The Scribe's Portion

Pride: The Sin That Destroys Everything

· A Brief Study on the Sin God Hates Most ·

August 7, 2019 10 Comments

Pride is the mother of all sins, it is a sin which causes many other sins. It was because of pride that Satan led a celestial rebellion against God. Pride then became the fall of humanity in the Garden of Eden. It was pride which caused Cain to kill Abel and motivated the building of Babel. Millions have died because of the pride of power-hungry leaders and millions more have suffered terrible peril. 

It’s no surprise that pride is a sin God hates and a sin that hates God. Because pride and love do not go hand in hand, they’re polar opposites. Yet, pride is a sin we all struggle with at different levels. Some are more humble than others but pride never escapes their grasp. By nature, humans are not humble. We want to be acknowledged, we seek to be greater, we defend our dignity, and at some point, we smiled at a compliment.  

[bctt tweet=”Pride is a sin God hates, and a sin that hates God. ” username=”TheScribe_Blog”]

Pride is subtle, it creeps up on you, other times you seek it and embrace it. And if you think that you’ve never fallen prey to pride, read along, you will be surprised. 

Pride: The Sin that Destroys Everything

Pride: The Sin God Hates

The Bible speaks much about pride. Scripture is brimmed with stories and parables about pride. And it’s no wonder since the LORD hates pride (Proverbs 6:16-7) and looks at it from afar (Psalm 138:2). 

The Bible refers to pride by several names: self-exaltation, haughtiness, puffed up, lofty, conceit, arrogance, and boastfulness. Prides has many faces, takes on different forms, and sometimes we are unaware of it in our hearts. But we all struggle with it in some way or another. Personally, I’ve struggled with pride my entire life and have lived through the consequences of it; I have learned to hate it because it has ruined many wonderful things. I have come to realize that pride destroys everything including my peace. I’m sure that you too have had your own battles with pride. 

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And while we may hate it, pride is not so easy to get rid of and we cannot do it on our own. Pride branches out to many other sins that cause us to become distant from God.  So we need to take it very seriously. And we need to acknowledge our necessity of Christ to battle and kill the pride in our hearts. The only thing we accomplish by trying in our strength to overcome pride is behavior modification. And even that is pride. Pride is an internal problem with deep roots in our hearts. Only the Lord can uproot it.

Here is what Scripture has to say about pride.

Proverbs 16:5

“Every one that is proud in heart is an abomination to the Lord” 

Proverbs 16:18-19

Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall. Better it is to be of an humble spirit with the lowly, than to divide the spoil with the proud.”

Psalm 10:4

“The wicked, through the pride of his countenance, will not seek after God: God is not in all his thoughts.”

Psalm 73:6

“Therefore pride compasseth them about as a chain”

Proverbs 8:13

“The fear of the Lord is to hate evil: pride, and arrogancy, and the evil way, and the froward mouth, do I hate.”

It’s very clear that the Lord does not tolerate pride and neither, should we. It has many repercussions; many have even lost it all. Pride is like holding tightly unto a blade, it cuts but we don’t want to let it go.  

Pride Destroys Your Spiritual Life

As I stated earlier, pride builds a chasm between the person and God. Take Adam and Eve for example. Satan knew how well pride would work in the human heart. That sense of autonomy, that sense of importance and carnal worth. “You can be as God,” he said to Eve. Her eyes were opened up before she even took of the fruit. What was the result? Eternal banishment from the Garden of Eden and separation from God’s Presence (Genesis 3:4-6).

YAH hates pride, He looks at a proud person from afar (Psalm 138:6). But humility brings us closer to Him.

Pride is very problematic but perhaps the worse problem it creates are the spiritual consequences it fosters. It prevents the person from growing spiritually, it separates him or her from communion with the Heavenly Father. Pride will not allow you to hear the voice of God which can turn out to be very hindering in the walk of faith.  A spiritually prideful person will never accept his or her wrongs and will reject all rebukes and admonishments from those who mean only good. He will ignore the convictions of the Holy Spirit if it means that he needs to apologize or humble himself in some way. The prideful person does not like being preached at because he thinks he knows it all and does not need anyone telling him something he already knows (1 Corinthians 8:2). But in reality, he knows he’s wrong but pride does not allow him to make the necessary changes. 

However, pride will lower you, it will humble you, it will put you to shame. The Lord allows this to happen to remind you that you are only dust. Now, I’m not saying that the LORD wants to make you feel worthless, let’s not go into extremes here. But everything and everyone who seeks to exalt himself shall be brought low.

Job 40:12

 Look on every one that is proud, and bring him low; and tread down the wicked in their place.”

Proverbs 29:23

“A man’s pride shall bring him low: but honour shall uphold the humble in spirit.”

Isaiah 26:5

“For he bringeth down them that dwell on high; the lofty city, he layeth it low; he layeth it low, even to the ground; he bringeth it even to the dust.”

Obadiah 4

“Though thou exalt thyself as the eagle, and though thou set thy nest among the stars, thence will I bring thee down, saith the Lord.”

Pride leads to destruction and ultimately to eternal death. Like all paths of sin lead to hell, pride takes the soul into the place where there is no return.

Malachi 4:1

“For, behold, the day cometh, that shall burn as an oven; and all the proud, yea, and all that do wickedly, shall be stubble: and the day that cometh shall burn them up, saith the Lord of hosts, that it shall leave them neither root nor branch.”

Needless to say, destruction is the end of arrogance and brings shame in the process. There is a joke that highlights this perfectly.

A priest, a doctor, a politician, a scientist, and a boy were traveling in an airplane. When suddenly the plane’s engine started to fail. The pilot desperately tried to fix the problem without success. He told his passengers to each grab a parachute and jump off because the plane was going to crash. So the pilot grabbed a parachute and jumped. The problem was that there were only 4 parachutes left. The politician quickly grabbed a parachute and said, “I’m an important man, I work to make important laws, so the people need me,” and jumped off the plane. The doctor grabbed the 2nd parachute and said, “I have an important job, I save people’s lives, so the people need me,” and jumped off the plane. The scientist grabbed the 3rd parachute and said, “I’m among the world’s most intelligent men, the people need intelligent men like me,” and jumped off the plane. The priest then turned to the boy and said, “I’m old, I’ve lived a full life, but you’re young and still have a long life before you. You take the last parachute.”  The boy looked at the priest and said, “No, don’t worry. The world’s most intelligent man took my backpack. 

While we may chuckle at the joke, we realize that pride will not let you see clearly.

It is like the scientist who was blinded by his own arrogance and took the wrong parachute. His pride was his demise.

Pride Hinders Growth

Arrogance stagnates your Spiritual AND personal growth. Pride prevents a person from having a teachable attitude which is essential for growth. Humility is necessary for growth, you have to admit ignorance and be willing to be taught in order to grow. Both are absent from a person with a prideful disposition. Pride does not allow a person to admit and accept help when they’re struggling which keeps them from learning. 

Pride in the Christian life impedes the Christian from learning from his mistakes, he will never admit when he’s wrong. This keeps him from becoming Christ-like and getting closer to God.  

We all struggle with pride at different points and in different levels but until we get rid of it we will never grow. Your desire to be more like Christ has to be greater than your love of pride. And let me tell you that it will be hard sometimes. But we cannot remove the pride from our hearts on our own. That is something the Lord has to do and it will be a lifelong process. We need to repent of the pride in our hearts and depart from permanently.

In my 27 years of life, I have not met a single person who was completely clean of pride. But I have met many people who are less prideful than they were before. 

Pride hinders growth but we grow in our process to be cleansed from it. Humility is the first step. 

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Pride Destroys Relationships

Pride not only affects the individual but those around him as well. And if left unchecked, it can cause considerable damage to relationships. In romantic relationships where both persons are too proud to admit their wrongs is like a powder keg, it’ll explode at the slightest provocation. Pride decays and kills love, it causes the affected person to grow cold. It makes the other person wonder whether they love their pride more than them. 

The signature response of a proud person when they have committed mistakes is “Well, I’m human, no one’s perfect.” They’d rather say that than admit their mistake and apologize. To them, admitting they’re wrong is humiliating. Pride cannot distinguish between humility and humiliation. You can be humble without humiliating yourself. Apologizing does not take away your dignity, it reveals your honor.  

Pride kills friendships. Countless are the number of friendships that have ended because of pride. No one likes to hang around, much less fellowship with someone who is too prideful. It’s unpleasant being around a person who never admits wrongs, never apologizes, is arrogant, brags, among other things. 

Prideful people also tend to get offended very easily. They think that people are always out to attack them. Even a small innocent joke or comment will trigger an angry response. This too causes rifts in relationships. 

A prideful person ends up alone and lonely. 

pride sin

Pride: The Sin That Pays Tribute to Self

Arrogance seems to be society’s best companion, especially in Western countries. We get started on it early in our lives. Remember when teachers used to applaud a job well done? I don’t know about other countries but here in America, teachers put a HUGE emphasis on compliments and rewards. Students get treated like fragile glass; adults are afraid of shattering their self-esteem. I can understand wanting to encourage students to do their best but there are other ways to do that. 

People are obsessed with self-esteem. I’m not saying that you shouldn’t have any self-worth or dignity but people use it as a compass. And that’s very bad because too much of it breeds pride. 

Arrogance makes a person think too highly of himself. It causes people to rely on their talents, abilities, and intelligence. Independence is good but when it leads you to abandon God completely then it’s not so good. What’s more, arrogance reveals your foolishness and highlights it for the whole world to see.

Romans 1:22

“Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools”

Arrogance also displays itself through vanity. Look at how models depend on their appearance and beauty for a living. They have to be vain and there is some arrogance in that. 

Then there’s the intellectual with several doctorates who prides in his accomplishments and intelligence. 

The world-class athlete with 20 medals and trophies. 

Or the atheist who thinks himself too smart to believe in God. 

What about the self-assured politician who basically won the elections? 

Success is good but when it gets to our heads and all the glory goes to the Creature and not the Creator then we have a problem. In a nutshell, pride is self-idolatry. When we are prideful we commit 2 offenses: pride and idolatry. 

Galatians 6:3

“For if a man think himself to be something, when he is nothing, he deceiveth himself.”

Proverbs 3:7

“Be not wise in thine own eyes: fear the Lord, and depart from evil.”

Isaiah 5:21

“Woe unto them that are wise in their own eyes, and prudent in their own sight!”

Proverbs 21:4

“An high look, and a proud heart, and the plowing of the wicked, is sin.”

Pride looks down on others, makes assumptions to feel better of himself yet is still miserable.

Pride Reveals Your Insecurities

The surprising truth about pride is that it’s actually a response to insecurities. I know this sounds like an oxymoron but think about it. Pride is the auto defense against feeling insecure. I believe deep down, we all know our shortcomings so we have 2 options: 1. We can acknowledge them and do something about it (repent and depart from it), or 2. We can deceive ourselves and use pride to cover it up. Pride won’t let you admit your weaknesses. 

Having pride is a lot of work. Pride tells God, ” Leave me alone, I can do this on my own. Give me my burden back, I want to carry it even if it’s too heavy.” 

Humility says “God, here are my faults, here are my troubles. I give them to you. Take away this burden, I cannot do this on my own.” 

Guess who has more peace and freedom?

In trying to be free and independent, the prideful person does the opposite and shackles himself as a slave to sin.  There is much to lose with pride and much to gain from humility.

[bctt tweet=”There is much too lose with pride and much to gain from humility.” username=”TheScribe_Blog”]

Bible Stories About Pride

Pride is the world’s oldest sin. As I stated at the beginning of this post, Satan rebelled because of pride. But there are many stories in the Bible about proud individuals, here are only a few. 

Tower of Babel (Genesis 11:1-9)

The people who constructed the Babel Tower did so out of pride. Blinded like Eve, they thought they could reach the Heavens and be mighty like God. This is no small matter. Here are puny human beings who tried to place themselves at the same level as God! Well, the confounding of tongues was God’s good grace who instead of annihilating humanity simply dispersed them. God is VERY patient! 

Pharaoh (Exodus 5:2)

Because of Pharoah’s pride and stubbornness who refused to let the Jews go, brought the 10 plagues upon Egypt and the death of his son. There’s much too lose with pride!

Naaman (2 Kings 5:1-14)

Naaman, captain of the king’s guard had leprosy. So God spoke through Elisha, that he would be healed if he dipped himself 7 times in the Jordan. But his pride told him that was humiliating, he deserved something better. Until he finally obeyed and was instantly healed. Naaman lost two things that day, his leprosy and his pride. Sometimes losing is not a bad thing. 

King Nebuchadnezzar (Daniel 4:30-35)

King Neb was a very arrogant man. One day he looked at his kingdom and admired all the work he had done. Well, the Lord wasn’t pleased with his self-glory so he made him go mad. For 7 years he lived in the wilderness like an animal. Eating wild grass like a beast and crawling on all fours. He learned his lesson and praised God at the end of it. 

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Reflection

I love reading about the Quakers. They shunned all pride, they dressed in simple clothes, their speech was unflattering, their graves were unmarked so as not to make idols of anyone. Their simplicity of everyday life promoted humility. 

You don’t need to convert to Quakerism to be humble but we can learn much from their example in humility. Pride is an ugly sin that leeches unto you. It takes and takes, rewards you with loneliness, anxiety, discontentment, and steals eternal life from you. There are many good things in life we need to hold onto, pride is not one of them. 

The first step in becoming humble is to acknowledge our problem with pride, the good news is that that’s also hardest to do. If you can accept the pride in your heart you will accept the Lord’s help. Next, you must repent AND depart from it completely (John 8:11).

[bctt tweet=”With humility we have nothing to lose but pride itself.” username=”TheScribe_Blog”]

Look at Jesus as your example. Jesus being the SON OF GOD was born in a manger, made furniture for a living, carried nothing with him on his journeys, did not defend himself when falsely accused, and died in a very humiliating way. If He being God incarnate can humble Himself that way, how much more should we? How much less are we owed? 

We have nothing to lose but pride itself. 

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5 Ways Pride is Destroying Your Life

Evelyn Fonseca

Christian millennial, writer, editor, introvert, lover of languages, and full-time bibliophile. My mission is to tell the whole world about the love of Christ and that apart from Him there is no hope.

10 Comments

  1. Reply

    Oman

    August 29, 2023

    Since I was young I have dealt with pride. I was hard headed & very stubborn (even sometimes). This article brought tears to my eyes because I have never read nor have I heard a break down of pride like you did.
    It’s very convicting, thoughts provoking and it touched me DEEPLY, because I realized pride is my #1 enemy. I loss jobs, ruined good friends/relationships and most IMPORTANTLY it has prevented me from growing spiritual. It’s my first time ever saying this “I HATE PRIDE” with all my heart and I repent of it in Jesus Mighty Name. Amen! God Bless You!

  2. Reply

    Joshua Kelly

    August 22, 2021

    Love the whole work of your… Very helpful. Keep up the good work

  3. Reply

    Netta

    July 18, 2021

    Excellent Bible study.

  4. Reply

    Jacob

    June 15, 2021

    I read through it and found that it is very true and I believe it.
    May God bless you.

  5. Reply

    Mike

    August 11, 2020

    Evelyn,

    You are the first person who has dissected pride to the core that I’ve seen. I am glad you realize it is the most dangerous sin. However, in your entire essay, you mention Christ twice, and only in your last paragraph.

    Christ is all we need, but as you mentioned, we cannot accept him until we realize that we are sinners. We need to repent. I don’t think I read the word repentance once in your essay, if I missed it I am very sorry. It is a word that’s been watered down for “American Christianity”, however it is the single biggest requirement for salvation. You cannot be saved unless you are born-again, and there is no way you can be born-again unless you have repented. We need to repent and be born again, change into a completely new person and only by fully surrendering our life to Christ can this happen. No longer do we live through Satan in the ways of the flesh, but now we live through Christ in the spirit being born again.

    Hope you don’t get mad or offended, I hope not to stir up the dormant pride that Christ is blocking in your heart, but anytime a fellow brother and sister does not mention repentance or the Holy Spirit, I feel convicted to say something. I am only going by things I read in the bible on a daily basis. If I am scripturally wrong with any of this, I accept your rebuke and chastisement in Christ.

    -Michael

    • Reply

      Evelyn Fonseca

      August 15, 2020

      Brother Michael,

      No offense was taken, on the contrary, thank you for your obedience to this conviction. When I wrote this article, I had in mind more of a Bible study/ expository writing rather than exhortation. Both of which I believe are very important to have on a Christian blog. However, I do think I should have mentioned repentance in my article regardless of the style of the piece. I agree with you 100% on the importance of repentance, and the complete departure from sin necessary for salvation. You will see that I have edited the article, a result of the conviction I share with you about repentance and sin. Where sin is mentioned, repentance must follow.

      Blessings!

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