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Topic: Pride (04/12/04)
TITLE: HATEFUL PRIDE By Angela Williams 04/18/04 |
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“The fear of the Lord is to hate evil: pride, and arrogancy, and the evil way, and the forward mouth, do I hate.”
The first thing that is juxtaposed with evil is pride. That is a bit strong, isn’t it? But what is pride? One definition is that it is to have an “excessively high opinion of oneself.” Why would this be a bad thing? Well, with pride, it is never only about you, it is about the other person as well. The “I am better than” syndrome inevitably comes into play. When this happens, then all kinds of evil can be justified because “I am better than, therefore I can.”
In Ezekiel 28:17, the prophet recounts the words of the Lord to him. He describes the reason for the first rebellion, which satan led against God thus:
“Thine heart was lifted up because of thy beauty, thou has corrupted thy wisdom by reason of thy brightness: I will cast thee to the ground…”
How could a created being rise up against his creator and hope to defeat him? It does not seem sensible does it? Pride tends to destroy reason. Consider some of the most horrible systems that have been created by man, slavery, the idea of a superior race and apartheid. How can a man look at another, whose only difference is the color of skin, and feel that he is somehow superior? He then uses this ‘superiority’ as the reason to carry out all kinds of injustices against the other. This is evil indeed. It is no wonder that destruction inevitably follows pride.
This evil manifests itself in other ways as well. In addition to beauty and intelligence, you can add status, money, special abilities, success and possessions. Even the church is rife with elements of pride. Humility is a disappearing virtue. This is dangerous because God has promised to resist the proud! Satan tried to take Him on with a third of the angels in heaven; they lost badly. I certainly do not want God to resist me. However, He has also promised to give grace to the humble. This is what we should strive for. The precious Holy Spirit tends to nudge us when we are getting bigger than our boots. We must listen to him. We have to be conscious always of who we are in Christ; sheep who have to obey our Shepherd. Let us opt for grace.