I like Tim Keller's quote today: "If you met a truly humble person, you wouldn’t think him/her humble, but happy and incredibly interested in you."
Being a pastor and wife for over a half century we have been privileged to entertain scores of folks in our home. Curiously we noticed something: the vast majority spontaneously told us all about themselves without even being asked. They could easily occupy two hours at the table reciting story after story, incident after incident..... all about themselves. Much was interesting and we thrilled with them but afterwards had a sense of lopsidedness. In hindsight, rare has been the person who made inquiry about our lives, children, ministries, perspectives, opinions or background. And that's alright. We're pretty ordinary people. Not too many humdingers to pass on. But I think we could come up with an interesting tale or two.
A well known Christian leader once visited us by surprise. His name was known throughout the Christian world. What impressed us most was his interest in 'little old us.' Really we were very young but he was so inquisitive about our limited experiences in life. He hardly, if at all, referenced himself, his enormous knowledge or his widely traveled life.
Someone once noted: In the 1940's and the 1950's we had the all-encompassing Life magazine. Then we cropped our vision down to People in the '70's. Things tightened up even more with Us. Next came Self. Somewhere there's got to be a magazine just for me: THE DICK CHRISTEN MONTHLY.
Oh, that's right, I'm a Christian. Jesus showed me how to wash the other guy's feet. I'd best remember that because when self is not negated it is necessarily worshiped.
-Dick Christen
