May 19

Proverbs 16:18 Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall.

The story is told of two ducks and a frog who lived happily together in a farm pond. They were great friends and enjoyed playing together. When the hot days of summer came, however, the pond began to dry up. They soon realized that they had to move. This was no problem for the ducks because they could just fly to another pond. But the frog was stuck. So they decided to put a stick in the bill of each duck that the frog could hang onto with his mouth as they flew to another pond. The plan worked well ­ so well, in fact, that as they were flying along a farmer looked up in admiration and said, “Well, isn’t that a clever idea! I wonder who thought of that?” To which the frog said, “I did…” Be careful of pride,­ it can cause you to fall!

Proverbs 16:5 The Lord detests all the proud of heart. Be sure of this: They will not go unpunished.

It is clear from our reading today that God hates a prideful heart. He doesn’t require for us to think of ourselves as nothing, but he wants us to think of ourselves in proper relationship to Himself. Pride elevates self to a place of importance not meant for us. Pride indicates self-reliance instead of reliance upon God.
C.S. Lewis says of pride, “There is no fault which makes a man more unpopular, and no fault which we are more unconscious of in ourselves. And the more we have it ourselves, the more we dislike it in others. The vice I am talking about is pride or self-conceit.”

Pride is considered by many to be the greatest sin of all. It leads to every other vice and it is puts a person in an anti-God position. Destroying pride in the heart is one of the hardest and longest battles that we all fight. I like what Benjamin Franklin had to say concerning his own pride when he wrote his autobiography, “There is perhaps no one of our natural passions so hard to subdue as pride. Beat it down, stifle it, mortify it as much as one pleases, it is still alive. Even if I could conceive that I had completely overcome it, I should probably be proud of my humility.”

To define sin is to understand the battle we have with it. Pride is defined as “An inordinate amount of self-esteem.” The synonyms for the word “pride” are not pretty; they are conceit, arrogance, and boastfulness. Pride is puffed up, stiff-necked and stuck-up. When we think of pride, we think of people that are loud-mouthed, obnoxious, and outlandish. In reality most are very meek, mild, calm, cool, and very calculated. Pride blinds itself to its own presence. Pride tells us that we have done all that we could, even though our walk doesn’t show it. Pride puts the “Me First” theory into play, whether it’s first in our job, our families or the church. Pride whispers to the over-spender “You deserve it”, even though you’re maxed out on your credit cards. Pride whispers to the alcoholic “go ahead you can stop anytime you want.” Pride whispers to the control freak, “If you don’t orchestrate their life, who will?” Pride whispers to the blamer “It’s the other person’s fault.” Pride says “it’s not me, but “it’s them.” In the end pride repeatedly shouts the word, me, me, me, me!

Beware of pride.