Last week, I mentioned Stephen Cherry’s book Barefoot Disciple, and I want to share a bit more about it this week.
The book itself came into my hands quite serendipitously. I had read a blurb about it while preparing my Lenten reading list, and at that stage, had entered in on my Goodreads account as a book I wanted to read. Then, of course, I forgot about it. But at church, I have been collecting books for a new venture: a used book stall, which in a well-read and curious congregation seemed like a good idea. We are planning to refurbish the current library a bit – a few new shelves, perhaps, a lick of paint, a carpet. We are hoping to have it as an open room, staffed by welcoming hosts before each service so that it might serve as a bit of a living room space, where people can pick books up, drop old ones off, and sit for a quiet moment or a chat before the buzz of full-on congregational life. We’ll see how all these visions develop as time goes by and plans become commitments. Right now, we are still in the dreaming and gathering stages.
And, because we are gathering, books keep appearing on my desk. Now, I find that this happens from time to time anyways, and so I can’t be sure that Stephen Cherry’s book was a donation for this purpose or if it merely migrated there as other books do. In any case, because I had wanted to read it, and because it was suddenly there, I picked it up and started to read.
“Today humility is seriously out of fashion. It is impossibly uncool.”
Indeed. The word humble never seems to make it to the pages of public consumption as anything other than an insult, or at least a snide remark.
Still the words of Micah echo – seek justice, love kindness, and walk humbly with God. That all sounds clean and easy. But we know that it feels more complicated than that. Into that complication, Cherry offers thoughts about the apparently impossible task of learning humility.
“We know that to claim to be humble is to risk being thought of as conceited and boastful, but we also know that it is far more complex than that. All this makes us very self-conscious about it, which is deeply ironic because, as we shall see, humility is the virtue which encourages self-forgetfulness.”
He presents an interesting analogy for the self-forgetting necessary when one seeks to learn how to be a humble disciple of Christ. He compares this to those moments when we are overtired and find it difficult to sleep. Our thoughts keep spinning and the unrest grows. What we need to do is to summon enough energy to clear our pestering thoughts away. If we can focus on something other than our exhaustion, our thoughts will clear and rest will come naturally. We can’t aim for sleep; we need to focus on something other than not sleeping. In much the same way, we can’t learn humility by focussing on becoming humble, but we can try to walk the way of the humble.
This book isn’t a how-to book. Not really, at least. It is a discussion about the human realities of this uncool calling. Cherry insists that learning humility is integral to discipleship, and he shows us what that looks like. It is a book full of gentle reminders of what Christ-like living should look like. Passionate and self-forgetting. But most emphatically, it reminds us that, though we might seek to be humble disciples, humility is ultimately a gift.
“Humility… has nothing to do with coming out with words which are intended to persuade others that we are not taking pride in our achievements. It is about being honest, generous, open and engaged with the world as it is transfigured and transformed into the kingdom of God.”
Barefoot Disciple is a slow read in the best possible sense – a book to read slowly, to mull over, to consider. I tend to devour books, reading for information and amusement, but this is a book has been making me slow down and read carefully and thoughtfully. And that might be that best recommendation.
