The innate and incurable pride of human nature creates within us an inveterate tendency to boastfulness and self-display. The interior plea of the heart is, “Look at me!” That is the ineradicable source of rivalry and ambition. It is right to excel for the right reasons, but often the impetus is the desire to rise above others. The braggart exaggerates his merits and the bashful offer excuses for mediocrity, but all are concerned as to how they appear, perform, and succeed in their efforts. All of us have a “front”, a façade we present to the world, and a carefully guarded image that we seek to enhance with some distinction or other. Self-love and self-elevation are symptoms of the infection of our souls that we identify as original sin. Our perversion is evident in the fact that we seek to display the counterfeit glory of the creature in our doings rather than reflect the true glory that is God’s alone. The goal of excellence is good but the motive of its achievement is often awry. Everything that shines within human competence is meant to redound to the splendour of God who enables our exertions. We exist to serve his praise and acknowledge his worth but we direct our energies toward self-exaltation and thereby imitate the dark master of our fallen spirits who vaunts himself in false light before the creation in competition with the Lord. Lucifer (a name he does not deserve) is gleeful at the little candles we light in honour of self. His aim is to rob God of his glory and we are hoodwinked into participating in his crime. When we are awakened to his game, and see ourselves as his hapless pawns, we are nauseated at the arrogance of man and sickened by ourselves. Who can deliver us from the foul habit of self-worship and the exhibition of our own contemptible glory? This is the very essence of sinfulness, to withhold our adoration of God and praise and parade our own excellence. We know that the world, even when tempered by the general grace of God, strives for the goals of greatness and gratification without reference or deference to God, but how much does the Church of God, at the various levels of its life, function from the craving for prestige? How much does boasting, carefully masked, dictate our aspirations and boost the momentum of our actions?
Are we, the weak, endeavouring to prove our strength? Are we, the poor, pretending to be rich? Are we, the kin of the lowly One, operating with a detestable loftiness of spirit? We boast so much, forgetful of the modesty with which we ought to conduct ourselves. And we can’t help ourselves. Pride is our native, natural, fundamental characteristic. It flows from an unstoppable fountain, forms a putrid pool within in which we vainly search for a flattering reflection of self, rather than occupying ourselves with mirroring the magnificence of God and ascribing all credit to him. We are to be wholly offerings to the Lord but we are off-centre in terms of our vocation before him. Our existence is askew. The ungodly are unaware that this malady of conceitedness is the clue to their lives and all that they enterprise. Our vanity consumes us, our time, our assets, our occupations, our aspirations. Life is the beauty parlour in which we adorn ourselves for the admiration of others. It makes us self-conscious instead of being God-conscious, and our real self, when it is permitted to emerge, makes us miserable. It can do no other when our makeup is removed. The loathsome ego always dogs us, feeding our illusions and fuelling our illness of heart. Even the godly are terrorized by this monster, this tormentor from the deep that we cannot ourselves fathom. “The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it? (Jeremiah 17:9). Redemption or wrath must meet us at this point in ourselves. We cannot defile God’s domain forever. Our inner evil must arrive at a terminus eventually through renewal of our entity or divine rejection forever. Our dependence on grace is total. Our plea for grace must be earnest.
In the meantime our pride, so subtle in its manifestations, so guileful in its disguises, enfolds us in a sense of security and smugness. The godly may congratulate themselves on their supposed stability and degree of sanctification. The election of grace soon becomes misinterpreted as preservation by merit. Salvation to purity becomes qualification for privilege and misled believers, bathing in the favour of the power of God, infested with presumption, so identify themselves with the purpose of God and their centrality to it, that they become pompous and consider themselves ever prosperous through the divine dealings on their behalf. Peter assumed a strength in himself that he never had. He crowed about it until he was corrected by the call of a rooster. His accurate confession of Christ was a gift (Matthew 16:13-20). He met head on with his frailty in his craven disowning of Christ before a serving girl and a stranger. His fallibility appeared again when Paul rebuked him for his disregard toward Gentile believers, having received such emphatic intimation from God that Gentiles were fully integrated into his people. Paul himself, a notoriously boastful individual, had to be humbled continually by a “thorn in his side” following an extraordinary revelation of God imparted to him in the third heaven. If we are witnesses of apostolic arrogance, given the grace accorded to them, we must be watchful over our own inclinations that can gain a grip and move apace before we know it. We live in continual need of forgiveness and renovation.
No writings anywhere surpass the Psalter in its insight into the human condition, the corruption and motions of the heart, the helplessness of our condition, and our only ground of hope in God. The psalms acquaint us with ourselves and point us to God introducing us to his kind awareness of our plight and disposition to deliver. They speak truth to every phase of our experience and every attitude of mind. They monitor the seasons of the heart wintry or wonderfully bright. They follow the fluctuations of our moods and chart our passage through varying circumstances. They astonish us with their pertinence and wisdom. Through godly poets they are God’s description of our internal state and our intellectual, emotional, and spiritual leanings. The author of Psalm thirty is shrewdly familiar with our habit of smugness and complacency: “When I felt secure, I said, ‘I will never be shaken’. O Lord, when you favoured me, you made my mountain stand firm; but when you hid your face I was dismayed” (vv6-7). We only stand when God supports us. Our only strength is his. He makes our foundation firm. When we are pleased with ourselves and in self-congratulatory mood his disciplinary withdrawal can leave us shattered and humbled. He punctures the puffed up spirit. When we have recognized our folly we turn to him for mercy. We forsake our bragging for his blessing which is only bestowed upon the humble and not those who feign humility. Haughtiness within Christians and among Christians is a total contradiction of the character of Christ, especially the tendency to talk down from the heights of super-spirituality or superior knowledge (head only). Our confidence is in God exclusively and is cautious of self-importance. It avoids self-sufficiency. “What do you have that you did not receive? And if you did receive it why do you boast as though you did not?
RJS
Are we, the weak, endeavouring to prove our strength? Are we, the poor, pretending to be rich? Are we, the kin of the lowly One, operating with a detestable loftiness of spirit? We boast so much, forgetful of the modesty with which we ought to conduct ourselves. And we can’t help ourselves. Pride is our native, natural, fundamental characteristic. It flows from an unstoppable fountain, forms a putrid pool within in which we vainly search for a flattering reflection of self, rather than occupying ourselves with mirroring the magnificence of God and ascribing all credit to him. We are to be wholly offerings to the Lord but we are off-centre in terms of our vocation before him. Our existence is askew. The ungodly are unaware that this malady of conceitedness is the clue to their lives and all that they enterprise. Our vanity consumes us, our time, our assets, our occupations, our aspirations. Life is the beauty parlour in which we adorn ourselves for the admiration of others. It makes us self-conscious instead of being God-conscious, and our real self, when it is permitted to emerge, makes us miserable. It can do no other when our makeup is removed. The loathsome ego always dogs us, feeding our illusions and fuelling our illness of heart. Even the godly are terrorized by this monster, this tormentor from the deep that we cannot ourselves fathom. “The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it? (Jeremiah 17:9). Redemption or wrath must meet us at this point in ourselves. We cannot defile God’s domain forever. Our inner evil must arrive at a terminus eventually through renewal of our entity or divine rejection forever. Our dependence on grace is total. Our plea for grace must be earnest.
In the meantime our pride, so subtle in its manifestations, so guileful in its disguises, enfolds us in a sense of security and smugness. The godly may congratulate themselves on their supposed stability and degree of sanctification. The election of grace soon becomes misinterpreted as preservation by merit. Salvation to purity becomes qualification for privilege and misled believers, bathing in the favour of the power of God, infested with presumption, so identify themselves with the purpose of God and their centrality to it, that they become pompous and consider themselves ever prosperous through the divine dealings on their behalf. Peter assumed a strength in himself that he never had. He crowed about it until he was corrected by the call of a rooster. His accurate confession of Christ was a gift (Matthew 16:13-20). He met head on with his frailty in his craven disowning of Christ before a serving girl and a stranger. His fallibility appeared again when Paul rebuked him for his disregard toward Gentile believers, having received such emphatic intimation from God that Gentiles were fully integrated into his people. Paul himself, a notoriously boastful individual, had to be humbled continually by a “thorn in his side” following an extraordinary revelation of God imparted to him in the third heaven. If we are witnesses of apostolic arrogance, given the grace accorded to them, we must be watchful over our own inclinations that can gain a grip and move apace before we know it. We live in continual need of forgiveness and renovation.
No writings anywhere surpass the Psalter in its insight into the human condition, the corruption and motions of the heart, the helplessness of our condition, and our only ground of hope in God. The psalms acquaint us with ourselves and point us to God introducing us to his kind awareness of our plight and disposition to deliver. They speak truth to every phase of our experience and every attitude of mind. They monitor the seasons of the heart wintry or wonderfully bright. They follow the fluctuations of our moods and chart our passage through varying circumstances. They astonish us with their pertinence and wisdom. Through godly poets they are God’s description of our internal state and our intellectual, emotional, and spiritual leanings. The author of Psalm thirty is shrewdly familiar with our habit of smugness and complacency: “When I felt secure, I said, ‘I will never be shaken’. O Lord, when you favoured me, you made my mountain stand firm; but when you hid your face I was dismayed” (vv6-7). We only stand when God supports us. Our only strength is his. He makes our foundation firm. When we are pleased with ourselves and in self-congratulatory mood his disciplinary withdrawal can leave us shattered and humbled. He punctures the puffed up spirit. When we have recognized our folly we turn to him for mercy. We forsake our bragging for his blessing which is only bestowed upon the humble and not those who feign humility. Haughtiness within Christians and among Christians is a total contradiction of the character of Christ, especially the tendency to talk down from the heights of super-spirituality or superior knowledge (head only). Our confidence is in God exclusively and is cautious of self-importance. It avoids self-sufficiency. “What do you have that you did not receive? And if you did receive it why do you boast as though you did not?
RJS
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