I went for a very long run last weekend.  If you are about tired of the running stories, please bear with me once more.  It was a hard run.  In the spirit of humility, it was the worst I’ve ever had I think.  I began to have a cramp in my calf with quite a few miles to go and was forced to stop and stretch and then continue at a walk. Now, run-walkers pass me every race I run.  They beat me over and over, but I just can’t join them.  My body doesn’t work that way, if I stop running then my body thinks we’re done and doesn’t take lightly to starting back up again.  So for me to stop and walk is not normal and not welcomed.

To stop and walk because I have no other option is humbling at the very least.  It isn’t what ‘runners’ do, hence the title of runner. I began to ponder other things that I have felt were somehow beneath me.  I remember when I was not a kid, but not a teen in that unsettled place between.  My church had a ‘children’s church’ program.  You sat through the music in ‘big church,’ then filed out of the sanctuary to a back room where you did activities more suited to your age.

I was close to too old for children’s church, but my neighbor ran it and I enjoyed helping her each Sunday.  One Sunday she wasn’t there.  I didn’t know this.  I filed out with the kids and found someone I didn’t know leading the pack.  The woman didn’t know me, she didn’t know I was a ‘helper’ and not a student, she didn’t know that I was too big for that craft project.  She didn’t know that all that was beneath me.

How old do you think Jesus was before He really put it all together?  Do you think He knew from birth that He was God?

Do you think He ever got fed up with His earthly body and the limitations it put on His infinite power?  Do you think He was disgusted by the fact that He had to be potty trained and didn’t just do things perfectly in complete bodily control?  Do you think that He ever wanted to say, “If you had any idea who I am, you would never ask me to wash these dishes!”

Just imagine for a minute what His life must have been like.

Have you ever had someone try to tell you about some subject on which you happen to be a certified expert, not knowing just who you were and what you knew?  Have you ever had someone tell you at length of things you know like the back of your hand?  It makes you want to fill them in, doesn’t it?  The inclination is to stop them and say, “Actually, this is what I do for a living.  I happen to know all of this already, perhaps I can tell you a few things.”

There was never a conversation that our God in the flesh ever had where He didn’t know more about the subject than the person with whom He was speaking. There was never a time in His life when He was inferior to someone.  He was fully man, but He was fully God.  At any time, He could have called in the legions and expressed His Godly character to it’s fullest.  All the humility that He expressed was an act of will, a choice that He consciously made.

Can’t you see Him, shaking His head, belittled by His tasks and His limitations, and mumbling the words, “I’m really taking one for the team here.”

Those humbling situations where I find myself wanting to be treated the way I ‘should’ be, where I’m disappointed with myself for not asserting the skills or talents I know I have, where either I or others have forgotten just who it is I am and what I’m capable of.  I don’t go looking for those.  And I try to stop them when they look for me.

Every minute of His life was one of those situations.  All day, every day, He did that which was beneath Him.

And it began at Christmas–the first concession to the plan, the first of many times when the Savior would say, “Ok, I’ll take this one for the team, I’ll do this for them.”  It was the beginning of that life of humble moments lived in denial of His rights, in the selfless demeaning of His Perfect, All-Powerful potential.  He let Himself be squeezed into a frail and helpless capsule of skin and bones.  He let Himself be stripped of all power and control.  He let Himself be put into the care of an average little girl hand picked to be His mom.  He let Himself take on bodily functions that reminded Him every hour of this new humanity – every hunger pain, every dirty diaper, every rash, every human need.  He didn’t just come to earth in a body, a strong, powerful, imposing and charismatic figure that demanded respect by His very presence.  He came as a baby that demanded no respect, no attention, no accolades, and no praise.

My God does that.  He so often goes one step further than I could have come up with.  I can see the King on His horse, the mighty Warrior Prince riding in to victory.  That I can visualize.  But He took it one step further, He didn’t just come to rescue me, He came to welcome me.  He came to make sure that I felt understood and valued and important and special.  He didn’t want to just come in and wow me, He wanted to woo me too.

It worked.  Who wouldn’t love a God who would leave it all to be near them?  Who wouldn’t love a man who can do anything He wants, but chooses not to because He loves them?

From the very first cry, He chose humility.  He chose to be demeaned and overlooked, He chose to be helpless and underestimated, He chose to be selfless and humble.  He chose the hard road.  Not so that I could have an easy one, but so that I could have a purposeful one–in the company of a humble King who loves me so.