“World Series”
We have been watching the World Series this week. For those who don’t know, the World Series is the annual championship of Major League Baseball. It is played by teams in North America, not the whole world. In fact, of the 30 teams in the MLB only one is located in Canada. So, according to baseball, the “world” is basically the United States. There is no competition with teams from other countries such as Japan, Mexico, the Dominican Republic , Russia, or China or any other continent. The “World Series” is no more a “world” competition than the Mr. Universe contest is a universe competition. I mean, really, where do we get off claiming some man or woman is the greatest specimen in the universe? In the universe!! I don’t recall hearing any contestants from Saturn, Jupiter, the Milky Way or the ever expanding black hole.
Somehow we humans think more of ourselves than we should. We think the world (and universe) revolves around us and that we are the most important person in the room. Isn’t this at the root of all wars and killing? That people somehow think their country, their opinion, their perspective, their religion, their government, their way of life, their property, their parking space, their dreams, their rights are more important than anyone else’s. James writes about this in the fourth chapter of his epistle:
What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don’t they come from your desires that battle within you? You desire but do not have, so you kill. You covet but you cannot get what you want, so you quarrel and fight. You do not have because you do not ask God. When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures.
A little humility goes a long way. Maybe we don’t have the best team in the whole world. Maybe we are not the greatest thing in the universe. Maybe my time is not more important than your time. Maybe my way of thinking or my opinion is actually not better than yours. Maybe my way of doing things or my perspective is not the be all end all. Perhaps we can learn from others and see things a little differently. Asking God to humble us does not mean we become a doormat. It means we are able to enter another’s world and make their world as important as ours. We learn this from Jesus.
Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others. In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus:
Who, being in very nature God,
did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage;
rather, he made himself nothing
by taking the very nature of a servant,
being made in human likeness.
And being found in appearance as a man,
he humbled himself
by becoming obedient to death –
even death on a cross!
rather, he made himself nothing
by taking the very nature of a servant,
being made in human likeness.
And being found in appearance as a man,
he humbled himself
by becoming obedient to death –
even death on a cross!
Live humbly. It makes a world of a difference.
Shalom!
What do you think? How does it make you feel?
Blessings,
Steven