Pride Vs. Humility

Pride vs. Humilty

a) Introduction...

A wise man once said that,

"To know a man, observe how he wins his object,

rather than how he loses it;

for when we fail our pride supports us; when we succeed, it betrays us."

How many in here tonight have ever been betrayed by pride?

My guess is every man in here.

Pride is not some horrible thing.

It’s an human emotion.

A God-created emotion.

How many father’s are in here?

Aren’t you proud to be a father?

When your child does something absolutely amazing don’t you take pride in raising such an

amazing young man or young woman?

How many veterans are in here tonight?

Aren’t you proud to have served your country?

Pride is not an all together bad thing.

But pride is kind of like the stereo type of the pit bull.

If it’s rubbed the wrong way there’s always that chance that it can turn on you.

In fact, the Bible says in...

Pro 16:18 Pride goeth before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall.

So pride often comes before a fall. Amen?

Why?

When misplaced pride draws the attention away from God,

And gives us a false sense of security in ourselves.

The type of pride that goes before destruction is the "pride of life" mentioned in 1John 2:16.

That scripture warns us not to love the world...

1Jn 2:16 For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world.

The greek for this type of pride, the pride of life, is al-ad-zon-i’-a bee’-os, (alazoneia bios)

Which means to have self-confidence in our present state of existence.

This kind of pride makes the top of God’s hate list in Proverbs 6:16.

And this type of pride is a plan killer.

b) Pride is a Plan-Killer...

How many in here tonight know that God has a plan for your life?

Eph 2:10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.

But pride kills our ability to follow God’s plan. 1 Peter 5:5 and James 4:6 warn us that God gives grace to the humble but resists the proud.

From Genesis to Revelation we are warned about pride.

You say well brother JB, if pride is not all together bad then why does God seem to hate pride?

It’s not necessarily pride that God hates.

He hates the way we play on that emotion.

See, God created us for purpose.

Every feeling, every desire, everything about us was intended to serve a purpose.

Not our own, but His purpose.

And after the fall, Even during the events that caused the fall, the devil has played our emotions against us.

We should look around us and as we see all the wonderful things in the world

we should take pride in God for all that He has done.

But instead, with our distorted view point, we choose to take pride in what we have accomplished.

Not really seeing the big picture.

Simply put...We take pride in the creation rather than the creator.

It’s not without first humbling ourselves to God that we can see things from a true perspective.

Benjamin Franklin said it best when he said, “Humility is a virtue so difficult to grasp that if

I should ever attain to it, I would be proud of myself.”

c) Humility is Essential to the Plan...

I said earlier that Proverbs 16:18 said that pride comes before a fall.

Well, the next verse, verse 19, says that it is better to be humble and poor, than rich and

proud.

I believe that humility is directly affected by the size of our God.

If we think little of God or don’t believe God can direct our lives,

we will think that we are able to do a better job than He can.

But in all actuality, we don’t possess the ability to direct our own lives.

Alot of us haven’t even come to that realization yet.

And that’s why we experience one failure after another.

But Jeremiah knew that we weren’t capable of directing our own lives.

Listen to what he says in...

Jer 10:23 O LORD, I know that the way of man is not in himself: it is not in man that walketh to direct his steps.

See, when we serve a small god we feel we have to do it all ourselves.

And when we succeed we take pride in our selves,

Which then sets us up for the fall.

But when we put God in proper perspective, then and only then, will our self-image fall into

the right perspective.