I suppose we Christians might think we have a fairly good understanding of pride—that it is sinful, hated by The Lord, and The Bible is full of clear examples and consequences of, and warnings against pride. That’s exactly what I was taught and learned. That is until I took some time to pray about, meditate and study pride.
What is Pride?
It may be helpful to consider pride from several layered perspectives: its definition, basis, sources, motivations, expressions, and spiritual position.
- Definitionally, pride is an inward, elevated valuation or sense of worth.
- It is based on internal feelings, opinions, or thoughts about an intrinsic or extrinsic action, idea, person, quality, or object—the target or focus of pride, i.e., self, others, or abstract ideals.
- Pride may be internally motivated by:
- a perceived elevation in achievement or status,
- a desire for greater recognition or influence,
- fear of being diminished, or
- comparison, envy, or jealousy related to perceived qualities, possessions, or achievements outside oneself.
- It may be expressed inwardly or outwardly as thoughts, words, or actions that elevate the self or personal associations. Prideful expressions may include: acclaiming, applauding, appreciating, boasting, bragging, crediting, esteeming, exalting, glorying, glorifying, honoring, idolizing, lauding, magnifying, excessive defending, promoting, revering, and worshiping. Such expressions may be subtle or brash, perceived or misperceived, judged or misjudged.
- Spiritually, pride may be sinful or righteous, depending on its motives, targets, and manner of expression.
Very likely, the last point may have captured your attention because we typically understand Biblical perspectives on pride to be sinful. Right?? That may well be biases from the perspective of our collective and personal sinful natures.
Have you noticed that The Bible never defines pride? Rather it floods us with examples and consequences of, and admonitions against sinful pride. That generally anchors our emphasis and focus. But in doing this, The Lord intends to draw us back to His original intent for pride!
Hold on! Hear me out…
The Original Intent for Pride
In the beginning, The Lord created everything, and then declared it to be GOOD. Moreover, His intention was for everything in creation, animate and inanimate alike, to know Him, and to function/perform in accordance with His DESIGN and GOOD intentions. He created humans (as a little lower than The Godhead), and angels (to serve both The Godhead and humans), to receive and enjoy His eternal Gracious, Loving Goodness, and in turn, to reflect their Appreciation, Devotion, Honor, Joy, Love, Praise and Worship back to Him, Their Creator.
In this, do you perceive His intent for
reciprocating, righteous pride??
Pause for a moment…
Does that concept startle you? It should. We're all so conditioned to associate pride only with sin, that the idea of eternal, righteous, reciprocating pride almost sounds heretical. And yet, that is exactly what The Lord created, and plans to redeem—not pride rooted in human or angelic self-exaltation, but in mutual exultation between The Creator and ALL of His creation—forever!
The Lord created both humans and angels with free-will—the personal choice and opportunity to obey or disobey His intentions—the opportunity for rebellion. We all know …‘the rest of the story’. Lucifer was likely the first in The Lord’s creation to ‘cash in’ on/activate this opportunity, and thus he became the first fruit of sin. And just like a third of The Lord’s angels joined in his rebellion, so have we all followed suit. But thankfully, a few of us have opened our ‘wide shut’ spiritual eyes, to perceive and believe His plan of eternal redemption, to draw us back to His original …’reciprocating pride plan’!
The Bible predicts He, Who created pride, will also be THE ULTIMATE source of all pride, throughout eternity, on a new, eternal Earth!
In this, can you perceive the full circle
of His intent will be completed??
Meanwhile, pending that predicted 7th age of human history, in addition to examples and consequences of, and admonitions against sinful pride, The Bible iteratively informs us of what to be proud in, about and for. We might typically miss the full meaning of the following verses because of limited understanding of ‘glory’. Today, we don’t generally use ‘glory’ to signify the noun, pride, or the verb, to be proud.
Please read, study and meditate on these verses. In doing so, I trust you will see that all pride is not sinful, and is not shunned across The Bible. The concept of righteous pride isn’t generally heard today. As a result, Christians might not be skilled in discerning what it is when they encounter it, especially when it isn’t shrouded in …religious rhetoric.
Recall, the Pharisees claimed Jesus was sinfully prideful.
Righteous pride:
It’s a theological reversal that feels almost scandalous—
until it starts ringing true …in Scripture!
