Have you ever just sat down and thought about pride?
Like we're infected with it, each one of us. It happens so early we don't even see it coming. And then our pride makes way for destruction, pain, hate, shame, and loneliness. Pride doesn't love. It doesn't act selflessly or sacrificially. Humans are just so prideful. It's the underlying cause of so much sin, anger, and grief. Pride says I've got this. It says I deserve this, I earned this. Pride takes no orders. It gives no mercy and accepts no redemption. It creates a crack in the wall for vanity and prejudice. Pride's too good to serve or address wrong.
But then think about God. God is, well.. God. Wow. He's so above us. He made us. HE CREATES LIFE. He is. He was. He is to come. He will always be. He has always been. He is at the beginning and the end. Nothing is above him or before him. He is omnipotent. He is all good. He knows everything. He is perfect, merciful, and yet completely righteous. He is absolute. God is beauty, goodness, love.
We stumble about blindly looking for anything to fill in our holes, looking for any answer that makes it okay. We can't control ourselves. We live in a broken world, driven by flesh. We destroy. We murder and steal. We hate and we lie. We deny mercy to others though we beg for it ourselves.
HOW HUMBLE IS GOD? I mean look at the magnitude of Him. To see Him face to face is to die. He is beyond our realm of understanding. Yet He became human. GOD became HUMAN. Can you imagine? We who take pride in ourselves by inflating our egos, but bringing others down find perfect humility impossible to reach. Yet this God who sees forever became a person. Better yet, he became an infant and before that, a fetus in the womb of a woman He himself created. He ALLOWED Mary to give a human birth to Him. He was born among animals because even at His birth He was rejected. He grew up as a carpenter's son. He had nothing material. He was no king, master, landowner, or any other position giving authority or demanding respect. He did not boast of His excellence. He became the least among us. He preached to the poor and ate with the sinful. Those who are the lowest of low- the cheaters, the sick, the poor, the vain, the hateful, the immoral- these were His friends. He healed them, blessed them, and taught them. He gave them hope. And then He allowed Himself to be murdered by His own creation. He gave every last bit of Himself at the hands of those whom he would save. But he didn't even die a great warrior or some other honorable death. He died a criminal. Accused by His own people and sentenced to die next to thieves as their equal. Mocked and scoffed at like scum. Beat and tortured in great displays of power over Him, He allowed Himself to be humiliated by those who owed Him their every breath.
Can you even imagine? How great is God's wonderous humility. And His love that all this was just for me. To win me. To pay my debt.
It's like me becoming a bacteria.
