Sermon: The Problem with Pride
No Pride, No Problem
#1809A
Ryan McClure
Given 22-Mar-25; 35 minutes
description: Pride and self-exaltation have proved detrimental in countless personal struggles, from Satan's attempt to exalt himself above Almighty God to Eve desiring to be on the same level of God to the haughty Pharisee exalting himself above what he considered to be 'underlings' or 'scum'. Proverbs 16:18 warns us that pride precedes destruction while humility fosters peace and alignment with God's will. If we could forcibly imprint the maxim "No pride, no problem" into our nervous systems, it would eliminate immense grief associated with placing our desires over God's will for us. Naaman's initial pride in in II Kings 5 nearly cost him a miracle of healing. Nebuchadnezzar's humiliation and Herod's swift horrible judgment reinforce the destructive consequences of unchecked pride. In stark contrast, Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ's humility (Philippians 2:1-11) provides the ultimate example of how to live selflessly, submitting to God's will.
transcript:
Several months ago, Jenny and I had the opportunity to have dinner with some good friends of ours. We had not seen each other in quite some time, so it was nice to share a meal and catch up on life. We went through the normal list of topics and reminisced about some of the good times that we had had in years past, eventually got to discussions about the church worldwide, and then the various splinter groups and our overall thoughts on the church of God as a whole.
As the conversation continued, we made our way to the following topic, and I am not sure what the segue was, but I do recall my friend relaying a story to me about a man that he knew who had been at a certain level within an organization and over time received what I would call titled demotions. Now the easiest way to describe this, and I have personally witnessed this in corporate America, it is someone who has been elevated to say, an executive level, and has been demoted to say, a senior vice president or a senior vice president that has been demoted to that of a vice president. Now hopefully that makes sense, and I want to expound on this a bit before I move on to what he said to me because it will add some additional color and significance to his comments.
Now there are many people in this world and also in God's church, I might add, that work very hard and diligently to do a great job for the company that they work for. Typically this performance is tied to increased scope of responsibility, pay, and even title. Once one has worked hard for several years to obtain a specific position, if that is then stripped from them or taken from the person, it is quite difficult to process and to deal with. I am sure that a 4-star general, being demoted to a 3-star or lower, that would be pretty hard to take, especially if it was not really deserved.
Closer to home, I have seen people that have led teams that are now individual contributors, and that is tough for them since their outlook on success was either leading a team or the actual size of the team that they led. And finally, I have seen others who have had someone that used to report to them who is now either their peer, and even in one instance I have seen someone who worked for someone else who is now their boss. Pretty interesting situation. These types of changes in status, I will call it, are difficult at best for top performers who are constantly trying to do their best only to be pushed back in an organization.
Now back to the story my friend was relaying. The man he knew had apparently reached a certain role or rank or position in the organization and over time experienced something very similar to what I just described. And so he asked the man, "How do you deal with all that's happened over the years?" And his response was, "No pride, no problem."
I do not recall how many times in my life where I have been kind of struck in awe of certain words. Maybe my memory is not as sharp as it could be. But all I know is that when he said, no pride, no problem, I paused silently, in quiet reflection as my brain seemed to process what felt like millions of memories and thoughts, situations I have encountered or heard of and been a part of. I felt like I had just been told the secret to world peace. Since that dinner, the phrase "no pride, no problem" has stuck with me, and I find it useful to recite in various situations (some that we will cover today), to remind myself that if I take my pride out of this or that situation, there will, in fact, be no problem.
Now a quick programming note. I do know that the topic of pride has been covered quite a bit over the past couple of years. So if you are feeling the need to doze off and you get nothing else from this message, walk away with "no pride, no problem," and start using that in your daily life to remind yourself that in most situations, if you remember to remove pride, you will also remove the problems that come as a result of it.
For those of you still with me, we will jump into what pride is and the origins of it. According to an online dictionary, pride is "a feeling of deep pleasure or satisfaction derived from one's own achievements," "the achievements of those with whom one is closely associated," or from "qualities or possessions that are widely admired." Now pride is inherently self-centered, as it is focused on the self and how one views and feels about oneself. Pride produces a change in one's perception of reality and it inflates and even puffs up one's thoughts of themselves or their accomplishments, and pride typically involves one thinking that they are better or higher than a particular situation or even the people around them.
The word pride is first mentioned in Leviticus 26:19, where God is telling the Israelites that if they do not obey Him, He will bring terror upon them and punish them and break the pride of your power, meaning their power. Now pride here is used as arrogance and presumption. God is showing that pride in their strength, their power, very well could be the thing that is keeping them from repenting, and He was ready to break it down.
We have covered the definition of pride and where it is first mentioned in the Bible. So now let us take a look at an example of pride in action. So let us go over to Isaiah 14 for our first scripture. We will read verses 12 through 15. This is the account of the fall of Hillel.
Isaiah 14:12-15 "How you are fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! How you are cut down to the ground, you who weakened the nations! For you have said in your heart: 'I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God; I will also sit on the mount of the congregation on the farthest sides of the north; I will ascend above the heights of the clouds, I will be like the Most High.' Yet you shall be brought down to Sheol, to the lowest depths of the pit."
Now we can spend a lot of time dissecting these verses because I think there is a lot in here. But I want to focus on how many times direction is mentioned throughout these verses. And let us keep in mind what pride means and even what it means to be proud.
Verse 12 starts out with "How you are fallen from heaven." We know and understand that heaven is above. It is significantly higher than our position, say, down here on earth. Now this shows that Hillel was once at a high level or position, and of course we understand this from what we can read in Ezekiel 28. Verse 12 goes on to say that "You are cut down to the ground." Another directional sentence, for a lack of a better way to put it, showing that Satan was brought down to ground zero, as it were.
Why did this happen? Verse 13 reveals that Satan's heart became wicked and pride entered and puffed up his own thoughts of who and what he was. And he said, "I will exalt my throne above the stars of God; I will also sit on the mount of the congregation on the farthest sides of the north; I will ascend above the heights of the clouds, I will be like the Most High." Let us look at how many times directional prideful words were used. He says exalt above, farthest sides of the north, ascend above the heights, and then we can include the Most High because there is a sense here that Satan wanted to be above the Most High, which is not possible because God is the Most High.
Now in these scriptures, we are shown the direction and effect that pride has on our thoughts. Pride moves us to step out even above the place or position that God has created for us and given to us. Pride causes us to first think that we are somehow up here when in fact we are down here. Once the prideful thoughts come in, eventually there is an action that follows those close behind. What is interesting is that in I Timothy 3:6, Paul warns of promoting novices lest they be puffed up with pride. And here we can see the mention of pride growing or puffing up. It has action.
Let us continue to follow this progression of pride, as we see what happens as pride puffs up. So on our way to the next example, let us go over to I John 2:15.
I John 2:15-17 Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world—the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life—is not of the Father, but is of the world. And the world is passing away, and the lust of it, but he who does the will of God abides forever.
Here, John provides the delineation between the love of the world and the love of God, which if, obviously, one loves God, that same person will clearly do the will of God.
With this in mind, let us head over to our second progression of pride in Genesis. 3 verse 1. This is the account of the temptation of Eve. I know we have read this many times, but as we go through this, remember that pride was also the sin that Satan committed.
Genesis 3:1-7 Now the serpent was more cunning than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman, "Has God indeed said, 'You shall not eat of every tree of the garden'?" And the woman said to the serpent, "We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden, but of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God has said, 'You shall not eat it, nor shall you touch it, lest you die.'" Then the serpent said to the woman, "You will not surely die. For God knows that in the day you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil." So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree desirable to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate. She also gave to her husband with her, and he ate. Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves coverings.
This very discussion, the conversation documented here in the Garden of Eden, is easily echoed throughout the generations of man. I have no idea how many times I have seen or heard this argument tactic. All you are looking for is a tiny fracture in the person's logic or thinking to then provide enough information to make that person think that you are actually right when in fact you are not.
I appreciate that in the documentation of this interaction, Eve does recount what God had required of them basically to the letter. She knew what they were supposed to do and what they should not do. But Satan, knowing the effects of pride so well, gives her a half truth, "You will not surely die," when in fact he knew that they would. In that moment though, she started rationalizing. Well, did God lie to us? Was He telling us the truth?
Let us focus in on where pride welled up in this exchange. In verse 6, "So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food," here is where the lust of the flesh presented itself. The fruit to her carnal eyes looked good, and it appealed to her carnal nature that it would satisfy her desire. We see that she saw that it was "pleasant to the eyes," so the lust of the eyes entered into the thought process. And finally, believing that the "tree was desirable to make one wise," she succumbed to the pride of life, thinking that she could find wisdom outside of God Himself.
Now these two examples—that of Satan, and Adam and Eve (or Eve)—shows us that very early in time, pride and the putting off of God and elevation of oneself was a problem. So we have seen that pride has been a stumbling block across the millennia, and in a way is unnatural because it puffs up or lifts up one's thoughts and opinions of oneself, which results in actions that ultimately condemn the prideful. It is no wonder that the book of Proverbs, where we are pleaded with to get wisdom, is full of warnings about pride.
Proverbs 16:18-19 Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall. Better to be of a humble spirit with the lowly, than to divide the spoil with the proud.
Notice once again the direction of pride. Pride puts us in our thoughts up here, when in reality, with the humble and the lowly down here is where we should be.
We have seen how pride can distort our relationship with God. Now let us take a look at how it can distort our relationship with each other. Let us go over to Luke 18 for our next example. This is the Parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector. And to set up this message, Jesus appears to be speaking to both His disciples and definitely the Pharisees, those that were gathered around Him. Throughout chapters 18 and 19, you can read of what Jesus said and see small indicators that He was either talking with a group or directly to His disciples.
Luke 18:9-14 Also He spoke this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and despised others: "Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, 'God, I thank You that I am not like other men—extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I possess.' And the tax collector, standing afar off, would not so much as raise his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, 'God be merciful to me a sinner!' I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other; for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted."
It is interesting here. The comparison that Jesus draws is just interesting to me. He specifically mentions a Pharisee, which was really a person who was part of a religious group at that time, and then a tax collector, which notably is a profession, something that you do for a living versus a political affiliation. Also of note is how the Pharisee's puffed up or prideful assessment of his own life and conduct is so much higher above everyone else, you know, the extortioners, the unjust, the adulterers, and oh yeah, this tax collector guy. So Jesus is showing that pride, very similar to what happened in Satan's mind, clouded his thinking. He thought that somehow he was up here, way above all the riffraff of the world, and he was doing great. The reality though is that he was failing at best and at worst missing the mark.
How many times have we compared ourselves to others? The Pharisee was clearly trying to point out specific sins that others were committing, while casually omitting his own and even focusing on what he thought was going to put him above others, which was tithing and fasting. The "no pride, no problem" phrase would help us remember that we, in fact, actually do have sins and problems, issues that we need to work on and overcome. Time would be better served on focusing on what we should be changing in our lives versus what we think others should change in theirs. The problem is that it does not feel good when we focus on ourselves. It feels better to say, "Well, I mean, I have these sins, but at least I'm not doing X, Y, or Z. That person's far worse than me."
How many times have we heard or even said that? Jesus was calling that out in this very example. "At least I'm not as sinful as that other person over there," pride tells us. If we removed the pride and let humility reign in our lives, I would suspect that we would be a lot more productive in our spiritual lives and in overcoming.
Now in these scriptures, and in this example, we have seen that removing pride, you know, "no pride, no problem" from our comparison of ourselves with others will help us to focus on the real issues, the problem that we need to face and overcome. We cannot let pride tell us that we are fine.
I just want to show this real quick. Let us go over to Revelation 3, verse 17. This is a frightening reminder to the Laodicean church that seems to echo what the Pharisee said here in Luke.
Revelation 3:17-18 "Because you say, 'I am rich, have become wealthy, and have need of nothing'—and do not know that you are wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked—I counsel you to buy from Me gold refined in the fire, that you may be rich; and white garments, that you may be clothed, that the shame of your nakedness may not be revealed; and anoint your eyes with eye salve, that you may see."
Pride, as it grows, as it puffs up, causes us to not be able to even see things for what they are. We are not able to see the reality of the state that we are in—and that is frightening. Without pride, we can acknowledge that we need a lot from God and that we indeed have a lot to overcome. Which would we rather see? Do we want to lie to ourselves? Or do we want to honestly see ourselves and what we need to work on to be part of God's Family?
Now a quick recap. We saw in the first example with Satan that pride, once fully born, can grow and cause us to think that we are something that in fact we are not, and even cause us to take actions to appease the pride that is puffed up in our lives. With Eve, we saw that pride can trick us into thinking that we do not need God, that we can somehow lean on our own wisdom and live without our Creator. And with the Parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector, we can see that pride can lead us to having a false perception of ourselves and lead to false comparisons of ourselves with others, which inhibits continued spiritual growth and damages both the relationship with others and our relationship with God.
Let us turn to another example which I think, again, we can all relate to as well, and this is in II Kings chapter 5. Now when you arrive there, you will see that this is the account of Naaman and Naaman was actually referred to by Jesus in Luke 4, as the only leper in Israel during Elisha's time that was healed of leprosy. So let us begin in verse 1, and let us learn a little bit more about Naaman.
II Kings 5:1 Now Naaman, commander of the army of the king of Syria, was a great and honorable man in the eyes of his master, because by him the Lord had given victory to Syria. He was also a mighty man of valor, but a leper.
So we see that Naaman is a pretty important person. He is great and honorable, in fact, reporting directly to the king of Syria. He was a successful man of valor because of what God had given him and God had given him victory over Syria's enemies, but he had leprosy.
II Kings 5:2-4 And the Syrians had gone out on raids, and had brought back a captive young girl from the land of Israel. She waited on Naaman's wife. Then she said to her mistress, "If only my master were with the prophet who was in Samaria, for he would heal him of his leprosy." And Naaman went in and told his master, saying, "Thus and thus said the girl who was from the land of Israel [also translated, she said such and such and so forth].
Now I am doing a bit of speculation here, but it would appear to me that Naaman was a decent guy. I doubt that the young girl would be inclined to offer up anything nice to someone who was mean to her or treated her poorly, because this was basically informing him of how he could be healed and really escape a death sentence. There was no cure for leprosy. So I think that was pretty significant.
II Kings 5:5-7 Then the king of Syria said, "Go now, and I will send a letter to the king of Israel. So he departed and took with him ten talents of silver, six thousand shekels of gold, and ten changes of clothing. Then he brought the letter to the king of Israel, which said, Now be advised, when this letter comes to you, that I have sent Naaman my servant to you, that you may heal him of leprosy. And it happened, when the king of Israel read the letter, that he tore his clothes and said, "Am I God, to kill and make alive, that this man sends a man to me to heal him of leprosy? Therefore please consider, and see how he seeks to quarrel with me."
Of course, the king knew that he could not heal this person, and he thought the king of Syria was trying to pick a fight with him.
II Kings 5:8-14 So it was, when Elisha the man of God heard that the king of Israel had torn his clothes, that he sent to the king, saying, "Why have you torn your clothes? Please let him come to me, and he shall know that there is a prophet in Israel." Then Naaman went with his horses and chariot, and he stood at the door of Elisha's house. And Elisha sent a messenger him, saying, "Go and wash in the Jordan seven times, and your flesh shall be restored to you, and you shall be clean." But Naaman became furious, and went away and said, "Indeed, I said to myself, 'He will surely come out to me, and stand and call in the name of the Lord his God, and wave his hand over the place, and heal the leprosy.' Are not the Abanah and the Pharpar, the rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel? Could I not wash in one of them and be clean?" So he turned and went away in a rage. And his servants came near and spoke to him, and said, "My father, if the prophet had told you to do something great, would you not have done it? How much more than when he says to you, 'Wash, and be clean'?" So he went down and dipped seven times in the Jordan, according to the saying of the man of God; and his flesh was restored like the flesh of a little child, and he was clean.
To paint a little bit of a word picture here, my 6th grade teacher was pretty good at this, I am probably not. But Naaman rolls up to Elisha's house in his limousine, complete with the flashing lights, the little flags from his country, and he stands outside Elisha's door and he is like, "Here I am. I'm the best general in Syria. I'm here to be healed and I've got money." Now, Naaman's pride had already puffed up his opinion of himself in this situation. When Elisha's messenger came out to greet him, I get the feeling that Naaman was ready to explode. Imagine a president of a foreign nation coming to visit the president of the United States and instead of receiving the foreign president in person to shake his hands in front of the camera, the president sends out a messenger to say, "Hey, thanks for coming. You can go do thus and thus or such and such and so forth."
Now Naaman's inflated opinion of himself is revealed throughout each sentence. It is almost like he is screaming, maybe silently, maybe loudly. "Do you have any idea who I am?" Naaman came to see Elisha, but could only talk with the messenger who he believed was beneath him.
The next part is something, again, that I think we can all relate to. Verse 11, "But Naaman became furious, and went away and said, "Indeed, I said to myself, 'He will surely come out to me, and stand and call in the name of the Lord his God, and wave his hand over the place, and heal the leprosy.'" Like many of us human beings, Naaman had an idea of how he thought he was going to be healed, but that was not the way that God was going to heal him. If we apply this more broadly in our lives, because I feel like it applies way beyond healing, do we not have these preconceived notions of how our lives should go? Do we not think we know how certain things in life should go or how we should be treated through them? "I thought I'd go to school, marry my high school sweetheart, get a fantastic job, become a millionaire, and die of old age." Right? (I mean, this was not my idea. I am speaking in generalities. I am very happy with my blessings.)
But God has other plans for us, and this life that we live is designed to prepare us for His Kingdom, so things are not always going to go the way that we think they should go. Applying "no pride, no problem" when things are not going the way that we think they should go, and humbly looking for what God wants us to learn or do, will help us to get through each situation successfully. And of course, with the help of His Holy Spirit.
Now, another interesting thing happened during this exchange, and I think it is one of the products of pride. Note that when things were not going the way that Naaman thought they should go, and he was told to go dip in the Jordan versus some of the other rivers that he clearly thought were better, he turned away and went in rage. As pride continued to puff up in Naaman's mind, it eventually turned into rage, which is violent, uncontrollable anger. I am not sure that anything good can come from being in that state. Pride, when left unchecked, can puff up and manifest into some pretty terrible things.
The story, of course, ends well for Naaman. He eventually dipped seven times in the Jordan and his skin became like the flesh of a little child.
A practical application of this and the lesson for us is Naaman should have just rolled up and said hello to the messenger, thanked the messenger for the instructions to go dip in the Jordan—no pride, no problem—and that would have been the sum of the exchange. And I do think this is a wonderful example though for us to remember when we find ourselves in situations that we do not quite expect.
Now, be humble. Remember that however high we think we are in life—we could be super wealthy, we could be famous, we could be part of high society—but none of that really matters to God. God wants us to be humble, to root out any pride before it leads to our destruction.
I think it is fitting, especially as we approach the Passover and spring holy days, a time of self-reflection and examination, to see where we might have some pride rising in our own lives. II Timothy 3:19 tells us of the perilous times to come when people will be lovers of themselves, of money, and proud, among other things. These things are the things that we should be avoiding and overcoming that we do not bring on our own destruction.
Now, one of the problems with pride is that when it is left unchecked it often leads to swift destruction. We covered Satan's fall. We covered Eve's deception, the Parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector, and even Naaman's healing. But think about how quickly sudden judgment came upon the likes of King David when he took that which was not his to take. Nebuchadnezzar in Daniel 4 reflecting on what he believed he had built for his own majesty, while the word was still in his mouth, judgment was passed and he was humbled. Acts 12, King Herod arrayed in royal apparel, neglected to give God the glory as the crowd offered praises to him as if he was a god, and it is written, "Immediately an angel of the Lord struck him, because he did not give glory to God."
There is more. There is the handwriting on the wall which came to Belshazzar because he did not humble his heart and lifted himself up against the Lord of heaven. There is many more that we could go to.
This snare, this sin of pride is so deadly and deceptive that there is a large amount of Scripture dedicated to the solution to pride, which is, of course, humility. Now if words were not enough, God Himself provided the ultimate example of this in His sinless and selfless sacrifice for all of mankind.
Let us begin to wrap up here and turn over to Philippians 2 for our last scripture. I am just going to jump in and read this.
Philippians 2:1-11 Therefore if there is any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the Spirit, if any affection and mercy, fulfill my joy by being like-minded, having the same love, being of one accord, of one mind. Let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit, but in lowliness of mind let each esteem others better than himself. Let each of you look out not only for his own interests, but also the interests of others. [he could have basically said here, be humble, no pride, no problem] Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross. Therefore God also has highly exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
Now Jesus Christ was God and even now is God, right? He had no problem with pride. He humbled Himself so that we might have an opportunity to be a part of His Family. How many times was Jesus disrespected and treated poorly as even a man when He was actually God in the flesh? He could have at any time said, "Do you know who I am?" He could have ended it. Instead, He chose humility, and in doing so, along with the example He gave for us at the Passover service, He showed us that we should be humble ourselves and serve others. No pride, no problem.
Now pride will puff up and eventually rear its ugly head in various forms throughout our lives. It comes in many flavors, from how we react to someone cutting us off in traffic on the way to church to how we compare ourselves to others, even our own brethren, to how we evaluate our relationship with God and our standing with Him. I think we have concluded that pride indeed comes before destruction, and having a "no pride, no problem" perspective will often set us up for success rather than failure as we look to God for help and humility in every situation.
As we finish getting the physical leaven out of our lives, let us also take a moment to toss out the pride that goes along with it and start living with a "no pride, no problem" approach to life.
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