Yesterday I introduced to you the distinction between vice and virtue. In the next few videos, we’ll talk about the Seven Deadly Sins, the seven vices in the heart that are deadly not in the sense that they could kill you but in the sense that they can maim your soul.
Today, let’s consider the first of these vices, the vice or sin of pride. In Thomas Aquinas’ day, it was considered the worst because all the other vices were connected to pride. From Adam and Eve, it rolls down to us. The only difference between Adam and Eve and us is that we've made an art out of pride. We mask it in a lot of very popular sayings like “Just believe in yourself,” “You do you,” and “Love yourself first.” The Bible teaches us that people have this extreme focus on self; Martin Luther and Augustine called Incurvatus in se or curving in on the self, which was this radical bending in to focus on the self. We all struggle with it.
In Proverbs 21:4 we read:
Haughty eyes and a proud heart -
the unplowed field of the wicked - produce sin.
Haughty is the look of arrogant superiority. The Message gives the verse this way: “Arrogance and pride - distinguishing marks in the wicked - are just plain sin.”
The distinguishing marks of pride are that it wants to take credit for anything good and to blame shift for anything that's bad. Pride brings a subtle but arrogant sense of deserved-ness or owed-ness. I deserve this in life.
Pride wants to fill this void inside of us.
Karen Blixen, writing under the pseudonym Isak Dineson, wrote: "Proper pride is faith in the idea that God had when he made us.” There is a proper pride and it's rooted in how God made you. But Dineson also notes that there's an improper kind of pride that takes its cues from the personal headlines of the day. It’s based on what you tell yourself, what others tell you about you, and what your culture tells you: I'm awesome or I've got to fix this because it's all up to me.
The human soul, as I've noted, is always trying to fill this void inside. What pride says is I can fill it. I can do it; I don't need anybody else. I'm perfectly sufficient in and of myself. But the problem is that you and I are not sufficient to fill that void inside. We’re finite human beings.
So it’s impossible for a person full of pride to be a grateful person. Proud people are always taking credit for themselves for what they're doing or what comes their way. How grateful are you? Grateful people realize that whatever comes to them is a gift from someone outside, especially God. In your prayer today, would you just reflect gratitude to God? Tell him that you’re grateful and list some very specific things. Let that help disinfect your heart of pride.
Prayer for Today
Father, we want to be humble people. We want to be the kind of people that aren't constantly referencing ourselves and going quickly to ourselves. Teach us this simple practice to be grateful people: to realize that we cannot, in our gratitude, at any point claim credit for what's happened to us in our lives for what we've done. You're a good giver of gifts. We thank you for this now in Jesus name, amen
