12 days of Advent: a Substack Community Celebration #5

an Advent reflection on humility, with Sarah Styf

Hi, I'm Laura, and I’m a multi-passionate mama of 3, excited about demystifying creativity, obsessed with other people’s pivots and delighted by flat whites, long walks and learning.

just wow!

I can't help but wonder if we would be better off as a collective if we more willingly embraced humility in our personal lives and relationships instead of engaging in an endless pursuit of greatness.

- Sarah Styf

Welcome to the fifth offering from 12 days of Advent: a Substack Community Celebration. I’m sure you’re going to be fascinated by this offering. Today’s gift is from

Sarah Styf

: a teacher, podcaster, and writer. When she isn't working at her day job or spending time with her husband, two children, and two dogs, she is busy writing and creating over on

On the Journey

.

This is a fantastically thought-provoking piece of work on the role of humility in the entire Christmas story, from an American Christian. I loved it, and can’t wait to read your thoughts.

please note there is reference to Palestine in this article (in reference to the story of the life of Jesus Christ).

Sarah Styf

Sarah writes…

Americans do not value humility.

Sure, we love to celebrate rags to riches stories, the epitome of the American dream. We're supposed to always want something bigger and better. We're not supposed to be happy with what we have. Success is about having more money, a bigger house, and a lucrative job in a highly respected profession. After all, if you live in the land of opportunity, shouldn't you be able to achieve all of your dreams?

“Humble” only suits our narrative if we can eventually leave it behind us. It’s okay to come from humble (or poor) circumstances, but only if we use our past to highlight just how far we’ve come. No one wants to hear the story of how a successful individual continues to return to the tiny house where they grew up. Audiences want to see a one-time visit saved for a reflective news piece with folksy music playing in the background.

Yet I can't help but wonder if we would be better off as a collective if we more willingly embraced humility in our personal lives and relationships instead of engaging in an endless pursuit of greatness.

Far too often, we see humility as the result of defeat: an undefeated team loses in a championship game, a politician steps down in disgrace, a company watches record profits dry up due to changes in the economy. But true humility is about seeing oneself as only a small part of the bigger picture. It’s about recognizing that there are people and situations so much bigger than us. It’s about acknowledging that true “greatness” isn’t about us.

I find some of the most humbling moments to be those when I realize just how small I am in the greater scheme of things. When I look up at a cloudless, starry night. When I gaze at mountains and canyons. When I see the tremendous accomplishments of others.

Nearly five years ago, our family fulfilled one of my dreams by traveling to Mesa Verde National Park. The park is surrounded by majestic mountains and stunning rock faces, but in the middle of the desert is the preserved ancient architecture of the ancestors of today's Pueblo people. I thought I was prepared to see Cliff Palace in person, but I wasn't. We came around the corner and I gasped. There was once a civilization that had figured out how to heat and cool their homes and build entire villages into mountain walls and farm in the desert. They did this without modern technology, and in some ways, their work was more advanced than what we see in most of our cities today. What we learned during our two days in the national park humbled us; even with all of our knowledge and technology, we still have so much to learn.

Advent also humbles me.

The older I get, the more I think about the role of humility in the entire Christmas story. As a Christian who believes that the historic Jesus Christ was and is the Son of God, I cannot help but wonder at the incredible humility it would take for God to take on a human body for 30 years. I have given birth twice, and I can say with absolute certainty that there is nothing clean and romantic about being born. I’ve changed diapers and cleaned up after vomit. I have nursed sick kids and cared for them while wounded. I have experienced my own physical and emotional pain, pain that is just a part of being human. Being human means experiencing life for all its beauty and awfulness. To me, the most incredible part of the Christmas story isn’t the virgin birth, the journey to Bethlehem, the eventual arrival of the magi, or even the angelic birth announcement: it’s believing that God willingly became a human being.

And it didn’t end there. He escaped to Egypt as a toddler. He grew up in Roman-occupied Palestine. He would eventually die a humiliating and horrific death at the hands of his enemies. When tempted with wealth, power, and notoriety, he turned away from it. He wasn’t on earth to become a celebrity. He was on earth to serve and save his people.

During this Advent season, I want to embrace a little humility. I want to remember that there is something greater than me. I invite you to also practice a little more humility throughout Advent and into the new year.

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Thank you so much

Sarah Styf

for this timely reminder. Humility can be such a charged word: what are your thoughts?

Sending love,

Laura x