A Little Talk about the PP

That's right, I'm going to delve into the preposterousness of pride.

I do realize in class that we touched upon the subject of pride being the "worst sin", but I feel that I didn't share enough. Well... I didn't utter a word. But it didn't have anything to do with being afraid to speak up. I just couldn't piece the words together in my head. There was a plethora of thoughts floating around, but they were all bumping into each other and causing absolute mayhem in my mind. Later, I decided to simply look up a quote about pride in Mere Christianity, and sure enough Lewis was there to save the day. He declared that “[a] proud man is always looking down on things and people; and, of course, as long as you are looking down, you cannot see something that is above you.”

Couldn't have said it better myself! In reference to my aforementioned statement, I feel like we didn't cover this subject enough in class. Maybe it was because we were all incredibly frazzled (yes, that is a word), or quite possibly everybody else was having the same dilemma as me. In any case, I thought it was important to take note on why pride is the worst sin of them all. Now don't get me wrong, a sin is a sin in the eyes of God and will be judged accordingly. That being said, I don't think pride is a greater sin than the rest, but rather a more dangerous one. That's right, in a world full of delinquent and juvenile sins, pride is the methodical serial killer that works behind the scenes. Nobody notices it, but it causes the most damage.

I thought you (Mrs. Myers) made an excellent point about pride during the discussion in class. You said something along the lines of "you may not realize it, but pride is the underlying factor in all sins". That was insanely paraphrased of course, but that's the main idea I took out of it. You said that if we steal something from another person, we think we deserve it more than they do. Also, if we sabotage another man's work, we do it because we consider our own needs above the needs of others. In a way, these all relate to pride and the concern with only one's own well-being.

My biggest takeaway from the whole ordeal of pride was what Lewis touched on in his book: if we are too preoccupied with controlling those that we consider below us, we will lose sight on why we are even living in the first place. Our entire worldview is rattled if we go from focusing on God to focusing on ourselves. The reason why non-Christians don't even know what pride is (in the context of a sin) is because they have no God to look to. I know this isn't true in all cases, but for the vast majority of secular individuals, thinking about themselves is the only thing that keeps them going. They worry about their own success, their own family, their own home, their own toys, their own everything. They are so occupied with what they want, that they slowly begin losing any sense of empathy for other human beings.

I realize that I went off on kind of a tangent, but hey, that's what blogs are for right? Anyhow, I just want to wrap things up with a quick synopsis. To anybody reading this and trying to pry out a deeper meaning, understand this: God's will for your life is more than likely different than your own. If it doesn't benefit the kingdom of God's people, than it isn't worth doing. The reason pride is so dangerous is because it consumes people from the inside out without them even realizing it. Unless you specifically look for pride (and trust me, we all have a little bit of it), you won't even know that it exists within you. It is the root of all evil in my opinion, and deserves to be brought to the public's attention.

P.S. C.S. Lewis is an amazing author that has inspired my inner thoughts to become more concrete and believable. He helps clarify a lot of doubts for me, and that is the key to having good faith.