All tagged pride
This morning I read Psalm 127 and contemplated God's provision for us and His hand in all we are, have, and do. This is a short Psalm that is comprised of five verses, but it speaks volumes about God's involvement in all aspects of our lives, and the goodness He brings to them. It also reveals the deception of Satan as he works through our pride in self to steal God’s glory. Pride led to Satan’s downfall, and our pride remains his ultimate deception as he attempts to separate us from God.
Are we reluctant to ask something of God? Are we too embarrassed by our condition, or too ashamed of our sin, to reach out to Him for forgiveness and help? When should we bring our needs and our contrition before Him in prayer? Sometimes we do so at a certain time of day, or come to Him only when we feel overwhelmed, but we have been told specifically when we are to come… we are to come always, right now, and without ceasing, and in so doing we find that this is also how God forgives us.
Prideful Christians, we have all known one or two in our lives, and Heaven forbid we are one. We see in them a holier than thou attitude where we should find the distinct humility of Christ. Our boasting should never be in our own faith, and belief, but in Christ, and He crucified. Too often we see the palm fronds lying on the ground, and the fine colt on which Christ rode into Jerusalem. We hear the cheers, and forget the jeers, and neglect the sting of the whip. In the midst of our pride we forget that the cross was His true glory. We forget what it means to pick up our own cross and follow Him into the spit of the crowd, and that only by suffering as He did can we boast in Him. Does our faith make us proud, or does it point to our own Cross on Calvary?
As we seek after God are we arrogant, boastful, or consider ourselves above others? Even in our faith do we look down on those we perceive to be of little faith, those who remain lost in the world, or those believers that appear to be less blessed than we are? Well God’s blessings in our life are not because of our own perfection, but come from His grace, and mercy through Jesus. Any boast we might make, or haughtiness we exhibit regarding our righteousness, goes hand in hand with all our other transgressions, it is no less founded in sin… it is the revelation that we have succumbed to the “pride of life”, and is not of God, but solely of this world.