July 22 2011, 10:23 am | David Hudson
Funny thing about the way pride works - at my moments of greatest intoxication with it I have the greatest confidence in how others must perceive me, when in reality it is then that others are most likely to be embarrassed of my behavior. Pride is deceptive even to its bearer.
Pride is probably the least often sin confessed by the Christian. And the least likely to be brought up in accountability. We fear offending others by calling it out in them only to possibly have it called out in us. So, rather than walk in the light as God is in the light that we may have fellowship with one another, we choose to deceive ourselves and others by covering up it's blemish.
Pride is not acne. It's cancer.
I need to come to grips with the reality of my pride if I ever want to be free if it. I need to regard myself honestly, and the only way to do that is through the lens of an external, objective Reality.
I can never arrive at humility through self-evaluation. The only way to get there is through God-evaluation: I can compare myself to me (am I self-improving?) or others (am I as good or better than him?) all day long but if I am to walk in honest humility I have to see myself in the reality of God's infinite perfection - how low I truly am by comparison, yet how infinitely valuable I am because of the perfect blood of Jesus that is my new identity by transfusion. That's the only true humility - neither puffed up or self-depricating.
Anything less is psychotic, or worse, deceptive (I can put on a false humility before others when in fact I am just as infected with pride and probably lapping up the praise of men that feeds my insatiable flesh).
True humility is simply an honest recognition of who I am in comparison to who God is. The greater my awareness of His expansive perfections, the more lowly I will think of myself in comparison. The greater my appreciation of His perfect work on the cross, the more I steer clear of the God-belittling sin of self-deprication.
It's also the reason Jesus was able to say with all honesty and without a hint of presumption, "I am humble in heart" (Mt 11:29). God was simply comparing Himself to God.