Humble

"Is this one for the people, is this one for the Lord, or do I simply serenade for things I must afford?"

(What If I Stumble by DC Talk)

How much humble is too much humble? At what point does Confidence and Take Charge Attitude become NOT humble enough?

I believe that I have a reasonably accurate assessment of my skills in most aspects of my life, but acting out my appropriate confidence (or lack of) in the correct doses baffles me. I am not a very good braggart – which is not to say I don’t brag. There are many times I want to project that I have full confidence in my abilities, but I often have no confidence in understanding what volume or intensity is productive or counterproductive.

I can make up my resume to reflect my skills as a cabinetmaker, or a customer service rep, or a QC technician, or a shop supervisor, or a documentation compliance manager, or a Youth/Music Minister. But I struggle creating a cover letter that highlights my abilities without sounding like (to me anyway) egotistical clichéd boasting. Father Tom Dunne once related a story about a young priest who might be in line for a promotion. He was told he needed to write a summary of all the great work that he had done. The young man was unable to do so because, although he was proud of his achievements and believed he was worthy of the promotion, he also believed that he should not be the one tooting his own horn – that his superiors should already know his accomplishments and worthiness. If he had to boast, he must not have done well enough to be noticed by them and therefore didn’t deserve it. Granted, this story is more appropriate to an “in-house” promotion situation, but the dilemma is similar.

Likewise, with my music, I think I am pretty honest with my self-evaluation of my abilities. I pride myself in playing what I play quite well – well enough to earn some extra money at it, and given more devotion could do better (but probably not significantly better – I’m pretty much near the top of my potential). Of course, what I don’t play so well, I try to avoid. I sing on key and reasonably strong, and can generally jump onto any un-filled harmony line as needed. I am not a natural born leader, although when put in that position I can draw on my belief in my skills and, having a vision of what the project requires, can do an adequate job. No matter how well it turns out, I am humble in the knowledge that it did so more on the abilities and cooperation of others, through fate, or Holy Spirit – certainly due to things beyond my control.

I have not been leading Youth Masses (except the annual Confirmation Mass) so I am a little out of shape. I miss it. I enjoyed the steady opportunity to work on improving my skills and attempts to deliver a memorable event. See, if I was truly humble, I would have my first thoughts be of offering my time and God-given talents for the good of the church. Instead, it’s the individual personal benefits I perceive, with an eye towards being favorably noticed by my community.

Last week, I received a call from a longtime Youth Minister friend, who needed a favor. His regular music people from his parish were for some reason not able to lead their Youth Mass music at a confirmation retreat being held on Cape Cod. Of course I was flattered that he would think of me for this occasion. I didn’t stop to consider whether he had already been turned down by dozens of others and I was simply the last on his list. My ego assured me that I was of course worthy of being honored by his request. I did harbor some concerns regarding how it would all go off. Not being familiar with his group/parish and therefore not knowing what songs would go over best, or if my lone guitar and voice would need amplification to be effective, and knowing that I couldn’t know what I might need to know but couldn’t, meant that I had some humbling doubts as to how well I could pull it off. I was informed in advance that another musician would be there to help me out. Well I found the retreat center with plenty of time to spare and started to practice to get a feel for the room. I soon learned that I would have a young bass player and some singers helping me out as well. Throughout the next hour, various teenagers were introduced to me as singers and the bass player, and even another young lady guitarist. Although the other officially listed musician had not yet arrived, I got my little but growing ensemble going through the song list – giving directions and advice, and figuring out who was capable of what. With one song still to go, Jon arrived and pulled out his guitar. With this final introduction out of the way, I explained to him where we were, what we were doing, and how I expected to proceed onward. I started to play – and Jon joined in behind me. As I said, I have a pretty good read on my abilities, and I instantly recognized that there was an absurd flip flop of abilities and of assigned responsibilities. I had no right leading THIS guy. This was like John baptizing Jesus. But similarly as Jesus, fully knowing his ability and place, casually and graciously submitted authority to a lesser qualified person, Jon happily added complimentary guitar parts and harmony lines and went along with everything I had prepared. Father Medairos (my own Pastor – the following day) spoke of humility. He quoted a bit from readers Digest where a great orchestra conductor when asked what was the most difficult instrument to play, claimed that “it was 2^nd fiddle. I can find plenty of 1^st violinists, but finding a 2^nd fiddle who will play with enthusiasm – that’s a problem. And if we have no 2^nd fiddles, we have no harmony”. Well, Jon showed no hesitation nor condescension at playing 2^nd fiddle to me. Nor were we short on harmonies. With a full-fledged chorus of able-voiced young men & women, we had harmony galore, counterpoint parts, and mid-stream dynamics and key changes on the fly. I discovered (thankfully not before hand – it might have un-nerved me) Jon is a musical evangelist with his own conceived and developed full blown stage show that he performs most every week, locally as well as around the country. His credentials are clearly not those of a second fiddle, at least not when compared to my own, but I never would have known this by his demeanor. It took an explanation from another friend to clue me in as to who/what he was. He never once tooted his own horn (although he played his guitar exquisitely). In the end, it was a very humbling experience, as once again, a terrific event occurred for which I was given gracious credit for, which in the end I had precious little control over. I was simply willingly in the right place at the right time with an assigned task which I hope I humbly performed well, as did the dozen or so others who stood beside & behind me all humbly performing their assigned tasks. It was just left to the Holy Spirit to make something special out of us all, and the results make it implausible to NOT believe in the power of the Holy Spirit.

"Do they see the fear in my eyes? Are they so revealing? This time I cannot disguise all the doubt I'm feeling. What if i stumble, what if i fall? What if I lose my step and I make fools of us all?"