The Pursuit Of Humility &

The Perils Of Pride!

"Surely He scorns the scornful. But gives grace to the Humble." Proverbs 3:34

"A man's pride shall bring him low: but honor shall uphold the humble." Proverbs 29:23

"Pride goeth before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall." proverbs 16:18

The word 'Pride' is mentioned 49 times in the King James Bible. What is Pride?  Why is it is so important that it was mentioned so many times in the Bible? Where does pride come from? How do we as Christians rid ourselves of it?

Pride by definition is a feeling or deep pleasure or satisfaction derived from one's own achievements, the achievements of those with whom one is closely associated, or from qualities or possessions that are widely admired. The quality of having an excessively high opinion of oneself or one's importance. Nowadays it's also synonymous with being Gay, i.e. Gay pride. I went looking for a pic on google of pride and well, I wasn't surprised that every gay image of the annual LGBT Pride Parade popped up, rainbows everywhere, even more of a reason why Christians should flee from this sinful thing called pride.

Many of us are guilty of wanting to flash around our new possessions, brag about our new promotion, new house, new car and new clothes, we long for popularity, to be the belle of the ball instead of giving glory to God we seek it all for ourselves. 

I've seen people who claim to be Christians that are musicians and say their in it to make a joyful noise unto the Lord, that they’re doing it simply to give God the Glory. On the other hand they go on about how they want grammy’s and fans and to be “successful”,  but which type of success are they pursuing, the worlds standard of success or Gods?

 Outwardly many of us put on the appearance of humility but inwardly we’re hoping to impress people, we find ourselves compromising in order to get people to like us. More of our attention is on ourselves, seeking attention instead of focusing on what we’re called to do, which is to give God the Glory in all things. God did not bless us with gifts/talents to uplift ourselves but to praise Him, instead we take opportunity with the freewill God lovingly supplies and try to seek praises for ourselves. I heard a pastor say that he read a book where the author said, “nobody can honestly say that their humble”, it’s true, and nobody can say, look at me I’m being humble, look at all the humble things I've done, the minute they do that their already contradicting what being humble is all about.  The author wrote that, “We’re people pursuing Humility by the grace of God.” We cannot obtain humility without the assistance of God, some attempt to but end up falling short every time. What in this life can we truly do successfully without the aid of The almighty powerful and loving God?

Where does pride come from? For all of us pride is innate, it's just another way sin manifests itself into our daily lives, we're all born sinners and therefore susceptible to all the different ways sin decides to barge itself into our lives. It’s in our nature/flesh to be prideful we were born that way, like the song goes, but don’t rest on your laurels and count this as an acceptable excuse. This battle between powers and principalities (which it is) can only be won with the help of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ along with  our willing co-operation. What we can do is fight against our innate nature to boast about ourselves , our accomplishments , our appearance, our possessions, even our knowledge of something. The Bible say’s knowledge puffs up, so even after obtaining a measure of knowledge whether it’s divine or worldly, we mustn’t  allow the Devil to take opportunity in our achievements  to make us boastful, hence making something seemingly nice a stumbling block. We must also be very careful try to bridle our tongue in every which way.  James 3: 1-18

So we know where pride comes from, and it’s certainly not from God. We should try to make an effort to move in the direction away from being prideful, but for many of us it's easier said than done. We've all had occasions where we knew we we're wrong about something and being so prideful we didn't want to humble ourselves and apologize. The other day a friend of mine was telling me how so much can be lost because of how we allow pride to overcome us, something so small can snowball into something huge simply because we refuse to swallow our pride. Pride is one of those trees that bare bitter fruits, like arrogance, boastfulness, haughtiness, conceit, vanity and so on. God doesn’t want anything to do with these things or people who partake in such things. We are called to be Holy like Him.

 The Bible said in the last day’s people will become lovers of themselves and that is very true today. Look around your workplace and schools and churches and so on and you will see for yourselves. People are being taught to love themselves instead of loving others. Jesus specifically said to Love (one another) the way he loves us, it is the greatest commandment. So many are blinded by these new age, new world, anti Christ standards that the world is polluting the minds of this generation with. People care more about their own happiness than that of others, having complete disdain to that which we are called to do.  Philippians 2:4 tells us to, “Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.”  

 As I wrote this I thought back on the many occasions where my mouth and pride have become a problem for me on several occasions in my life, even recently a friend had to bring it to my attention, which is the reason I decided to write this piece today. Pride is taxing on each and every one of us, but God has supplied each one of us with the tools to defeat this ugly force, (prayer). I find myself having to pray a lot to be cautious of things I say and how I react to certain things and being boastful even about performing my duties as a Christian. Every now and again we can all use a big slice of Humble Pie, better that than to spend your eternity wishing you did. Be blessed and remember to ask God daily for guidance,  it will take some humility on your part but it’s always worth it. God Bless.

"How Can you believe, who receive honor from one another,and do not seek the honor that comes from the only God?" John 5:44