Humility

The following is from a book that I recently read for my spirituality book club, The Last Addiction by Sharon A. Hersh:

I have learned that humility becomes shame when we speak it into the dark. Merely voicing our fears, failures, and distress will trap us on a dark merry-go-round that leaves us dizzy. But humility keeps us on the healing path when we speak it into the light – or the Light, the Light of the world. So I cried out, “Jesus, I don’t have anything to offer to those who will come to see me today.”
I heard Him – in my spirit – say, “I know, but I will sit in the chair with you while you work.”
Then I said, “And Jesus, I’m lonely.”
And He said, “I know. I’ll be lonely with you.”
And then I said, “And Jesus, I looked at my bank account last night, and I’m afraid about the future.”
And He said, “I know. I am your future.”
And then I said my deepest truth in that moment: “And, Jesus,…I don’t trust You.”
He said, “I know.”

I can’t help but be touched by the ending. It speaks a mountain of meaning to me. …of being absolutely truthful about what we believe. …of the absurdity of thinking God insists we hold a certain theology before taking us in …of the trust God has in us. …of the intimacy of God.

It gives a twist to what we mean when we talk about truth. Sometimes people get all bent out of shape when others use the phrase, “True for me.” “There is an absolute truth,’ they insist, often implying that the truth as they see it is this absolute truth.  I agree that there is an absolute truth, but I also know that it is vital that we fess up to what we really, really believe, that we acknowledge what does or does not make sense to us.  How can we ever be open to more knowing if we already believe that full knowing is already in us?  For those who get upset when people use the phrase “true for me”, maybe they need to open up to the possibility that this truth now being shared is closer to the “absolute” truth than their own.