Is Pride Alive
Pride focuses on self, it is the most dangerous of the sins because it blinds our understanding and unless God causes us to see the truth about ourselves we will go on in this blinded state.
We can see this today in the church; many say they are fine, nothing wrong with me because I have received Jesus…it’s all under the blood! Beloved this is true to a point. When we think we have nothing wrong in our lives we are blind and under the power of pride and deception. Remember the 7 churches in Revelation, 6 needed to get some things right for they were not perfect!
Sardis had a reputation of being alive but was dead! They had a form of godliness but no power. Laodicea was lukewarm, said they had everything and needed nothing but Jesus told them they are “wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked:”
Oba 1:3 testifies that the pride of the heart can deceived us and will not allow us to humble ourselves (be brought down).
The spirit of pride can be passed down through generations, it manifest in different ways.
self-centeredness; We want to be noticed/attention seeking. We are touchy and easily offended. Looks for fame, praise, and admiration and falls into vainglory.
self-will; hard to submit to others or to yield to their opinions, overbearing, critical, argumentative, inflated with a sense of superiority, inconsiderate of the rights of others.
Self-pity and over sensitiveness; breeds resentment, harboring grudges, suspicion, and has unexpressed anger. It is often not recognized for what it is because it hides itself as pity or being sensitive, so we do not confess it as pride.
Self-complacency and vanity; We are shocked by faults in others, but quite satisfied with our own.
Superiority makes us want to control the lives of others, to impose ourselves on them, to be their "dictator." It makes our will rigid and unbending when others try to assert authority.
Independence works with superiority; This leads us to disobedience and insubordination, to contempt and arrogant contradiction, to refusal of advice and assistance, to resentment of reproof by lawful authority, to blasphemy against God, bitter cursing, oaths and irreverence’s in word and act.
pride of ambition leads us to seek positions or offices of honor and dignity by which we prefer ourselves to others, however worthy they may be. Causes us to have excessive confidence makes us overestimate our abilities.
Spiritual vanity, imagining ourselves to be perfect and our acts always virtuous or finding a thousand reasons to lessen/excuse our faults if we acknowledge them at all. We may have a pride which makes us cynical. If so, we speak sarcastically and use cutting words. We ridicule others, scold and misjudge them.
Pharisaical pride leads us to boastfulness and to criticism of others. It makes us over talkative; it leads to lies and contradictions; to esteeming high birth or social rank above virtue. Haughtiness of manner, spurning others who we believe are inferior, this is where we get clichés in the church. It manifests itself by a legalism, causing us to fulfill our duties without spirit, but with hypocrisy.
Being fully submitted to the Lord Jesus Christ and Holy Spirit led can prevent us from being prideful and deceived by pride. Scripture tells us that God resist the proud but gives the humble grace. We are warned that pride is the gateway to falling and to destruction. Self-examination can truly help us to know where we are in our relationship with the Lord and if we are operating in pride.