I would improve; I would “get there” eventually, he assured me.

God had heard my accidental prayer after all. I’d been humbled.

The timing was not great. I was slated to repeat the same talk twenty minutes later at the 11 a.m. service. Should I quickly revamp my presentation, I wondered, anxiety percolating in my stomach. Should I shorten the section about the Bible story? Should I try to slow down? Speak more loudly? Enunciate my words more clearly? Scrap the whole thing and wing it?

In the end, I did nothing. I didn’t change a thing — not because I didn’t think there wasn’t anything to improve, but simply because I didn’t even know where to begin.

Two weeks later, I’m still thinking about that talk and the critique offered in between the two services. Let me tell you, in the not-so-distant past I would have felt humiliated by the feedback I’d received immediately after my first talk. I would have obsessed over it, replaying the man’s words again and again in my head. I would have fretted incessantly about all the flaws he’d pointed out and then berated myself for my ineptitude.

This time, though, strangely, I’ve not done any of that. Instead, I’ve accepted the man’s feedback with humility.

This feels like progress.

The more I’ve thought about this incident and my reaction to it, the more I’ve realized that the difference between these two responses — humility versus humiliation — depends on how we understand and define our worth.

Our ability to embrace humility depends on knowing that our worth is based not on what we produce or how we perform, but on who we are as a beloved of Christ.

When we define our value on what we do or achieve (or fail to do or fail to achieve), we are more apt to feel humiliated when faced with criticism or failure. When we understand that our value is based wholly on who we are as daughters and sons created in the divine image of Christ, we have the freedom to choose humility.

Criticism is never easy to receive, even when it’s presented gently and with good intentions. But in those moments when we are on the receiving end of a challenging word, it helps to view criticism as an invitation to remember who we are at our core: beautiful, beloved, and valuable in the eyes of the one who created us.

When You Fall on Your Face and Everyone is Watching

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I participated in my first official speaking engagement this past weekend at the Refresh My Heart conference in Nebraska City. I didn’t expect to, but when a friend had to bow out at the last minute because of a family emergency, I agreed to step in. As I mentioned earlier, public speaking isn’t exactly my thing. Truthfully, I kept cursing under my breath during the four days leading up to the event. I was praying like a madwoman, too, but let’s be frank … I was also cursing.

I spoke twice – same material, two different audiences. The first session went really well. I couldn’t have asked for a more engaged, receptive audience. I was smooth as gelato.  I worried I’d be a mumbly-jumbly Moses and I was articulate Aaron instead.

A miracle! God is good! Hallelujah!

I was on a high.

And then? Two hours later, I bombed the second session. Big-time.

Honestly, I don’t know what happened. Like I said, it was the exact same material. But as I stood at the podium and looked out at the audience, I saw no fewer than three women dead asleep and another one in the back texting furiously. As I was speaking I worried about what she was texting: “This speaker rots! Snooze-o-rama! Bring me a coffee asap!” The rest of the women wore a glazed “for-the-love-of-the-land-make-her-stop-talking” look on their faces.

I panicked. Instead of Lamazing and recalibrating and doing something to recapture the audience, I simply panicked. I talked faster and faster and faster, bent on a single goal: to finish the talk, scurry off the stage and hide in the bathroom.

Later, a woman who had been in the second session said to me, “You did pretty well. Considering you only had four days to prepare.” I know. It was that bad.

I beat myself up during the entire 53-minute drive home. First I berated myself for rushing through the material, for choosing the topic I did and for not practicing enough. Then I obsessed over how I’d disappointed a roomful of women who had paid money to nap through my talk.  And then finally, I beat myself up for not being my friend, the one who was supposed to speak, the one who clearly would have rocked the room and rocked Jesus and been way more successful.

Back home, though, curled in the fetal position under my grandmother’s afghan, I realized something — something that enabled me to see the gift in the experience, even in the failure.

I realized that in failing, I was humbled.

I admit, I can let success go to my head faster than a horse goes to hay. After that first session, I was feeling pretty cool, pretty confident. I was thinking I could take the speaking circuit by the horns, no problem. But the truth is, I’m not quite ready for the big leagues. There is a process to this, a necessary period of growth and learning. As it turns out, I have a lot to learn. Clearly I’m not going to snap my fingers and become Christian Speaker Extraordinaire overnight.

Franciscan priest Richard Rohr once said that he prays that God will humble him at least once a day. When I read that, I thought he was brave and perhaps mildly insane. After all, who actually wants to be humbled? Who wants to be intentionally and purposefully brought down, brought lower? As tough and uncomfortable as it is, though, I now see the power in being humbled. I see the power in humility. Humility is a gift, because it teaches me who, exactly, is in charge.

And it’s not, nor should it be, me.

When’s the last time you were properly humbled? Did you see it as a gift? 

“God does not respond to what we do; we respond to what God does. We’ve finally figured it out. Our lives get in step with God and all others by letting him set the pace, not by proudly or anxiously trying to run the parade.” (Romans 3:27-28, The Message)

Blogging Benedict: Learning the Practice of Humility the Hard Way

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This Lent I am reading and practicing some of the exercises in Jane Tomaine’s book St. Benedict’s Toolbox: The Nuts and Bolts of Everyday Benedictine Living. Benedict was a fifth-century monk who founded the Benedictines, a Roman Catholic order that still thrives today. He wrote what he called “the little rule,” a manual to help his fellow monks live a spiritual life in community.

I figured this week’s theme, obedience, would be a piece of cake. After all, I’m a rule-follower, always have been. As a teenager I never once broke my curfew. I always did my homework and got good grades. Even today, I write prompt thank you notes, visit the dentist twice annually and get my oil changed at 3,000 miles. I’m the quintessential annoying good girl, so I figured I could nail Benedictine obedience, if nothing else.

I should have known Benedict’s take on obedience would require more than simple rule following.

According to the Benedictines, humility is at the center of obedience. “The reason humility and obedience are linked,” explains Tomaine, “is that we cannot listen or respond if we believe that our way is the only way.”  Humility, in a nutshell, is placing God first, often by placing others before ourselves.

Because Benedict knew practicing humility would challenge his monks, he broke the concept down into twelve steps, one of which is this:

To believe in your heart that others are better than you.

Did Benedict mean we should believe everyone is better than ourselves, or just some people, I wondered. What about the people I don’t like very much, for instance? Or the person who’s spending a life sentence in prison? That person is better? Or the person whose lifestyle choices are markedly different than mine? Or the person I simply think is wrong.

This is what makes humility and obedience so tough. Benedict did mean everyone – not just the saints and the heroes. Not just the people who think like us and believe the same things we do. He meant even the annoying people. The people who have wronged us. The ones with whom we disagree.

I have a confession. While I was writing this column, I shot off a curt email to my dad. He had done something that had irritated me, and I wanted him to know that I disapproved. Frankly, I wanted him to know that he was wrong and I was right. Several hours after I’d hit “send,” in the midst of writing this column, I realized that I had demonstrated a distinct lack of humility with my dad. I could have said what needed to be said with grace rather than condemnation. I could have chosen humility over arrogance. I could have chosen my dad’s feelings over my own need to be right.

Benedict may intended his rules for his fellow fifth-century monks. But today, it seems his advice on obedience and humility was meant especially for me.

Have you ever learned a real-life lesson in humility?

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I’ve recently revisited a series I wrote three years ago called Blogging Benedict, and I’ve decided to run some of these posts on Fridays through Lent. They are based on the book by Jane Tomaine called  St. Benedict’s Toolbox: The Nuts and Bolts of Everyday Living, which I am re-reading this Lent.

This story ran last Saturday in the Lincoln Journal Star.

The Patient

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Hospital Pictures, Images and Photos

I pad down the hallway in my bare feet, wearing only a pair of grey, elastic waist athletic shorts and a cotton hospital gown.

“Nice outfit,” says the man seated in the first chair, his arms ropey sinews beneath skimpy tank top. “You, too,” I reply, smiling and tucking the gown around my legs. We sit in silence outside x-ray.

“Are you wearing a bra?” the technician asks as I stand in the dark room. I answer yes. She and her assistant tactfully duck behind the partition while I slide the undergarment out through the armholes of my gown. I fold the bra into a compact lump and slide it under my medical chart on the chair so it doesn’t show.

The technician instructs me to curl on my left side on the table with my knees pulled to my chest.

…I’m delighted to be a guest over at Duane Scott’s place today. I love Duane — I love his compassionate heart, his sweetness, his dedication to nursing (he just got a gig at the Mayo Clinic!) and his voice. Plus he’s super young … so the fact that he’s invited an old lady like me to write at his place makes me feel very, very hip indeed.

So click over and read about my morning at the orthopedist [like I mentioned…old lady], and then stay a while and see what Duane has to say. He’s wise beyond his years.

* Photo courtesy of Photobucket.

Never Good Enough

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This past summer I read a statistic that had me howling in indignation:

According to Nielsen’s television audience report, the average American home now has 2.93 TVs per household. In 2010, the number of U.S. homes with three or more TV sets increased to the highest percentage ever at 55%. What’s more, the average American home now has more TVs than people (people: 2.54).

“What?! That’s ridiculous – the average, the average! American family now has three televisions? Three?” I snorted to Brad. “Think of the starving people! Think of the millions without even clean drinking water! Think of the billion people who live on less than a dollar a day! And we Americans have televisions! More and more televisions!”

I didn’t stop there.

I proceeded to toss out names. “The So-and-Sos have five TVs, five, including one in the bathroom,” I announced. “And you know the So-and-Sos? Each of their kids has their own TV in their bedroom!” I rattled off people I knew who owned three or more televisions and denounced them for their materialistic shallowness. And then I went a step further: I accused them of ignoring the world’s poor and suffering.

By the time I was done, I’d riled myself into a frenzy. My family, of course, has only two televisions, so we don’t fall into that category, I reassured myself. I glossed over the fact that one of those is a brand-new HDTV, which replaced the perfectly functioning television we already owned.

I also missed the fact that in condemning others for their supposed sins, I fell prey to one of the most damaging sins of all: self-righteousness.

I do this regularly, you should know. I usually start with the best intentions, but it doesn’t take long before those intentions morph into ugly self-righteousness. I step onto my soap box and rail. And pretty soon I place myself above everyone else. I define myself as better.

I become a Pharisee.

When Jesus heard this, he told them, “Healthy people don’t need a doctor — sick people do. I have come to call sinners, not those who think they are already good enough.” (Mark 2:17 NLT)


When Brad eulogized his mom last September, one observance he made about Janice stood out plain as day. He recalled that several people had said they’d never heard her say anything negative about anyone else. I can attest to that – I never once heard Janice gossip about or badmouth a single person in the 17 years I knew her. That quality, Brad noted, came from a place of self-assurance – not a prideful self-assurance, but a genuine humility. Janice knew that she was not better than anyone else, and she lived out each day with that knowledge in her heart and exemplified in her actions.

Janice never assumed she was “already good enough.” I pray that I will learn to follow her example.

Do you ever have times when you think you’re “already good enough?” What brings you back into reality?