Recently, I had the privilege to be interviewed by Dr. Gina Loudon on “American Sunrise,” the morning program of “America’s Real Voice” network.
This was for their faith segment, and the one interviewing me this time was Dr. Gina Loudon. (Other times it is David Brody of CBN.)
Dr. Gina asked me to comment about some remarks Hollywood A-lister Matthew McConaughey made about what appears to be his burgeoning faith.
McConaughey said recently, “I’m a believer. I believe in God.” He went to church as a child, and now is apparently returning to church.
One of the things that strikes him is how insignificant we appear to be in the universe: “I look at Earth. I look at the little dot that we are on the planet. The world’s turning. And we’re that little individual on the planet. That smallness can make you go, ‘Oh my gosh. I’m nothing. None of what I do matters.’”
And then he added, “But a place of humility is actually when you realize, ‘Oh, it all matters.’ There’s a great empowerment that comes with that.”
We wish him well on his spiritual journey, and here’s hoping he continues on this current trajectory. As the classic hymn puts it: “Jesus, the very thought of Thee, with sweetness fills the breast; but sweeter far thy face to see, and in thy presence rest.”
I’m glad McConaughey underscored the importance of humility. I think humility is often the missing ingredient in many lives.
I’m a student of American history, and in that interview, I mentioned how another American also humbly promoted faith. Patrick Henry, a key founding father, the orator of the American Revolution, gave the fiery speech in March 1775, “Give me liberty or give me death.” Twenty-seven days later came “the shot heard ‘round the world” in Concord, Massachusetts, more than 500 miles north of Richmond where Henry spoke.
When this great founding father was dying many years later, he wrote in his will: “I have now disposed of all my property for my family; there is one thing more I wish I could give them, and that is the Christian religion. If they had this, and I had not given them one shilling, they would be rich, and if they have not that, and I had given them all the world, they would be poor.”
Another great hero in American history was mightily used by God to help spark the First Great Awakening. I’m not talking about George Whitefield of England, who did a phenomenal job in spreading the Gospel of Christ a generation or two before the push for American independence.
I’m talking about Jonathan Edwards, the brilliant Congregationalist minister. He’s best known for preaching the sermon, “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God”---although Paul Johnson, author of A History of the American People (1997) asserts Edwards preached more often on the love of God.
Edwards was a model of humility. He had one of the greatest minds America ever produced, and, as noted, his preaching helped spawn the First Great Awakening in the 1730s, emanating from his church in Northampton, Massachusetts. Nevertheless, he was eventually fired by his own congregation around 1750 because of church politics.
But week after week, after being humiliated by his church, a deacon would come to his door on many Saturday afternoons and would ask the reverend if he would fill the pulpit the next day because they didn’t have anyone else to do it.
And so, many times, Jonathan Edwards would preach once again to the very congregation that had fired him. What humility.
Many of us pray for revival in America. I think humility is the missing ingredient there too. 2 Chronicles 7:14 famously says, “if my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land.” Note how God says the first key in the path to God’s healing of our land is humility.
The great Church father St. Augustine was once asked, “What are the three most important virtues?” He answered, “Humility, humility, and humility.”
I often like to quote the statement from George Washington in his well-known “Circular to the States,” June 8, 1783, where he calls for us to imitate Jesus, “the divine Author of our blessed Religion.”
But humility, notes the father of our country, is a key ingredient in that equation: “without an humble imitation of whose example in these things, we can never hope to be a happy Nation.”
We need more humility in our time. Whether we get that message from the Bible, from ancient church fathers, the founding fathers of America or even Hollywood stars, a little humility goes a long way.