Pride is often seen as a 'I am a god' mentality - where you boast about your accomplishments - in truth pride lurks in even those with the strongest of faiths. Pride prevents us from embracing full communion with God, partially driven by fear that in HIS light we'll be made aware of our nothingness and the fact that without God we are nothing. It also means that we cannot be self-reliant - so anchoring in a turbulent sea of the soul.
Pride hides behind the shell of humility. How often have you denied God's existence or ability because you claim 'I'm not worthy?' I do this everyday - I have been taught from a young age by my father and other significant influences that I am nothing - I mean nothing. In truth God is the center of the universe - he created infinity, countless galaxies and constellations - it is easy to ask time and again - if the world hates me - then how can God truly see value in me?
Christ acknowledged this: 'If the world hates you, remember it hated me first.'
How can the world hate God? God created everything - from the far off galaxies and solar systems, countless stars and planets - God is our creator and the power that exists - from HIM comes all power and creation - How can the world hate God when God created everything - how can man despise God - the answer is sin - and the sin that spurs this hate is pride. In pride we are desperately in need of God's love but we would rather deny HIS existence or doubt the role he plays in our life.
I've debated this today, my heart aching at the thought God - the creato
r of all the universe cared nothing about me - I can never doubt through science that there is a Divine Creator - the universe even in its chaos is too fine tuned and beautifully glorious to be random - it has an energy source greater than all of science can imagine - God. In the human mind and ego we instantly say - 'What stake does God have in my life? Why does he care about a screwed up planet seething with evil when there are probably countless other planets teeming with life he has to deal with.'
God doesn't think like we do. God's energy is pure love and out of love he wrought us - God doesn't need us - but he loves us - love goes greater than need. Love is the act of loving for the sake of loving. God's creation is most glorious in our imperfection because what greater display is it to love that which is broken - the love that can heal the brokenhearted and guard their hearts is a love that is pure and more powerful than the universe itself.
I have been struggling with doubts about whether or not God will answer my prayers. I am a faithful person, but I have been beaten down emotionally - God sometimes seems so deathly silent - in truth God has a bigger plan - I had to endure the fear of the loss of not having HIS love and the contemplation that we are but dust in the universe of billions of light years. Dust we are made - God gives us His Spirit.
I have wrestled with theories of an empty God that creates without being active in our lives - an energy that set the laws in motion and a God that exists but has too much on His place with laws of the universe to listen to our small - often petty prayers.
The thought of not having God in my life as a friend, guardian and teacher made me see how empty my life could be - how worthless I was without God's love. It showed me the unimportance of so many trivial worries and temporal anxieties. When we examine our lives and consciences under the microscope of the entirety of the universe and order of the cosmos - our lives not only feel small and unimportant - we also gravitate away from getting so enmeshed with the petty disputes and grudges of our daily lives we lose a key macro perspective. Our planet is volatile and chaotic - with earthquakes and hurricanes and floods. The mountains we climb are nothing compared to the expanse of the heavens - examining our faith and our conscience under the weight of the stars we are left with a void and longing as big as the heavens - our desolation makes us thirst and hunger, our bones broken as we are paralyzed in the weight of our unworthiness.
Then we crack into a different skin of pride - the skin of pride that is the dark night before the dawn - the pride where we see the vastness of the universe and examine our sin and our unworthiness and want nothing to do with God because we are unworthy. How does this classify as pride - so broken and disgusted with ourselves we dare not to trust to look at God? Surely this is humility? NO! I have been in this fetal position lost and disconsolate so many times because I am analyzing God by the way of human hands and minds. I argue that God is not concerned with He is all POWERFUL and created the universe - I am just one person. I am not worthy. However I came to the place that I realized not accepting God's love because of our unworthiness is a pride of distrust. We don't trust God will love us purely because the world hates us and has an agenda averse to love. God is love - His ways are not our ways.
I then contemplate the countless other planets - do they have life? If so why would God come incarnate as Christ to save this corrupted planet from sin - God not only saves us but gave us HIS very Person in Christ to live and die in the flesh and spirit - Christ then blessed us with the Holy Spirit - what sort of Creator of an infinite universe could do this? Can it be real? We are not worthy enough.
This question seems one for the modern age where we deal with science against God and human ego against faith - when prayers seem unanswered we'd rather be cynical than search God for understanding. We would rather assume that the universe randomly came into being rather than trust that there is a Divine Architect - a Creator. We use God's gift of science to elevate human hearts to think we are a god and technology is our altar of worship. (Interestedly enough the new Jurassic World movie, like the originals, delves into some of the moral implications of our worship of technology and satisfying the needs of human desires and the motives in war and consumerism).
War - humans keep thinking if we rise up and rise up in battle again and again control over the world will have stability and peace. The only peace comes from the Spirit. For humans desperately try to exercise their power in this realm - but apart from God we are nothing but dust.
I went through a day of questioning God's role and nature of existence after watching a segment on multiverses. My logically mind demanding answers to questions raw and unanswerable in human capacity. I kept going back to 'if the universe is so enormous - God cannot care about me.'
It was only after hours of prayerful discernment and reading scientific articles - I started to understand the purpose of this wrestling in the galaxy of fear, doubt and distrust - I had to master that chaos of doubt to fully understand God's divinity and his strength. For the past few years I have been grasping in faith - believing in God, but distrustful of HIS promises of listening to our prayers and standing beside us in the trials of life. Prayers were shouts - begging and desperately hoping with less than a seed of faith - God showing me the dust in my flesh against is supreme authority reminded me that God can do anything and not to doubt HIS glory. It also revealed to me God's great love for me and that if HE created all the heavens of the earth and has chosen to adopt me as a child and heir of Christ - then I must fully surrender to His love.
God also spoke to me through HIS Holy Spirit - whispering 'six days.' The world was created in six days (although I believe God is so infinite we cannot even begin to perceive time in HIS care) - the symbolism here is six. On the sixth day Adam & Eve fell from grace - yet it only took God 'six days' to create the universe. This reminded me of my own brokenness and God's saving hands - like a potter he refines us and builds us into a sure foundation.
Still the biggest question that tested my heart and logical mind - was the question of Jesus. Why would the Master & Commander of all of Creation - send a part of HIMSELF - his very essence to earth to live as a human in humble circumstances and die for our sins. The perspective of God as Jesus shifts your perspective of his suffering - God chose to suffer and to be human.
The Holy Spirit led me to realize that while we see this as absurd - not worthy of the glory of God. What greater glory is there to lay one's life down for His friends? When God came to earth as Christ he flipped the order of His upside down and honored His Holy Law so we could be saved. God knows His own power - he doesn't have to prove HIS glory - the universe is display alone of that. However in HIS love, God understood how much we needed His Glory for the sake of life itself...God's will in becoming the Incarnate Word - Jesus Christ was purely an act of love. The greatest power - the mightiest of might giving up His life, His power to live amid His creation is a gift that blows your mind. What glory and passion would God have in lifting up the powerful - no God knew His power and creative abilities could rewrite our salvation - and that is the greatest Glory of God - deeper than the cosmos and deeper in love than the infinite universe.
God became man and lived and died to teach us the Way of HIS Truth and ignite the purest light of love in a broken world. Only God can heal our wounds through the grace of Christ.
When we pray do so boldly and in confidence for OUR God created the heavens and the earth - all that is seen and unseen. He loves you as a child and delights in loving you. Love the Lord with all your heart, soul and strength and He will reward you will life abundant in the spirit. If the Creator of all things is on your side what do you have to fear?
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