Ezekiel 28:1-2 The word of the LORD came to me again, saying, Son of man, say to the prince of Tyre, Thus says the Lord God: Because your heart is lifted up, and you say, I am a god, I sit in the seat of gods, In the midst of the seas, yet you are a man, and not a god, though you set your heart as the heart of a god.
Ezekiel 28:17 Your heart was lifted up because of your beauty, you corrupted your wisdom for the sake of your splendour, I cast you to the ground, I laid you before kings, that they might gaze at you.
Pride is an ugly thing and God hates pride. Unfortunately, all of us have some degree of pride in us.
Pride will kill you. Forever. Pride is the sin most likely to keep you from crying out for a Savior. Those who think they are well will not look for a doctor.
We all think that we don’t have pride, as it’s hard to spot. Pride infects our eyesight, causing us to view ourselves through a lens that colours and distorts reality. Pride will paint even our ugliness in sin as beautiful and commendable.
We can’t conclude that we don’t struggle with pride because we don’t see pride in our hearts. The comfortable moments when I pat myself on the back for how well I am doing, are the moments that should alarm me the most. I need to reach for the glasses of Christ-like humility, remembering that nothing good dwells in my flesh, and search my heart for secret pride and its symptoms.
Here are a few symptoms to help us to identify the pride in us:
1. Fault-Finding with others
While pride causes us to filter out the evil we see in ourselves, it also causes us to filter out God’s goodness in others. We sift them, letting only their faults fall into our perception of them.
The spiritually proud person shows it in his finding fault with other saints. . . . We are so busy finding fault with other people, that we don’t see our own faults. We won’t even listen to the Holy Spirit who prompt us about our sin.
In Matthew 7:5 Jesus said Hypocrite! First remove the plank from your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from you brother’s eye.
The eminently humble Christian has so much to do at home and sees so much evil in his own that he is not apt to be very busy with other hearts.
2. A Harsh Spirit
Those who have the sickness of pride in their hearts speak of others’ sins with contempt, irritation, frustration, or judgment. Pride is crouching inside our belittling of the struggles of others. It’s cowering in our jokes about the ‘craziness’ of our spouse and other people.
3. Superficiality
When pride lives in our hearts, we’re far more concerned with others’ perceptions of us than the reality of our hearts. We fight the sins that have an impact on how others view us, and make peace with the ones that no one sees. We have great success in the areas of holiness that have highly visible accountability, but little concern for the disciplines that happen in secret.
4. Defensiveness
Those who stand in the strength of Christ’s righteousness alone find a confident hiding place from the attacks of men and Satan alike. True humility continues in doing good, entrusting the soul to our faithful Creator. The more the world is against the humble Christian, the more silent and still he will be, but in his prayer closet he will pour out his hart to God.
5. Presumption Before God
Humility approaches God with humble assurance in Christ Jesus. If either the “humble” or the “assurance” are missing in that equation, our hearts very well might be infected with pride. Some of us have no shortage of boldness before God, but if we’re not careful, we can forget that he is God.
Psalm 2:11 Serve(worship) the Lord with fear (reverence), and rejoice with trembling.
Others of us feel no confidence before God. Which sounds like humility, but in reality it’s another symptom of pride. In those moments, we’re testifying that we believe our sins are greater than his grace. We doubt the power of Christ’s blood and we’re stuck staring at ourselves instead of Christ.
6. Desperation for Attention
Pride is hungry for attention, respect, and worship in all its forms.
Maybe it sounds like shameless boasting about ourselves. Maybe it’s being unable to say “no” to anyone because we need to be needed. Maybe it looks like obsessively thirsting for marriage, or fantasizing about a better marriage, because you’re hungry to be adored. Maybe it looks like being haunted by your desire for the right car or the right house or the right title at work: all because you seek the glory that comes from men, not God.
1 Corinthians 1:31 that, as it is written, “He who glories, let him glory in the LORD”
7. Neglecting Others
Pride prefers some people over others. It honours those who the world deems worthy of honour, giving more weight to their words, their wants, and their needs. We consciously or unconsciously pass over the weak, the inconvenient, and the unattractive, because they don’t seem to offer us much.
Maybe more of us struggle with pride than we thought.
There’s good news. Confession of pride signals the beginning of the end for pride. It indicates the war is already being waged. For only when the Spirit of God is moving, already humbling us, can we remove the lenses of pride from our eyes and see ourselves clearly, identifying the sickness and seeking the cure.
By God’s grace, we can turn once again to the glorious gospel in which we stand and make much of Him even through identifying our pride in all its hiding places inside of us. Just as my concealed pride once moved me toward death, so the acknowledgement of my own pride moves me toward life by causing me to cling more fiercely to the righteousness of Christ.
Psalm 139:23-24 Search me, O God, and know my heart! Try me and know my thoughts! And see if there be any grievous way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting!
Prayer: Dear heavenly Father, thank you for you mercy and grace. We pray that you will forgive us our pride. We ask that through your Holy Spirit you will open our eyes for the pride in our lives. Help us to change and be truly humble in everything we do, think and say and honour You. We ask in Jesus Name Amen