Taking the Escalator Down
My first escalator ride was with my dad when I was a little boy. We walked up to this big moving staircase and I saw all those metal teeth. My dad, of course, warned me with the usual line, “Make sure you pick up your feet. You don’t want the escalator catching your shoestring.”
The sheer thought of that—this transportation monster catching me and pulling me under—created a stream of questions: How would I fit? Where would I go? Would I just keep revolving, hour after hour? Would I get mangled? It seemed dauntingly paralyzing.
But my dad got on and said, “Are you going to join me?”
So I did, hesitatingly. I gripped the black rail tightly and, holding my breath, took the escalator down.
Humility is a lot like that. It’s taking the escalator down. Your first time approaching it, it just seems big and scary. Will it eat me up? Take me under? Where does it lead? We often hold our breath spiritually when we realize humility is our only, yet no doubt best, option.
Fortunately, Jesus is already on that escalator. He has taken the escalator down, and he wants you to join him in living humbly. He invites you to reject pride and embrace meekness. To accept his yoke of gentleness and lowliness. And because he has, you can as well.
This really is the point of Philippians 2:1-8. Paul doesn’t just admonish the believers there to be humble (vs 1-4), but to be humble like Jesus (vs 5-8). In other words, there is a template for us. An example. It’s Jesus. And because he took the escalator down, we can—and should—too.
Join Jesus today in taking the escalator down, and “in humility count others more significant than yourselves” (Philippians 2:3).
Pastor Todd