Rooting out pride: Part 1 

The Power of Pride

Living purposefully, for a Christian, goes hand in hand with living the way God calls us to live.

 

It calls us to step into what He calls us to step into, but it also calls us to root out the things He hates. One of those things is pride.

 

Isaiah 2:12 says very clearly, “For the LORD of hosts has a day against all that is proud and lofty, against all that is lifted up–and it shall be brought low.”

 

James 4:6 says, “God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.”

 

Proverbs 16:5 is very firm when it states, “Everyone who is arrogant in heart is an abomination to the LORD; be assured, he will not go unpunished.”

 

 

On a very practical level, we can see that pride destroys. 

 

If God HATES pride and if pride brings destruction, it must go. Pride needs to be taken out. Living the way God calls us to live, living purposefully, does not allow for pride.

 

Here’s what pride can do.

 

        • Pride affects big and small things.
        • It makes demands and feels deserving and expects recognition. This is the opposite of what JEsus teaches in Luke 14:10 where he calls those listening to seek no honor and sit at the end of the table. 
        • Pride looks highly at self and even shows itself off.
        • It gets offended, it exaggerates offenses and it validates an extreme and unwarranted punishment for being offended. 
        • Pride can take us to unreasonable thoughts, actions and places.
        • It drives selflessness out and selfishness in.
        • It makes way for self serving decisions.
        • It inhibits our ability to see other’s point of view.
        • It puts us in the right.
        • Pride makes forgiveness harder, moving forward past offense harder. It breeds bitterness. 
        • It leads to rash decisions and unwise choices. 
        • Pride listens to yes-men.
        • It affects friendships, marriages and entire nations. 
        • It drives disrespect and anger. It sees others as lesser.

 

 

 

 

We see that making choices in pride can lead to a mess of things whether in small circumstances or large ones. 

 

Friends, pride destroys. It’s in most if not all of us in one way or another. Often it’s inevitable to have it rise up, but it’s important to constantly but that to death. We need to shut pride down. We need to pray for humility. We need to act in humility. 

 

As James 4:6 says, “God opposes the proud,” but it doesn’t finish without stating that He “gives grace to the humble.”

 

 

 

A huge way to combat pride is to remember who we are with and without Him and who we are in relation to Him. Compared to God, real talk, we are NOTHING. We don’t even come close. 

 

Let’s remember that when Jesus was on this earth, even HE was without pride – the one person who had the right to be prideful. 

 

Let’s humble ourselves – actively. For pride, although it seems to look out for us by putting us first, is only out to destroy us. 

 

 

XO, 

 

Meg