Pride and Prejudice

(Note to self: Begin Step 3)

I've been confronted on the issue of pride before. like- more than once. And it's really a pickle. When somebody tells you, "I think you're struggling with pride", it's tough to find the solution. Because all of the things that come to mind to reinforce your humility before God are- things to take pride in. Perhaps one solution would be to: stop doing anything that could possibly make you prideful. Make a concerted effort to value everyone more than yourself, and to worship God. And then to do as little as possible for selfish gain. <-- but this is a battle you could fight for 200 years and not be done. All the while, your purpose is... selfish. And your idol is humility. And your enemy is pride, so you would much rather embrace false-humility.

It's much more socially acceptable in Christian circles to be falsely-humble than it is to be honest-to-God-persevering... and that's a problem. I'm pretty sure that if Paul were living in our day, a HECKUVALOTTA Christians would 'lovingly' and 'gently' inform him of his pride problem(which really wasn't pride at all, but the outworking of complete faith in God(not that that's me, I'm still fairly prideful)).

So my solution is:
1. Stay humble before God in prayer. Ask Him for His guidance, His help, His forgiveness and grace.
2. Don't stop doing what God calls you to do. No matter what anyone says.
3. Blog about your opinions on Pride and Humility and Faith.

A lot of us see pride as an enemy. And, it is. But pride is a peon compared to satan, sin and death. And those are our enemies if we claim Christ. The Bible says:

(of satan)Resist the devil and he will flee from you.
(of sin)In your struggle against sin, you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood.
(of death)Whoever turns a sinner from the error of his way will save him from death and cover over a multitude of sins.
(and)Fight the good fight of faith.

The prideful person will read these and say, "Yeah! I can do it! YEEHAW!!"

The person with false humility will say, "I am nothing, I can do nothing. All I can do is worship Jesus. I am too sinful, too incapable, and too weak to do anything of value to God. It is only by grace, and not by works, that I get anywhere".

And it's the humble person who says, "I am nothing, I can do nothing apart from you. Although humble before You and Your word, I see that you have called me Your own. You have given me Your spirit. And in humility I seek not my own glory, but Yours, Lord, for you are worthy. I am only your servant, and I do only what you ask. However, I see you have asked much of me. So I will strive to do much. I believe that nothing can separate me from your love(Romans 8:38-39). I believe that there is no fear in love(1 John :18), so I will not be afraid. For it is your perfect love that compels me to follow when you say follow, and to go when you say go. You are the God who works all things out, and You will go before me and fight. You, the only possessor of efficacious grace, will give me that treasure in jars of clay. I humble myself, as I am, before you and you alone. And I will strive to be like Paul who struggled with all Your energy, which worked so powerfully within Him. And though the prideful and the falsely humble say no, I will dare to say yes. You are my strength and my shield. And I long to see Your glory revealed! Give 'em heaven! YEEHAW!!!"

Let's aim for true humility. Pride is bad, but false humility is also bad. And both of those look down on everyone but themselves. But true humility is about God, not about men. The question for me is: is my life about the things of God?

You can do nothing. But God can. And He will, if you'd just get over yourself and start moving. If your "humility" lessens the authority of God and the Holy Spirit in your life, it is not something of God. It is of the flesh, and it is of your desire to be looked upon favorably by men. And if you read Paul's writings, and He sounds prideful to you, that's probably a problem too.

I realize that I'm the "Peter" here. I jump out of the boat and God disciplines me. I claim strength and end up seeing weakness. But i firmly believe and hope that God can sharpen me as He sharpened Peter. If you're a Peter, do likewise, humbly.

But for the rest of you, look to Jesus. And in faith, take a step out of the boat. Don't let your false-humility be the limiting factor in what God will do in this world. Let's go, and let's see what an omnipotent God can do. YEEHAW!