If you go to public school in America, this title will inevitably be one of your writing prompts for the first week of school at least 8 of your 12 years in school.
I am a few years removed from the days of this prompt, and my summer vacation was a few months ago … and not much of a vacation, I might add … nevertheless, I was thinking about this topic as I was driving home from work tonight.
A few posts ago, I said you would probably be hearing some of our musings over what the summer meant, as we remove ourselves from the immediate excitement and recover from the initial withdrawal. These are now my own personal thoughts as I have mostly settled back into the routine of small town American life, with the change of having finished my years of schooling and now have virtually free reign of my schedule.
I think I can sum up this summer in two lessons, connected to each other, interestingly enough. 1. True Humility 2. Community.
Humility is one of those lessons that we, being human, never totally get. And the further and more enthusiastically we pursue it, the more it seems to eludes us … which is where the connection to community comes in (more on this in a bit). I have come to believe that the root sin of all sins is that of pride; humility, therefore ought to bring us to perfection once attained. But again, I think it is so common to have a misunderstanding of what true humility is. Pride, as I can best understand it, is seeing oneself (consciously or otherwise) as God, so, finding oneself at the top of humanity. Humility, then, is generally understood as the opposite, so, finding oneself at the bottom of humanity. The way I tend to go is towards the self-deprecating route. “I know that bragging about how awesome I am is a form of pride, so talking about how terrible I am must be a form of humility.” That’s generally my thought process. But both paths are actually two different paths to the same abyss of pride … both have me as the central figure. This is where my learning on community has come into play. Bathing this summer in communal prayer and intentionally seeking God’s hand on every aspect of this project led to a focus outside of ourselves. Pursuing a vision of such magnitude as crossing literal, cultural and emotional borders forced us to look to the only power that could pull off such a thing — Jesus Christ, the one who led the way on crossing borders. Subtlely, everything I did this summer (within human capacities) became about the ensemble and the people whose paths it crossed: within and without the ensemble. I found myself thinking about what would grow the group, not what would grow myself or make myself more comfortable. Now, obviously, I was not perfect at doing this … as anyone in the group can readily tell you. And I did not think these things because I’m so awesome, but because the vision was so huge, I simply could not succeed in the group AND think of myself. No one would benefit the more we sought our own comforts. But pursuing this dream, seeing the needs, and then getting to see them fulfilled and even getting to provide the provision, pulled my own sight from inside me, to outside myself. Seeing the size of the dream forced me to seek the Lord’s strength because I could not do it myself, or even in partnership with another member of Halo. And let’s be honest, there is no better way to learn the dirty truth about humility, honesty, and authentic community than to live with 12 people in a one room cabin with no running water.
So living in this close community, with a huge vision taught me about true humility … and learning about this humility taught me to live in community and pursue a vision so much larger than myself. The world becomes so much larger when you realize you do not have to be the center of it!
