Spirituality

We have a proclivity to think of individuals and nations as our adversaries when they present a threat to our personal or national well being. But, I submit, that our greatest adversary is Satan and he makes his assaults from within not without. It is an inside covert operation.

Pride
Pride is presumptuous and self-satisfying. It is estimating ourselves too highly and exaggerating our abilities. We erect myriad illusions about who we are and what we are about. We take credit where credit does not belong and parade around as though we have earned it ourselves. It is our distorted way of playing God in our own little world.

We have all heard people boast of all the things they do not do. What they often omit is what it is they do do. We all do something. Some of us engage in the same acts of others but we do it in a more subtle or different way. We may not drink, but we overeat. We may not murder physically, but we murder spiritually. We may not abuse a child, but we abuse those of a different ethnic group. We may not curse, but we demean and degrade others. Our pride blinds us to our failings. We seem hell bent on making ourselves look good to ourselves and feel good about ourselves and think God is satisfied with us. Some of us have never truly prayed but merely stood in the presence of a god we have created, because we refuse to see ourselves for what we really are. Pride is based in a real desire to be God and to be worshipped.

What does Scripture have to say on the issue of pride?

A man's pride brings him low... (Proverbs 29:23a)

Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall. (Proverbs 16:18)

The pride of thine heart hath deceived thee... (Obadiah 1:3)

This shall they have for their pride, because they have reproached and magnified themselves against the people of the LORD of hosts. (Zephaniah 2:10)

When pride cometh, then cometh shame... (Proverbs 11:2)

Not a novice, lest being lifted up with pride he fall into the condemnation of the devil. (1Timothy 3:6)

Before his downfall a man's heart is proud... (Proverbs 18:12a)

For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. (1 John 2:16)

Better to be lowly in spirit and among the oppressed than to share plunder with the proud. (Proverbs 16:19)

What we so often fail to realize is that we need God to discipline us and draw us closer to Him that we might feel our status as creatures. God is the Creator and we are the creatures. We need God, He does not need us. As Robert Brown points out, We know we need God because even when we strive to be humble, to the extent that we are successful, we become aware of how humble we are, and, regardless of how hard we try, we are unable to avoid the thought that we are “good” because we are so humble. Surely God must be pleased by our humility.

Well, what has happened here? We have become proud of being humble. So then the question becomes does our recognition of this solve our problem? Of course the answer is no, because even when we are aware of this fact, we are in danger of being proud of the fact that we recognize that we were being proud of being humble. Thus, we cannot escape this evil of pride without God’s intervention. It is only when we stand in His holy presence do we come to an understanding of who we are and who He is. Satan, God’s most formidable enemy, will have us believing we are more than what we are. And, only God can defeat the enemy within: pride.

More Articles:

2. The Gaian Paradigm Part 7 -- Belonging By Bill Ellis
*********************** GAIAN VALUES ******************ALL THAT IS -- IS A WEBS OF BEINGWe belong to the Webs-of-being - - to the Cosmos - - to Earth - to Gaia.Belonging is the protovalue from which all other values derive.We belong to the physiophere, to the biosphere, to the ideosphere. We belong to Gaia. As the aborigines said it ““we are the ownees of the land, not the owners of the land.” As Chief Seattle said it, “We can not own the land, we are part of the land.” We belong to an…

3. The Garden of Agony (Part 1) By Saundra L. Washington
Eden, the garden of ecstasy is no longer available to us. We left it in sin and shame and it cannot be regained. All the privileges it offered have been forfeited. And so every man on this toilsome journey through life, in the midst of much tribulation and much soul searching, enters the Garden of Agony.We do not enter this garden out of choice. Destiny calls us to it and we must heed the call. Jesus said "if a man is to save his life, he must first lose it." Regardless of our socio – economi…

4. Expect the Best and Get It By Daniel Sitter
The famous prayer of Jabez, where Jabez prayed for prosperity, is a model of expectant thinking that we can all benefit from. "And Jabez called upon the God of Israel saying "Oh, that You would bless me indeed, and enlarge my territory, that Your hand would be with me, and that You would keep me from evil, that I might not cause pain." So God granted him what he requested." 1 Chronicles 4:10.Jabez was absolutely sure that God would give him what he asked. He asked in faith with confidence. How…