Pride

 

Seek the Glory that comes from God

In their very nature, pride and faith are incompatible. We will learn that faith and humility are at root one, and we can never have more true faith than we have true humility. It is possible to have strong intellectual conviction and assurance of the truth while pride is kept in the heart, but it makes living faith, which has power with God, an impossibility.

We only need to pause for a moment to discover what faith is. It is the confession of nothingness and helplessness, the surrender and the waiting to let God work! Isn’t it the most humbling thing there can be, the acceptance of our place as dependents who can claim, receive, or accomplish nothing apart from grace? Humility is simply the habit which prepares the soul for living on trust. Every breath of pride, in self-seeking, self-will, self-confidence, or self-exaltation, is just the strengthening of that self which cannot enter the kingdom. It cannot possess the things of the kingdom, because it refuses to allow God to be the All in All.

Friend, the only thing that can cure you of the desire for man’s praise or the hurt feelings and anger which come when it is not given, is by only seeking the glory that comes from God. Let the glory of the all-glorious God be everything to you. You will be freed from the glory of men and of self, and be content and glad to be nothing. Out of this nothingness, you will grow strong in faith, giving glory to God. You will find that the deeper you sink in humility before Him, the nearer He is to fulfill every desire of your faith.

Murray, Andrew. Humility [Updated Edition]: The Beauty of Holiness . Aneko Press. Kindle Edition. 

Psychological research: The H Factor

"I suspect that humility gets a bad rap because it is sometimes linked with subservience or weakness or introversion.

Psychological research actually indicates the opposite. Humility is most closely associated with a cluster of highly positive qualities including sincerity, modesty, fairness, truthfulness, unpretentiousness and authenticity."

Why Humble Leaders Make The Best Leaders

The HEXACO Model of Personality Structure and the Importance of the H Factor

gigantic ME

May God teach us that our thoughts, words, and feelings concerning our fellow man are His test of our humility towards Him. Our humility before Him is the only power that enables us to always be humble with our fellow man. Our humility must be the life of Christ, the Lamb of God, within us. 

Let all teachers of holiness and all seekers after holiness take warning. There is no pride as dangerous, because it is so subtle and sneaky, as the pride of holiness. It is not that a man ever says, or even thinks, Stand by thyself, do not come near to me; for I am holier than thou (Isaiah 65:5). No, the mere thought would be treated with disgust. But unconsciously, there grows a hidden habit of the soul, it feels satisfied in its accomplishments, and it can’t help but compare itself to the position of others. It can be recognized simply in the absence of that deep selflessness which can only be the evidence of the soul that has seen the glory of God. It reveals itself, not only in words or thoughts, but also in a tone, a way of speaking of others. Those who have the gift of spiritual discernment can’t help but recognize the power of self. Even the world with its watchful eyes notices it, and points to it as proof that the profession of a heavenly life does not necessarily bear any heavenly fruit. Brothers and sisters, let us beware! Unless we make, in the pursuit of holiness, the increase of humility the focus of our study, we may find that we have been delighting in beautiful thoughts and feelings, and the motions of sanctification, while the only evidence of the presence of God – the disappearance of self – remains seriously lacking. Come, let us run to Jesus and hide ourselves in Him until we embrace and receive His humility. This alone is our holiness. 

[1]  “Me is a most exacting personage, requiring the best seats and the highest places for itself, and feeling grievously wounded if its claim are not recognized and its rights considered. Most of the quarrels among Christian workers arise from the clamourings of this gigantic Me. … How few of us understand the true glory of taking our seats in the lowest rooms!”—Hannah Whitall Smith, Every-day Religion.

Murray, Andrew. Humility [Updated Edition]: The Beauty of Holiness . Aneko Press. Kindle Edition. 

Overthrows pride

The mature moral result of Confession is its humiliation. If God commanded us to confess to Him alone, our sorrow would perhaps be as deep, and our purpose of amendment as sincere, but it would not be as humiliating as the truthful disclosure of our sins to a fellowman. We are so constituted by nature that the visible affects us more than the invisible. Very little humiliation would therefore accompany the secret telling of our sins, just as, indeed, very little shame and embarrassment accompany their commission before the veiled face of the unseen seen yet ever-present God. 

The fruitful confusion associated with Confession, which often prevents recourse to it, is an inestimable benefit. It overthrows our pride, the cause of all our sins; it deepens our humility, the foundation of all virtue, by making us share in Christ's unspeakable humiliations; it confounds us before one instead of millions. 

Furthermore, from another angle, Confession is especially beneficial. A thought expressed is a far more palpable reality than when it remains a mere mental existence. Words clarify the vagueness of ideas. They imprint print themselves upon the mind with a vividness wholly beyond the power of what is unformulated. Words can fill the heart with joy or crush it with sorrow, whereas thoughts not shaped in words, and therefore dormant, can wield no such influence.

John A. Kane. How to Make a Good Confession: A Pocket Guide to Reconciliation With God (Kindle Locations 362-369). Kindle Edition. 

Side by Side Google 2022

 

The 2022 side by side look at "Pride" and "Humility", it seems that we want our leaders to be "humble". Do we wish to hold pride for ourselves while desiring humility in others?

My heart, Your home

First, there may be significant heartfelt and active religion while humility is still sadly lacking. 

Second, all external teaching and personal effort is ineffective to conquer pride or produce the meek and lowly heart.

Third, it is only by the indwelling of Christ in His divine humility that we become truly humble.

Murray, Andrew. Humility [Updated Edition]: The Beauty of Holiness . Aneko Press. Kindle Edition.