What are you proud of? Are you proud of the accomplishments that you’ve made? Are you proud of the bad habits you’ve cut out of your life? Think about it, really. What are you proud of?
Now I want to ask you, do you carry that pride with you? Do you post on Social Media for all the world to see? Do you post about all of the books you read or all of the fun things you do just to show everyone how much more awesome your life is than theirs? Or how much more you know than them? Or how much happier you are than them? Is your pride a healthy pride or is it poison?
Billy Graham wrote:
It’s not necessarily wrong to take pride in something we’ve done well. This kind of pride isn’t boastful or self-centered, but is a feeling of satisfaction over what we’ve accomplished. King Solomon wrote in Ecclesiastes, “Nothing is better than that a man should rejoice in his own works” (Ecclesiastes 3:22, NKJV).
I read a story not too long ago about a mother of three kids. She was a stay at home mom that had her hands full. Her hair was a mess, her house was in constant chaos and she was so tired. She was tired because she loved her kids and worked hard to fulfill their needs in life. The extra hugs before they got on the school bus. The kiss and the bandaid on the boo boos. Being there and helping them with their homework. Mom stuff.
There was another mother. She was a little younger and only had one child. Her life was a bit different, because she had other priorities in her life that revolved around how many likes her social media profile can get. One day she takes her daughter to the pool in her matching bathing suit, both dressed up real nice. After a couple selfies and perfect pictures of her perfect life, she lays down to tan. Her daughter begging for attention and some quality time with mom, only to get told to find someone else to play with and leave mom alone.
When the first mom gets her 5 minutes of peace she logs in to her only escape, her Social Media account. What do you think goes through her mind when she sees the perfect picture of the “perfect” mom?
Just a side note to all of you moms who work so hard to be the first mom I’m describing, Thank You so much! To my wife, you are a supermom and I would be lost without you!!
This is the poison of pride! It poisons your heart, and the result is vanity. You see vanity is like pride, but not quite.
Pride can be a feeling of satisfaction as being superior to others and is in a sense a delusion of omnipotence. This misplaced pride deprives us of humility, an attitude that gives us kinship and an understanding of others which is an essence of righteousness. However, pride in the work one has done and how it has benefitted others can be enriching in old age if it is not accompanied by vanity.
Vanity is the awareness of this inner sense of superiority. One of its first symptoms is to blind an individual to its presence. Another symptom is to increase our awareness of vanity in others while providing us with a false and inflated sense of our own modesty and humility. Vanity always requires an audience even if it is only ourselves. It leads to self-justification, with our false personalities trying to defend themselves as highly worthy. It prompts much of what we talk about with others and directs many of our more excessive actions and activities.
King Solomon knew all too well what vanity does to a man.
In Ecclesiastes 1:14 he wrote
I have seen all the works that are done under the son; and, behold, all is vanity and vexation of spirit.
You see when Solomon became king he asked God for the wisdom to rule his people, and God answered his prayer. With his wisdom, he was a great king. He was also a husband of 700 brides (and 300 concubines), he wrote 2 and a half books of the Bible, he ruled over Israel for 40 years and built the Temple of the Lord.
He was a prolific writer, poet and scientist. We know of his wisdom from the story of the 2 mothers from the same house. One of the babies died and the mothers both claimed the remaining to be theirs. King Solomon decided to cut the child in half and the true mother pled for the child’s life. Wise King Solomon knew that the true mother would do so and reveal the truth.
Now somewhere along the line, as a man, pride crept in. King Solomon turned to worldly pleasures instead of seeking God. I mean he had 1000 women. He even allowed some of his wives worship their native God’s.
It was when he grew older and began to realize that he lived worshipping vanity and not God that he wrote Ecclesiastes. He realized that none of his life meant anything without God.
Now let’s look at the Social Media mom again. I’m sure that it didn’t start out as vanity. I’m sure she started out with love and the hopes of being the loving mom who spent the time and did the hard work. At what point do you think that her pride in being a mom turned into vanity?
It becomes very easy to see why Scripture tells us that pride can be a sin. How when pride consumes us, and vanity blinds us to our pride, we lose sight that without God we are nothing. Without God, there are no accomplishments. Without God, there are no kids to love. Without God, there is no us.
So, we have to look deeply at ourselves. Are we blind to our own vanity? Can we look again at the definition and say that we don’t check off the boxes? I am not being accusatory and I’m not calling anyone out. Jesus says, I have to remove the plank from my own eye before I point out the sliver in yours.
I want to close today with the last 2 verses in Ecclesiastes.
Ecclesiastes 12:13-14
13 Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole duty of man.
14 For God shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good, or whether it be evil.
