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᛭ INI ᛭

“Pride goes before destruction, And a haughty spirit before a fall.” So says the Proverb. Pride is actually the chief vice. Since we’re looking at the vices while also following our Lord’s Passion, we were forced to take the vices out of order. But pride really is the chief vice, the first vice. From pride flow all others.

Pride is the first sin. Pride is the original sin. In pride Adam and Eve listened to and believed the Word of the Devil. They wanted to be like God. (Gen 3) Adam and all humans ever since have been playing that game. “Being like God” is the motto of our fallen, sinful nature. Wanting to be like God, we actually place ourselves far above all gods.

Pride is selfishness. Pride causes us to exalt ourselves above others, and so we don’t do things out of love for one another, but rather because it serves our own interests. Pride will even turn love for neighbors into a means of boasting. “I love and serve more than you…”

Pride is to “to think of himself more highly than he ought to think.” (Rom 13) Pride is arrogance that says, “I’m all that and a bag of chips.” But pride’s deeper than even that. Pride is hubris that says, “I’ll succeed and nothing will go wrong because I’m doing it.” Pride’s even more than that, though! Pride is all encompassing. It weasels its way into every aspect of life in such a deep, dark way that we don’t even notice it. It seeps into everything!

Pride, since it’s the first vice, is like breaking the first Commandment. “You shall have no other gods” is the chief and first commandment, breaking it you’ve broken all the others, or rather you break all the others because our flesh is in in constant rebellion its Creator! Pride is the first rebellion against God—not just human but demonic! The devil convince Adam and Even to become turncoat against God! “Being puffed up with pride” causes one to “fall into the same condemnation as the devil.” (1-Tim 3)

Now, pride is so hard to see because human beings who are by nature sinful and unclean don’t really think pride is all that bad. Our flesh thinks, “Sure you can overreach with pride, and then that’s arrogance or haughtiness or looking down on others or whatever else you want to to call it.” Throughout human history there’ve been many moral thinkers, they’re called philosophers, and they never thought pride was all that bad! They admitted that someone could overdo it and that was problem. In their minds pride had to be tempered, but pride itself wasn’t bad. 


So, the Lord Himself, needs to let us know. Humans who rebel against God won’t see their rebellion as all that bad, so God reveals in His Word that pride really is a problem human heart. It’s full of pride, and this causes us to do many other prideful things… Like say, “I’ll never deny you, Lord!” Right after the Lord prophesies, “You will…” Pride is always being right, never being wrong….

Pride weasels its way in, and we don’t think it’s all that bad because we often use the term pride as a stamp of approval on someone or something. You do a good job because you take pride in your work. It’s good to receive the just reward for your work. But we have a work ethic often because our quality or quantity of work reflects on who we are. But that’s selfish pride. Now, I can hear you… “Well, then why should I do good work? If I can’t take pride in it, why even do it?” Because your neighbor need you to. We do our best because that’s what our neighbor needs from us, and the Lord put you there do that high quality work for your neighbor and not for your own sense of self worth. You can also give thanks to God that He actually used the likes of you to produce something good and useful for others…

The same goes for anything! Many take pride in our country. But “country” is actually a gift from God, as the Catechism reminds us from the Bible. (That’s next week’s congregation at prayer.) But we set up flags, memorials, plaques, museums, statues to commemorate all of our great accomplishments. We should humbly remember to thank God for our country, since He raises them up and takes them down.

In pride we hold to our country as an idol. This is the danger of democratic societies. “We” vote it into place, as if the Lord only controls as much as we let Him. But He’s God, we’re not. We’re afraid of the path of our country because we live as if the Lord isn’t in control. Like our country keeps everything safe and secure in the world, as opposed to it actually being the Lord. He can use ours or another one to do it, but that’s up to Him, because He’s God.

We take pride in our children. Often because they reflect on us. If they do something well that’s our parenting or genetics or whatever… If they go amiss, well then we failed.

In all these ways pride seeps in. In many and various ways the people and places of this life, even the things that we do well, they become our gods! Or in pride they reflect on us, and that reflection shows us that we think that we god, master of our own lives. And the problem with pride and how it affects all these things that I’ve just talked about, is that I could’ve gotten even more specific, but then you’d probably run me out with pitch forks…

So it is the prideful heart sets up many more things than the living God that we trust more than Him. We trust in ourselves more and our own ability than what the Lord himself says in His Word. Peter did that. The Lord said, “You’re all going to abandon Me.” “No I won’t!” Peter said, “You’re wrong Jesus.” “So said all the apostles.” “I don’t do any of those things pastor. You’re wrong.” “Pride goes before destruction, And a haughty spirit before a fall.” Peter denied His Lord three times with oath and curses. He cursed himself rather than admit that he was a follower, a disciple of Christ, so also we take personally any slight against our work or country or kids or even when we get some stupid little fact wrong!


Pride sets up all these things as God, so that we worry and get angry. This is the way of all sinful human beings. So Christ comes. He GOES THE WAY NO OTHER HUMAN DOES. Christ is also 100% human. As fully human, CHRIST GOES THE WAY NO OTHER HUMAN DOES, THE WAY OF HUMILITY—DEATH!—FOR YOU! “I will strike the shepherd,” the Scripture says. That Word is also true. He was struck down, not even defending Himself one bit, even when He wasn’t wrong! Struck in humility to save us from our pride.


CHRIST GOES THE WAY NO OTHER HUMAN DOES, THE WAY OF HUMILITY—DEATH!—FOR YOU! “He was in the form of God”—“God of God, light of light, very God of very God, begotten” from eternity, “before all worlds”— “yet didn’t count being equal with God [the Father] as something to be grasped,” held on to for dear life, stolen, “but made himself nothing. He took on the form of a servant.” He suffered himself to be betrayed; suffered Himself to be arrested, to be bound with shackles, chains, to be beaten, bruised, bullied. He suffered Himself to be mocked, ridiculed, spit upon; suffered Himself to be falsely accused, condemned; suffered Himself to be crucified to die all of it for you, all of it in true humility true. His true humility saves.

He brings us into His way of humility. There are differences in how we serve one another, but before God there is not greater or lesser standing, no room showmanship, no room for arrogance or boasting. “[Because of God] you are in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God—and righteousness and sanctification and redemption—that, as it is written, “He who glories, let him glory in the LORD.” (1-Cor 1)

Even Communion is a highpoint of Christ bringing you into His humility, for there He unites us all in the forgiveness of sins. “The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ? For we, though many, are one bread and one body; for we all partake of that one bread.”

CHRIST GOES THE WAY NO OTHER HUMAN DOES, THE WAY OF HUMILITY—DEATH!—FOR YOU! He brings you into that humility—baptized you into it, communion keeps you in it, that His humility, His forgiveness, would be yours, as He then uses you, humble that you are, to be of good service to others.

Repent and run away from pride! Pride’s end is in the devil’s kingdom—hell itself! Christ’s humility saves you from this, and His humility is a fruit worked out in your life by the Spirit. And this happens when hearing Christ’s Word not arrogantly saying like Peter, “No,” but rather humbly say in full assurance of faith, “Yes, Lord! ‘Pride goes before destruction.’ Yes, Lord, it is your body and blood for the forgiveness of my sins and the sins of everyone else. Lord, I’m humble before You. Help my in-humility (Pride).” And the CHRIST who went THE WAY NO of OTHER HUMAN, THE WAY OF HUMILITY—DEATH!—FOR YOU, will help you.

᛭ INI ᛭