Friday, April 8, 2016

April 9, 2016

"In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death—even death on a cross!" Philippians 2:5-8

This pride thing is powerful! REALLY powerful! You might say that pride is holding the remote control for your life.

You are born into it and unless you do something very radical you will die in it. 

One exercise I am suggesting to help you take the remote control out of pride's hand is to ask yourself three soberly serious questions:

How does pride manifest itself in my life?

How does pride masquerade itself in my life?

And a third question, how long will I allow pride to hold the remote in my life?

Pride is a prison. It shuts you in and shuts God and others out of your life. So, how long do plan to stay in prison imprisoned by your pride? How long? 

Another day?

A week?

A month?

A year?

How long?

Why not break free from the prison of your pride?

Freedom is a decision made possible by the radical humility displayed by Jesus. He gave up the glory of God's perfect paradise and and came to earth as a man just so He could humble Himself to death on a cross.

The One who had every reason to be proud humbled Himself in every way He could in order to break the power of pride in His life and in yours!  He who deserved to be honored and worshiped instead can to be a servant to those who despised Him.

Humility is the anti-pride! Whenever I am tempted to a prideful spirit I immediately begin looking around for a way to humble myself.

God had very right to demand us sinners seek Him and repent of our sins and seek to reconcile with Him. But he didn't wait on you He initiated the reconciliation! He rebuked the paralysis of pride and humbly came as a servant!

Pride says, "Wait on them to apologize to you!" Jesus says, "Don't wait - initiate!" Think about the powerful implications this would have in your relationships!

What if you fought through your prideful emotions and declared your decision to break out of your prison of pride?

What if you stood up to your prideful self and proclaimed:

PRIDE YOU ARE NOT!
  • My Master
  • My Boss
  • My Warden
  • My Boyfriend 

What if you told your pride, "Pride, I am not waiting on that person to reconcile with me. I am going to take the initiative to humbly serve that person in hopes that I can reconcile and repair that broken relationship!"

Honestly, you could do that couldn't you?

It wouldn't feel good. It would be hard. But you could do it if you decided you wanted to.

So, why wouldn't you do it?

What are you waiting for?













The Pride Masquerade

"Pride comes before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall." Proverbs 16:18




Pride is the root of sin and you are born with a sinful nature so pride is as natural to you as breathing.

I am not talking about the pride that is proud of your family or your country or things that motivate and inspire you. I am talking about pride that destroys and divides.

The problem with pride is it closes you in while it closes God and others out.

Like the sin nature itself, unless you kill pride it will kill you!

I am sharing three questions to help you deal with your pride before it does you in.

Honest questions are a good way to bring you to honest revealing insights into your struggles with pride.

The question from yesterday's post was "How does pride manifest itself in you?"

Today's question is similar but goes a layer deeper: 

"How does your pride masquerade itself in you?"

Once you are confronted by the ugliness of your pride you either have to deal with it or disguise it as something more acceptable.

Let me share several ways pride masquerades itself into more acceptable forms.

"Its not pride, its confidence!"

Confidence is a not a bad thing if it is based upon your confidence in God and from your faith. But any confidence that arises out of your talent, or your intelligence, or your level of education, or your success is not actually confidence it is pride.

"It's not pride, its competitiveness!" 

You tell yourself that you're not proud you are simply competitive. But why are you competitive? Is it because you don't want to look bad? Is it because you want to make the other guy look bad? It is because you feel bad when you lose and good when the other guy loses? 

Are those not reflections of pride?

"I'm not proud just because I make comparisons!"

When you compare your personal worth based on the worth of others that is a pride issue.

When you build your self-worth on how your abilities or your success or your IQ compares with another you are probably motivated by pride. 

Again, I ask you, "How does your pride masquerade itself in your life?"

Are you dealing with your sin or are you trying to disguise it?

That's a crucially important question!