Pride and ShameMuestra

PRIDE

The text message from my wife was troubling: “Our son got in trouble three times at school today.” This was very uncharacteristic of him (thankfully), and while part of me wanted to overlook it as an uncommon occurrence, my wife and I both knew that a consequence was needed to drive home the point that his behavior was unacceptable. When he got home from school that day, we talked about what happened and he received his consequence. My wife and I worried about how he would respond (would his behavior escalate as a result?), but he handled it like a champ. The next morning, we both talked about how proud we were of his response.

This is the good kind of pride, the kind that focuses on and recognizes the value and goodness in another person, especially someone or something we feel in some way responsible for. This is the natural pride of loving what is good and celebrating it among the people around us.

But then there is a different kind of pride – a pride that is more about self than it is about others. This pride centers around me (what I have done, what I possess, how I look – all of my “credentials”) and rather than celebrating others, it can actually work against them. Pride is often the fuel of self-promotion, self-protection, and self-praise, with self being the common denominator. This kind of pride loves to do good not for the sake of the good itself but for how it makes me look. Pride is sometimes hard to spot because it can so easily masquerade as virtue.

But when we allow pride to creep in (or when we throw open the front door to it), we find ourselves like the proverbial cat up the tree: enjoying the view from our high perch but unaware that there is no easy way down. Scripture clearly illustrates this: throughout the Old and New Testaments, the proud are typically referred to in the context of being brought low. God simply won’t stand for it; He will deal with it in our lives and get rid of it.

Sometimes, however, the most painful consequence of our pride comes not from God Himself but from our own self-criticism – when pride takes a nosedive. When this happens, our self-approval turns to self-judgment, and it’s remarkable how skilled we can be at piling it upon ourselves. And we call the emotion that accompanies this, shame.

Is there an antidote to this deadly, destructive pride? Yes there is, but before we reveal it, we have to give shame a closer look and discover that pride and shame really are two sides of the same coin.

Prayer: Father, it is clear that You take a very dim view of pride and oppose it wherever You see it. Teach me how to let go of my pride and embrace You instead. Show me in the life of Your Son how to do this, and let me walk in His ways instead. In Jesus’ name, amen.