By Pastor Brandon Young
There seems to be one important fact that that we are forgetting: We are all humans and we all make mistakes and do wrong from time to time. When you demand perfection in others, you surely will be let down continually. Although, as Christians we should aim and strive for perfection, we will often fall short! We seem to have grace and mercy for our own short falls if we decide to admit them at all, and we justify our own actions! Oftentimes we decide to live our lives in pride. Pride keeps you from celebrating other people’s success, keeps you from initiating an apology when you know you are wrong, keeps you arguing the point after the fact that you’ve realized you don’t have a really good point, keeps you from admitting loss, keeps you from admitting weakness, keeps you from admitting you need help, keeps you from being honest with yourself, keeps you from being honest with others and God, keeps you from learning new things because you want others to think you know everything, and I could go on and on with how pride robs our life of the joy of the truth! When my pride is speaking to me, it encourages me to seek my selfish interests above God’s. More bluntly, my pride prefers a deceptive illusion of self-advancement or self-exaltation or self-protection to God’s exposing, humbling, but ultimately merciful and liberating truth — which is utter foolishness, because that’s preferring the destruction of my greatest joy over the pursuit of my greatest joy. So, dishonesty is almost always a form of pride.
Jesus is the Truth! We can’t have a part with Jesus until we are truthful with ourselves and with Him! Pride prefers deception to truth and does not realize by doing so it prefers destruction, but God desires truth in our inmost being, because he knows that his truth will set us truly free (John 8:32). Humility produces honesty! Humility is referred to as lowliness in the Bible because there is not a Greek word for humility! Lowliness means self-depreciation — to lower in condition or rank, to be aware of one’s defects, not proud or assertive (forceful, forward, pushy and aggressive) Ephesians 4:1-3 states, “I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you that ye walk worthy of the vocation wherewith ye are called, With all lowliness and meekness, with longsuffering, forbearing one another in love; Endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.” Paul encourages believers to walk in lowliness and meekness. We must be aware of our own defects. If we take a good long look at ourselves and all our flaws, failures, shortcomings, and issues, we would have plenty of mercy, grace, and compassion for others. When we lie to ourselves by acting like we don’t commit sin and wrong, in pride do we shun others who are failing miserably thinking we are better than them.
David says in Psalm 32:3-5, “When I kept silence, my bones waxed old through my roaring all the day long. For day and night thy hand was heavy upon me: my moisture is turned into the drought of summer. Selah. I acknowledge my sin unto thee, and mine iniquity have I not hid. I said, I will confess my transgressions unto the Lord; and thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin. Selah.” When David was dishonest with God and men, it was like a wasting disease. When he came clean with God and men, it was health and refreshment to his soul. This is what God wants us to have: health and refreshment to our souls. It is a great mercy when God rests his hand heavy upon us because we are living dishonestly. And the longer we walk with him, the more rigorously he demands we live truthfully before him. He wants truth to reign in every part of us because he wants us to enjoy full freedom and to increasingly know him. We can never really know God until we are willing to be truthful with him and for him. We must realize our own weaknesses, and realize that from time to time, we hurt others and do the wrong things even as children of God. Not one of us is a mini Jesus although we should be trying to be like him more every day. When God saved us, he saved our soul and we live in this fragile and sinful flesh daily, and it is capable of hurting others. The worst thing that we can do is lie to ourselves and pretend in pride that we do not sin. For all have sinned and come short of his glory! If we can be lowly and truthful, we can find ourselves being compassionate and understanding of others, but when pride reigns in our hearts, we try to create a façade for others to see.
Pride tries to control and manipulate someone else’s perception of us for our own selfish interests. Being honest to God is openly admitting who we really are and no longer living out of the fear of man. It is repenting of the pride that has fueled our deceptive ways of living and have mercy, grace, and forgiveness for others that have hurt us along life’s journey. It is laying down before our merciful King Jesus all our old, sinful, defective beliefs about what it means to be significant and worthy and enough. It is embracing his truth, however difficult and painful that embrace might feel at first and being lowly before God and man. Satan is wonderful at robbing us of our joy, peace, contentment, and satisfaction because pride is his open door into our lives! Let’s close the door of pride, and walk humbly before our Lord.
(The Solution Column is provided by Pastor Brandon Young of Harmony Free Will Baptist Church, Hampton.)