An Unexpected Encounter with Pride

Have you ever had one of those moments where you get hit with new information that rocks the way you have always seen yourself?  I had that happen just a couple of nights ago.  I believe those are God moments – times when He reveals something that is distancing me from Him that I was not aware of, and maybe didn’t want to be.  And He reveals them so forcefully that I have to catch my breath and go spend some time with Him to recover from the shock of knowing myself more.  So what was this shocking revelation?  I am a person that struggles with too much pride. 

Much of what we label as pride, arrogance, and even narcissism is anything but high self-esteem. 

What was shocking to me was that I had always seen myself as a person with low self-esteem, and I truly am that person.  It comes with being a perfectionist.  No matter what I do, it is never good enough and I am plagued by doubts and haunted by thoughts of what I could have done differently and better.  Knowing that, how can I have too much pride?  How is that even possible?  Doesn’t having pride mean you think too highly of yourself?  Not really, as it turns out. Much of what we label as pride, arrogance, and even narcissism is anything but high self-esteem.  In fact, it is a way of masking that we think that we have little value, and we are doing everything in our power to get people to change our mind about that.  Ironically, the most secure and grounded people are the humblest people you will likely meet.

True humility is knowing, loving, and validating yourself so that you quit obsessing about whether you are enough and how others see you.

Now, I am not really on the arrogant, narcissist side of things by nature.  I get uncomfortable with too much praise and attention.  My go-to response is to deflect compliments.  In what I do and how God has chosen to use me, I am often out in front of people, but when my task is finished, I would be just as happy to slip away unnoticed.  Too much attention makes me nervous and suspicious.  I have learned not to trust praise because, too often, it is false and self-serving for the person giving it.  I run from criticism because I believe it too much.  Because of all those things, imagine how much I was floored when I realized that at the base of all those responses was pride!  What I thought was humility in myself was actually a false form of humility.  True humility is knowing, loving, and validating yourself so that you quit obsessing about whether you are enough and how others see you.  So whether it comes out as arrogance or as self-deprecation, all of that worrying about how we look to others, if they are happy with us, and what we can do to make them love us more is all the opposite of being humble – it is pride.  Mother Teresa put it beautifully: “If you are humble nothing will touch you, neither praise nor disgrace, because you know what you are.”  Arrogance is accepting all the praise eagerly and getting angry at criticism.  False humility is deflecting the praise and holding the criticism too close to your heart.  True humility is being the you God wants you to be no matter what anyone else says.

There are two sides to pride.

What was it that made me stop short and start looking at the pride in my life?  It happened at a revival that was being held at my church.  The preacher had us go prayerfully through a checklist about where we had pride in our lives.  I thought to myself, “Oh yeah!  I got this.  No pride in me – nope – I am so hard on myself that I can’t possibly have pride.”  It started out so good.  I happily checked the humility boxes that said I wanted to serve others and that I was willing to concede the right to be right.  Self-denying and willing to admit to myself where I am weak?  Yes ma’am – I am all over that.  Don’t you love when you are acing a test?  But then everything changed.  All of a sudden the humility boxes didn’t apply – the pride ones did.  I had to check on the side of pride when it came to being too self-sufficient and not being willing to trust and lean on others.  I had to check that I longed to be a success and didn’t want anyone to recognize any weakness or sin in me.  I sighed as I checked the pride boxes that said I kept others at arm’s length and felt wounded when I was overlooked.  And I cringed when I checked that I was self-conscious, compared myself to others, and was more concerned about how others saw me than about how I could walk alongside them.  That was when I realized there were two sides to pride.  Either you think you can do it all yourself and you are better than anyone.  Or you think you can’t do anything right and you aren’t measuring up to others.  Humility is when you move beyond that and realize God is the one in control.  He is the only one capable and He is the only opinion that matters.  And He already loves you just as you are – faults, warts, successes, and even pride. 

I would say that the biggest part of the work of sanctification is handing our pride and false humility over to God. 

We all know pride is a sin.  It appears in some form 70 times in the Bible, few of them positively.  We have all heard over and over how a humble and contrite heart is valued by God and how the meek shall inherit the earth.  In fact, humbling ourselves is a necessary part of being saved.  Until we can fully submit to God from a position of giving up everything – our own attempts to be good enough and our own brokenness about not being enough – we can’t give our hearts to Him.  Unfortunately, being saved doesn’t immediately rid us of pride.  It is one of those things we will have to keep offering to God over and over again.  In fact, I would say that the biggest part of the work of sanctification is handing our pride and false humility over to God.  How many other sins would we avoid if we didn’t have pride?  We wouldn’t covet what others have.  We wouldn’t lie to make ourselves look good.  We wouldn’t indulge in sinful acts to make ourselves feel better.  Pride creates sin in our lives.  Proverbs 16:18 says, “Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall.”  Pride comes first – sin follows immediately after.  And there is no distinction between the pride that boasts or the pride that beats ourselves up. 

I turn to something besides God for relief.

I see it myself.  I get wounded by some failure and I turn to something besides God for relief.  Maybe it is food.  Maybe it is buying things I don’t need.  Maybe it is something else, but it is always something that becomes a craving I could not resist in the moment even if I tried.  It becomes a false idol.  Or someone says something critical and I get angry or hurt.  I see the person as the thing they said, and not as a fellow human with thorns as well as roses.  I turn either to hurting them back, or more often in my case, I begin to covet their good opinion so much I start to change to get it.  They become an idol.  It is such an immediate response for so many of us.  We react in the moment of hurt pride.  Our default is not humility.  

Jesus neither stayed entirely in His anger nor in His desire to connect.  He was balanced in all things.

Am I saying that we should never defend ourselves?  Not at all!  Jesus was the ultimate model of true humility.  He was not affected by the hoards of people following Him nor the criticisms of the Pharisees and other people out to destroy Him.  He knew Himself – who He was and what His role was, even at the age of 12 when He was about His Father’s business in the temple.  He is perfect because He is God and so He is perfectly humble.  He didn’t back down from speaking truth to those trying to trap Him.  He didn’t run away from hard conversations with those accusing and criticizing Him.  He also didn’t waste a lot of words about it.  He said what He needed to say.  He stopped speaking when He was done.  He did it with honesty and with infinite love.  And He never, ever let it take Him away from who He was or His mission.  He could turn over the tables of the money changers, and also look out over the city and say, “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem! How often would I have gathered you as a hen gathers it chicks.” (Matthew 23:37)  He neither stayed entirely in His anger nor in His desire to connect.  He was balanced in all things.  His balance was not self-serving, either.  It came not from a place of brokenness and self-hatred, but of a place of knowing and being fully secure in Himself.  There are many lessons in that for us.

Humility is the path to being content.

First, humility has to start with finding security and acceptance in ourselves through our relationship with God.  Paul puts it this way, as he is thanking the Philippians for gifts they have given:  “I am not saying this because I am in need, for I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances.”  (Philippians 4:11)  His gratitude does not come from a place of need.  He has learned to not find the answer for all his needs from other people.  And he is also accepting their help when they freely offer it.  He is not pushing other people away with too much self-sufficient pride.  He has found a balance between demanding that people be everything to him and trying to be everything himself.  In finding that balance, he can confidently say he is content.  Humility is the path to being content.  But that isn’t all.  Paul goes on to explain what has enabled him to be content.  Philippians 4:13 tells us, “I can do all this through Christ who gives me strength.”  The first source to fill our need and give us strength is Jesus – always.  Once we are filled with Jesus, we can begin to give and take with others in a healthy dance of interdependence, rather than in a critical, demanding, or codependent way.

Our pride is in God alone.

Second, this doesn’t happen overnight.  We are not Jesus.  We do not have a perfectly stable, healthy self-image and core belief system at the age of 12.  We are all works in progress.  What we can do is to try to stop reacting out of pride in the moment.  We need to consider what is motivating how we want to act in moments of criticism or praise when our pride wants to take over.  Galatians 6:4 gives us great advice:  “Each should test their own actions.  Then they can take pride in themselves alone, without comparing themselves to someone else.”  So stop.  Think about your actions.  Does the action you want to take have more to do with who you were created to be, or does it have more to do with how you want others to see and treat you?  Our pride and our actions should never be based on how we want others to make us feel.  Our pride comes from how God wants us to be, what He created us to be, and the grace that He gives us when we fall short.  Our pride is in God alone.  If we could stop and consider whether our actions and words are self-serving, other-pleasing, or God-glorifying, we would be so much closer to humility.  It takes time and practice to get closer to the God-glorifying life, but awareness is always the first, best step.

Humility is focused on God making me into what He always planned, securely and contentedly.

The lesson I learned about pride is hard.  It is hard to realize that I took great pride in trying to prove to others that I was not in anyway prideful. I humbled myself not for the glory of God, but for the acceptance of others.  And at the same time, I was killing myself off trying to prove to others through perfection that I was worthy of their respect and love.  But I also felt an unexpected sense of relief.  God never expected me to be perfect or completely in control and put together.  He also never expected me to be a doormat or to constantly beat myself up.  He only ever expected me to be His, using the gifts and following the paths that He created for me.  My goal this week is to remember that pride is focused on the praise and criticisms of others.  Humility is focused on God making me into what He always planned, securely and contentedly, and then using that to help others to find themselves in God, too.

I hope today’s message touched your heart, increased your understanding, and encouraged you.  Praying the peace and comfort of Christ Jesus on your life.