Pride

Pride’s Prison

Dr. Mike 2026 , , , ,

“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 desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life—is not from the Father but is from the world. And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever.”  1 John 2:15-17

The enticement of the world is strong. We are all encamped in its arms. We may believe we are independent. We stand on our own two feet. That no one influences us. We make our own beds. We think.

Yet, over time, slowly, within each day, the cultural influence sneaks in. When we are young, we have little awareness of the power of our desires. If it feels good, we do it. If we want something, we go after it. If it makes us exalt ourselves, we get it.

But as the years go by, hopefully one learns before the floor crashes. Not everything we desire is good for us. Our feelings may be misplaced. All the toys, status, fame, and fortune available to us does not buy us real love, joy, and peace. What we thought would give us the freedom to experience life to the fullest, didn’t. Instead it has led us into a prison of emptiness.

The pride of placing oneself the center of the universe has caused many downfalls. We initially see this outcome in Genesis 3 with Eve grasping for the forbidden fruit. Compare this event with Jesus in Luke 4. Under a similar temptation, HE placed God in the center of HIS world and didn’t allow the enemy to win.

The pride of self-importance only leads to a prison of spiritless outcomes. When pride elevates us ahead of God, watch out. We have lost our way. When we take all the credit for our accomplishments, look out. We are walking into solitary confinement. A place where we get a nasty taste of ourselves. Pride is the downfall of many.

Over the years, I have either seen or experienced how pride locks up their victims. For example:

Pride prevents one from having a deep relationship with others.

Pride fails to forgive others and turns the event into a life-long road of bitterness.

Pride fails to forgive oneself causes one to live like a victim without hope.

Pride pushes help away until one lives an isolated life without friends or family.

Pride causes one to sacrifice their health for the attainment of a fleeting moment.

Pride isolates one to their hurt.

Pride makes one miss out on the virtue of humility and its fruit.

Pride’s short-term win leads to long-term failure.

Pride destroys friendships.

Pride leads to poor decisions which may destroy one’s life work.

Pride blinds oneself from the need of a Savior.


The list is endless. Each of us lives with pride. The problem is when it raises its ugly head to blind us from reality. How do we deal with it?

When one begins to live under God’s domain, one learns how to live with a servant’s heart. Humility becomes the robe to cover our pride. Yes, we appreciate pride when the moment is right. But we also know pride without God’s Spirit leading causes damage. As we surrendered our kingdom to Lord Jesus, we are being trained to live like HIM. This means placing Father-Son-Spirit the center of our life. When one does, one learns to share in the Triune God’s life. Pride then doesn’t lead to a prison sentence, but a pathway of humility with freedom for self and others.

Rooting For You in Christ!

Dr. Mike

Faith-Integrator, Encourager, Scribbler

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Pride of Life

Dr. Mike Shaped By The WORD , , ,

1 John 2:16

For everything in the world—the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life—comes not from the Father but from the world.

What is your standard of a successful life? How does your heart measure such success? What are the basic values you pursue to make your dreams come true?

John wrote his letter to the Church warning them of placing their ladder on the wrong wall. How many of us have learned the hard way?  We pursue certain goals built on values we believe are good only to find out many years later how empty and unfulfilling the achievement felt. Looking back, we realize only then that our climb up the ladder may have been fun but eventually ended up on the wrong side of the building. Instead of climbing the north wall, we found ourselves on the opposite side looking across the vast emptiness of space wondering where did we go wrong.

The pride of life blinds many of us from eternal truths and values which produce the more abundant life that we all desire but seem to escape us through the jungle of everyday decisions.

What is the pride of life?

A simple answer is everything and anything which places more importance on the things of this world rather than the eternal habitat God created for you to experience.

God is the author of GOOD. And many of the items we pursue are by themselves good. But our inability to manage them leads to paths of destruction and pain for ourselves and others.

For example, water is a good element. We all need water to survive. We use water as a healthy liquid to drink. We use water to bathe and clean ourselves. And we use water to cook. We even swim in water for relaxation or exercise. But we can also drown ourselves in water. Hold your head underwater for a length of time and you will run out of oxygen and drown.

This is what happens when we wrap our hearts around what makes us feel important. Our status, career, and achievements are only a few of the measuring marks our culture emphasizes as important. Do you?

The pride of life consists of the values this world emphasizes as important at the detriment of leaving Father God out of the picture.

Fame, winning, and academic success are a few more values the world glorifies. Sometimes the world counterfeits God’s concerns but their methods and ways are anti-God. One example is social justice. The human heart has a natural tendency to classify, segregate, and exclude whoever the power base decides is important or unimportant.

At the same time, the culture with an ungodly center, has a tendency to group people together and treat all of them the same rather than individuals. Whereas God looks at each individual’s heart to evaluate their behavior and the action required for justice to be measured, the ungodly establishment seek to punish the entire group for the infraction of one.

When God is not the center of life, the human spirit becomes empowered with pride which blinds the person from separating fantasy from reality and eventually leads toward harming those around them.

Pride is the downfall of many who have a high opinion of themselves. The sad truth is they rarely suffer alone. They normally take along all those who have followed them through the maze. From Lucifer whose pride turned him into Satan, and from many of the dictators, politicians, cult leaders, and business mavericks, pride has led to the destruction of many. The opposite of pride is humility. Humility is God’s path toward learning to walk together in community. Humility places God in the center of every relationship, decision, and plan we make. We acknowledge HIS presence; respect HIS authority in our life; and work to restore HIS values into everyday living. Without God, pride rules. With God, humility leads. Which way will you choose?    

   

Rooting For You in Christ!

Dr. Mike

Encourager & Founder of
Vocational Leadership 360
Author of e-Books:

 *  Dancing With God: Life-Giving Theology Explained
 *  Great Business Emulates a Good God
 *  Be Radical…Follow Christ!
 *  Simply The Messenger
 *  Unequally Married

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Pride Speaks

Dr. Mike Life in Christ
“Love the Lord, all you his saints! The Lord preserves the faithful but abundantly repays the one who acts in pride.” Psalm 31:23 ESV

 pride 3

Pride speaks blindly. When pride covers our true identity, we forget who we are and act accordingly: stupidly. Our words may sparkle, but they carry empty rhetoric. (Witness the political arena and you get a taste of it.) Whenever I feel a touch of pride-me-o-us coming, I turn to Scripture for grounding.

Proverbs 8:13
The fear of the Lord is hatred of evil. Pride and arrogance and the way of evil and perverted speech I hate.

Proverbs 11:2
When pride comes, then comes disgrace, but with the humble is wisdom.

Proverbs 16:18
Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall.

Proverbs 29:23
One’s pride will bring him low, but he who is lowly in spirit will obtain honor.

Obadiah 1:3
The pride of your heart has deceived you…

Mark 7:21-23
For from within, out of the heart of man, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, coveting, wickedness, deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride, foolishness. All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person.”

1 John 2:16
For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life—is not from the Father but is from the world.

The Bible has much more for you to read and discover about pride. For now though, those of us who have truly surrendered to Lord Jesus, we are most grateful for Him releasing pride’s grip on us.

Rooting For You in Christ!

Dr. Mike

Executive Director & Founder
Marketplace Bible Institute
& Resource Center, Inc
Author of e-Books:
 *  Great Business Emulates a Good God
 *  Be Radical…Follow Christ!
 *  Simply The Messenger
 *  Unequally Married

Encourage a Friend…Share Today’s Message!