Feast of St Mark the Evangelist
1 Peter 5:5b
Clothe yourselves with humility in your dealings with one another, for: God opposes the proud but bestows favor on the humble.
Can I tell you how grateful I am that the current style in clothing is a loose fit? Not that I'm a slave to fashion or anything. I have shirts that date back to the early 2000s. It's just nice to be able to cover up and still be wearing the stuff that is in the store window. I'd like to say that the entire reason I want to cover up is modesty, but it's not. It's also because I want to hide imperfections that I perceive in my body. And that's the beauty of clothing. Whether it's love handles, cellulite, a scar, or even sunburn, until you change it, clothing covers it up.
Here, Peter is telling the young church members, to listen to the elders and show humility, even if it is just as a cover up. Fake it until you make it. If you know you struggle with pride (and most of us do in some form or another) you can take effort to clothe yourself in humility.
Here are some ideas:
- Really listen when someone else talks.
- Consider that you might be wrong every once in awhile and allow that to shape the way you approach a disagreement
- When a friend or co-workers shares something about their life, ask more questions
Those are just three things we can do to take on the appearance of humility. The awesome thing is the longer we wear it the more it actually becomes part of what we are instead of just what we look like on the outside and humility is always in style.
