Have you ever wondered why God allows trials in your life? I certainly have. For close to a quarter of a century I have lived in a wilderness of chronic and degenerative disease. Each year my physical state sinks lower to the point where I am now triplegic and use an electric wheelchair. Despite this wilderness experience, I have been acutely aware of God's presence. He has led me through my wilderness for many of the same reasons He led the Israelites in the wilderness.
Moses told the Israelites “Remember how the Lord your God led you through the wilderness for forty years, humbling you and testing you to prove your character, and to find out whether or not you would really obey his commands.”[1]
Moses told the Israelites “Remember how the Lord your God led you through the wilderness for forty years, humbling you and testing you to prove your character, and to find out whether or not you would really obey his commands.”[1]
The Great Sin
“According to Christian teachers, the essential vice, the utmost evil is Pride. Unchastity, anger, greed, drunkenness, and all that, are mere fleabites in comparison: It was through Pride that the devil became the devil: Pride leads to every other vice: It is the complete anti-God state of mind.”[2]
Lewis called Pride “The Great Sin.” Pride is my sin despite the fact that most of my adult life has been marred by the various shocking humiliations of degenerative multiple sclerosis. Even afflicted by an
aggressive disease that is slowly destroying my body, I have still been guilty of Pride. Even living in a carcass riddled with disease, I have found myself, at times, taking a perverse Pride in the preposterous delusion that I bear a tough disease so much better than lesser men. What arrogance! I’ve tried to convince myself that I have not been broken by the dramatic loss of physical function or bowed to the terror of catastrophic neurological degeneration – ignoring the ocean of tears I've cried or nights fearfully trembling in my bed during harsh, unpredictable, dramatic attacks.
It is a perverse man who can still take Pride in his own destruction. And yet that is the colossal and pervasive extent of my monumental Pride. It knows no limits!
What is God to do with such a stiff-necked man! Perhaps He must leave me stumbling in the wilderness for my own eternal good, lest I truly fall into the pit. I am so prone toward the illusion of self-sufficiency – so ready and willing to push Christ off the throne of my life: “Move over Lord. I’ll take the driver’s seat now.” Allow me a modicum of recovery and that is exactly what I’m apt to do.
It is a perverse man who can still take Pride in his own destruction. And yet that is the colossal and pervasive extent of my monumental Pride. It knows no limits!
What is God to do with such a stiff-necked man! Perhaps He must leave me stumbling in the wilderness for my own eternal good, lest I truly fall into the pit. I am so prone toward the illusion of self-sufficiency – so ready and willing to push Christ off the throne of my life: “Move over Lord. I’ll take the driver’s seat now.” Allow me a modicum of recovery and that is exactly what I’m apt to do.
Pride, arrogance, presumption
Perhaps Twenty-four years in the wilderness of a horrible disease is where I must remain to finally learn utter dependence of God and uproot my Pride and arrogance.
If the Lord were to take me home prematurely I might argue with Saint Peter for the keys to the Kingdom of Heaven.
“Give me the keys, Pete. You might lose them." (Yeah right, I can't find my own house keys.)
“Give me the keys, Pete. You might lose them." (Yeah right, I can't find my own house keys.)
My Pride and arrogance can be boundless!
Better a wilderness on this side of the grave than to die with the weight of the Great Sin unresolved. Granted, Christ forgives all sin ... but do I really want to meet my maker with such a character flaw? No, I don't think so.
MP
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[1] . Deuteronomy 8.2. NLT.
[2] C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity (London, Geoffrey Bles, 1952) P. 96.
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[1] . Deuteronomy 8.2. NLT.
[2] C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity (London, Geoffrey Bles, 1952) P. 96.
1 comments:
It takes time and insight to recognize pride as the great sin. So many other sins are more visible and their consequences more evident.
Perhaps this is the trap that so many do-gooders (I do not use the word with malice) fall into. We are convinced another rule, one more assistance program or tax will solve "the problem".
We do not acknowledge either ourselves or mankind as essentially broken. In that refusal, we separate ourselves from God, as revealed by Christ. Pride is insidious.
Not well put, perhaps. Does that make much sense?
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