Humility, as we all know, is one of those virtues that is never gained by seeking it. The more we pursue it the more distant it becomes. To think we have it is sure evidence that we don't.
Interpretation
Humility cannot be attained through desire or pursuit; true humility arises naturally from self-awareness.
This quote highlights the paradox of humility, emphasizing that it cannot be achieved through deliberate efforts to attain it. Instead, genuine humility comes when an individual recognizes their limitations and flaws without striving for recognition or status, suggesting that the very act of pursuing humility may lead to its opposite.
In practice
During a speech about leadership, you could say, 'As Richard J. Foster wisely noted about humility, it is rarely gained through pursuit.'
Go another step. Try to live one entire day without words at all. Do it not as a law, but as an experiment. Note your feelings of helplessness and excessive dependence upon words to communicate. Try to find new ways to relate to tohers that are not dependent upon words. Enjoy, savor the day. Learn from it.
Jesus Christ and all the writers of the New Testament call us to break free of mammon lust and live in joyous trust...They point us toward a way of living in which everything we have we receive as a gift, and everything we have is cared for by God, and everything we have is available to others when it is right and good. This reality frames the heart of Christian simplicity. It is the means of liberation and power to do what is right and to overcome the forces of fear and avarice.
Love, not anger, brought Jesus to the cross. Golgotha came as a result of God's great desire to forgive, not his reluctance. Jesus knew that by his vicarious suffering he could actually absorb all the evil of humanity and so heal it, forgive it, redeem it.
When we determine to dwell on the good and excellent things in life, we will be so full of those things that they will tend to swallow our problems.
The Spiritual Disciplines are things that we do. We must never lose sight of this fact. It is one thing to talk piously about 'the solitude of the heart,' but if that does not somehow work its way into our experience, then we have missed the point of the Disciplines. We are dealing with actions, not merely states of mind.
Each activity of daily life in which we stretch ourselves on behalf of others is a prayer in action.
One of the many lessons that one learns in prison is, that things are what they are and will be what they will be.
Abundance is scooped from abundance yet abundance remains.
Sweet Mercy! to the gates of heaven This minstrel lead, his sins forgiven; The rueful conflict, the heart riven With vain endeavour, And memory of Earth's bitter leaven Effaced forever.
Whatever terrible things may have happened to you, only one thing allows them to damage your core self, and that is continued belief in them.
Right in the difficult we must have our joys, our happiness, our dreams: there against the depth of this background, they stand out, there for the first time we see how beautiful they are.
Even feigning surprise, pretending it was unexpected and saying a ritual thanks, is surely wiser than just expecting everything so carelessly.
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