SEEING EYE PEOPLE
21/02/24 11:13
Humility is an open door to personal growth and the realisation of one’s real self. Humility opens us to new ideas, evidenced based opinions and the kind of wisdom that enables us to see beneath the shroud of appearances and discern situations as they really are.
EYES THAT SEE
Humility enables us to know who is flattering us, who is being honest enough to express a truth about ourselves and who is speaking nonsense of the kind that comes from people who talk because they can. Humility will eventually enable us to see that some of us have been brain-washed with the misguided ideas of those we trusted.
There are non-Believers who have this facility and Believers who do not. We are talking spiritual discernment. Some journalists and commentators write with an acute understanding of situations. Their opinions are of the non-cliched kind that show true wisdom that sets them apart from a fashionable scepticism and routine political correctness. Some of these, I have noticed, have a serious relationship with God. They are quite different from people whose received, and long-held ideas are their god.
It is possible to discern truths in the social/religio-political sphere, not because we relied on a pattern from the past but because the spirit has enlightened us about the causes and effects at play. This kind of ‘knowing’ comes from the Holt Spirit.
HUMILITY COUNTS
But being a Christian is no more a sign of being intelligent than one is a theologian because one has a Bible. What counts is humility, the ability to listen and love the truth. What counts even more is to invite the truth to live in us and be us.
A small attention span can come from limited ability and an obsession with our own ideas. Having an attention span that is more than a milli-second long enables us to comprehend subtly, complexity and ambiguity. Talk for talk’s sake stifles our own wisdom and prevents us hearing it.
FORM OF BULLYING
We can be known for grace and an enquiring mind, or we can be known for our boorishness; as those who talk over people, talk loudly and talk a lot. Often because we lack the inhibitions that would tell more humble people to shut-up and stop filling up space with the equivalent of cotton wool. And because in talking loudly, constantly and over people we mean to convince themselves of the ideas to which we are married. We may like to convince ourselves of the truth of our stagnant ideas. Some hope to bully others into adopting their fear, prejudices and tired slogans. They live out of meanness – some because they believe in a mean god.
HUMBLE EYE SIGHT
There’s a reason why the poor in spirit see God and the humble inherit the earth. Humility opens us to life. Humility is a mode of loving ourselves enough to learn and loving others enough to see. Humility graces us with light and life. Humility restores the earth.
