The Sin of Pride

I am still reading the book Respectable Sins by Jerry Bridges for our small group. I finished the chapter on the sin of pride this morning and thought I would share a few of the points.

He said that Christians (including me) can be prone to these particular sins that are in the category of pride.

The sin of MORAL SELF-RIGHTEOUSNESS: We as Christians can tend to look down our noses at society with a heart filled with pride because we don't do some of the weightier and obvious sins that the world does. We can be like the Pharisee in the temple who looked at the Tax Collector in the back of the Church and said "I thank God that I am not like that Tax Collector over there." How many of us have read that passage and said in our heart, "I thank God I am not like that Pharisee?" This sin of moral self-righteousness is not limited to Christians. There are plenty of non-Christians that appear morally better than others in society, and have the same sin leaking throughout their heart. How many non-Christians read the beginning of this paragraph and said in their heart, "I am glad that I am not like those moral self-righteousness Christians!"?

The sin of CORRECT DOCTRINE: We also as Christians can tend to feel pride over having (in our opinion) all our doctrine straight and in line. We can feel pride because we are Calvinists and not Armenians; Covenant and not Dispensationalists...you get the point. Bridges also said that even the person who does not have a thorough doctrinal position, still can feel pride by his non-doctrinal views; they are "our" views that we tend to feel pride about whatever they are.

Then there is the sin of ACHIEVEMENT: We can also have pride over our achievements. The things we have learned, have accomplished, have done, have written, have spoken, have had our children do. This can be in any category of our lives from work to play, from home to church.

These are a couple of the verses Bridges suggested meditating over in his chapter on pride. I hope these points are helpful to you, and the verses listed below. I prayed throughout the chapter as I read it and asked the Lord to reveal to me the sin of pride in my own life; maybe you could do the same. Hopefully that didn't sound too prideful when I just said that :-)

1 Corinthians 8:1
1 Corinthians 4:7
Luke 17:10
Psalm 75:6-7
Hebrews 13:17