In studying the topic of pride as it relates to Christianity, I’ve found that all the material I’ve encountered has pretty much followed the same progression: i) teach people how pride is truly the worst of sins, ii) tell them to be humble (and that it’s only possible with Jesus’ help), iii) caution them not to fall prey to false humility which can be equally destructive.
Last week however, while attending Ottawa Christian Counsellings "Relationship Intelligence" seminar with Krystle, I heard a rather enlightening twist on this matter. The speaker followed the previously stated progression but ended off bringing things around full circle by stating that one of the essential components of true humility is a solid foundation of self-worth! Wow, that’s usually the one thing they try and steer way clear of.
To illustrate this, she used the example of a man who aspires to be a great writer but is scared to make any serious attempts at writing, and even when he’s encouraged by his friends he shies away from the prospect, usually with “humble” excuses like “oh, well, I’m not really talented”. On the surface, this man appears to be as far from prideful as can be, but he is very prideful indeed. His problem in fact is that he thinks too highly of himself. He knows that any attempt he makes brings with it the possibility of failure, and he can’t stand the thought of failing and looking like a fool to his friends and/or to himself. In other words, he thinks so highly of himself that he can’t stand the thought of showing any weakness and risk being ridiculed or embarrassed so he doesn’t try at all.
Undoubtedly, this point spoke to me so powerfully because I count myself among these pridefully shy people. As a society we’re accustomed to castigating openly prideful people, and even the unapologetic show-offs themselves are usually willing to admit that they shouldn’t be the way they are. On the other hand, pridefully shy people – such as myself – are left relatively alone. Sure, our friends might try and poke us out of shells for our own good but in general they’re willing to accept our shyness as an innate character trait that isn’t hurting anyone, but a sin is a sin, whether it’s a sin of commission (e.g. open pridefuleness) or omission (i.e. meek pride).
James 4:17 - Therefore, to one who knows the right thing to do and does not do it, to him it is sin.
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3 comments:
The lecturers point that being humble involves an acknowledgement of self-worth is really neat. I think of Jesus' command (out of Leviticus 19:18), "You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy" (Mt. 5:43). It's implied in there that you are to love yourself. Piper's the only one I've ever heard say that we need to love ourselves.
Imagine how much better the Church would be at addressing pride if the value of the person were addressed.
You're right Pete. He he, actually the first place I ever read about the need to love yourself was in Blue like Jazz.
Donald Miller talks about how the "golden rule" is usually referenced to get us to do good for others, but quite often we forget about how we ourselves factor into that equation. Too often we work so hard at satisfying other people that we might need to reverse the phrase and think of it as "do unto yourself as you do to others".
Someones we treat and think so lowly of ourselves, in ways that we would never allow ourselves to think of others, and in doing so we violate that command by not treating ourselves as people of worth (for anyone who has the book, this whole part is on page 231). I like what he has to say at the end of it, "Gods love will never change us if we don't accept it".
You need to be careful though. I think there is also a reason why the bible doesn't say we should love ourselves, and that is probably because that is exactly what naturally in our fallen nature we will do. Naturally we are selfish people. I think pride could be the worst of sins, but that pride is rooted in our own selfishness, our own self love.
One thing too about what Donald miller said about "by not treating ourselves as people of worth" We need to know where that worth comes from. In one sense i don't think it is a bad thing to think lowly of ourselves, for that is exactly what we are, we are lowly horrible sinners who deserve nothing but death! But then in the sense of that we are Christians, Christ has died for us, and so we are given worth through his sacrifice. We need to make sure that we find our worth in Christ alone, and not in who we are as a person.
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