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YOU’RE SO PRETTY

There was a cute exchange between actor Jason Alexander and one of the late-night talk-show hosts not so long ago. The man behind the desk begins with the usual riff of gushing praise. “Oh, Jason, you’re looking good. And right now you’re so hot. Everything’s working for you. You played George Costanza on Seinfeld for so many years; we all loved you in that. You’re a spokesman for KFC. And now you’re with Martin Short in The Producers – the talk of Broadway. The reviewers love you, the audiences love you, I love you, blah blah blah . . .”

And Jason holds up a hand. “Please,” he goes. “Please . . . finish your thought.”

Most of us will never be invited to sit in the coveted chair across from Jay Leno, even though for us at the Voice of Prophecy, Burbank is just down the 118 freeway from Simi Valley. But don’t we all enjoy – and covet – those moments when people appeal to our pride? One public speaker got introduced to an audience, and the emcee said so many nice things about him, when he finally got up to speak, he confessed: “I feel like a waffle that just had syrup poured all over it.” And it was a nice feeling.

The Bible has a well-known warning in it for our friend George Costanza – and all of us common folk who don’t get interviewed on the E! network should heed it as well. Proverbs 16:18:

“Pride goeth before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall.”

The Message paraphrase gives that line some Internet freshness when it warns:
“First pride, then the crash – the bigger the ego, the harder the fall.”

We’re going to spend a couple of weeks here talking about pride: what it is, what it isn’t. And about why God seems to hate certain forms of it so much. There are a lot of Scripture passages that talk about pride, and not very many of them are complimentary. Words like “fall,” “crash,” “disgrace,” “flat-on-their-face” seem to pepper the divine commentary. Heaven seems to almost enjoy it when proud sinners get their comeuppance; in fact, we’re going to explore some passages that suggest God and His angels are out there with banana peels, deliberately plotting our skids into embarrassment and shame after we’ve bragged on ourselves. He doesn’t just predict our demise; He engineers it.

What exactly is pride? Webster’s gives us a number of definitions, and all of you who are dads have said – appropriately – to your kids, when they graduated from high school: “Honey, I’m so proud of you.” The Bible’s not condemning that. You perform special music at church and people thank you; they say “amen” as you conclude your solo. That’s okay too. So what is the danger here? What kind of pride should we watch out for?

Here’s the risky one, #3 in our office dictionary:

“A high or inordinate opinion of one’s own dignity, importance, merit, or superiority; conceit, arrogance.”

Random House then adds a whole list of nasty synonyms like egotism and vanity. And we get a sense of exaggerated importance, excessive preoccupation with self, blindness about faults, a bloated opinion of our worth. Over and over, there’s this image of sitting up too high on the ladder and getting knocked down a few rungs.

In fact, Jesus has a little parable where He describes that exact scenario. It’s in Luke 14, and here it is:

“When someone invites you to a party,” He warns, “do not take the place of honor, for a person more distinguished than you may have been invited. If so, the host who invited both of you will come and say to you, ‘Give this man your seat.’ Then, humiliated, you will have to take the least important place. But when you are invited, take the LOWEST place, so that when your host comes, he will say to you, ‘Friend, move up to a better place.’ Then you will be honored in the presence of all your fellow guests. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.”

In a sense, it almost seems like Jesus is recommending a form of game-playing here, where the proud person can most effectively feed their pride by taking a place lower than they feel they deserve – with the specific hope of moving up while the spotlight is shining on them. Now they have the lofty throne AND the orchestra playing for them too. But as we examine the Lord’s teachings more closely, I think we find deeper issues at work here.

What happens to us when this kind of “I’m so important” pride enters in? Essentially, we begin to derive our worth, our identity, or sense of SELF . . . from those feelings. If we’re a TV pitchman for Kentucky Fried Chicken, if we have an SRO play running for months down at the Pantages Theater, then THAT is what makes us important. Our good looks, our bank account, our resumé, the pretty girls we’re seen with – “arm candy,” as Donald Trump calls them – become the definition of our value.

And you ask: well, what’s wrong with that? If I have more degrees than my neighbor, or more money, or more Botox in my face, aren’t I a better person? The answer is no: for two reasons.

First of all, each one of those so-called advantages are temporary. Riches and good looks can disappear; an attractive wife can dump you. Beautiful homes can burn to the ground; high-paying jobs can be lost. Sports cars crash or break down.

The second reality is this. All of these THINGS we think are a measure of our worth . . . are not true indicators in the sight of God. Our value doesn’t come from the fact that we are rich or handsome; it comes from the reality that we are His redeemed children.

In the book of Psalms, a rather wealthy and handsome king, a man with enough pretty wives to make 20 men happy, wisely comments:

“In his pride the wicked does not seek [God]; in all his thoughts there is no room for God. He says to himself, ‘Nothing will shake me; I’ll always be happy and never have trouble.’”

Notice the dilemma. This man, first of all, assumes the permanence of his trinkets and toys. “I’ll ALWAYS be happy; I’ll ALWAYS have these things. My prettiness will never fade away.” That simply isn’t true. But the second fact is that his pride, his obsession with stuff, with mirror-gazing, is keeping him from seeking a friendship with his Maker. And a friendship with our Creator, friend, is the only thing that gives any of us permanent, eternal value.

In his wonderful book, The Ten(der) Commandments, Pastor Ron Mehl puts it in a powerful nutshell when he writes:

“Our value doesn’t spring from what we wear, what we drive, or where we live. Our value is wrapped up in the amazing fact that Jesus Christ, the mighty Son of God and Creator of the world, loved us enough to die for us. He is the One who gives worth and value to our lives. He paid the price and purchased our salvation.”

So how does the sincere Christian keep his or her focus holy? How can we have good pride and not bad? Obviously, we do it by focusing our first and best efforts on a daily connected friendship with Christ. We gaze on His face, and derive our feelings of worth by knowing that He loves us and died for us. But it runs deeper than that.

In their wonderful book, Descending Into Greatness, Bill Hybels and Rob Wilkins devote a whole chapter to telling the story of Mike Singletary. Successful football player for the Chicago Bears, Super Bowl champion, nine-time Pro Bowl participant, Defensive Player of the Year, he has a beautiful wife, Kim. Beautiful kids. A beautiful home. A beautiful bank account. It is not wrong to have any or all of those things. A man can honor and trust God on the football field as well as anywhere else. But these two writers describe how Mike Singletary had to essentially allow himself to be broken, to experience the “fall” that comes from pride, before he could truly comprehend his real worth in Jesus Christ. And he confesses in the book:

“Humility was the wisdom to understand that I could not trust in myself. I think the thing that I learned most is that God can be trusted.”

But you know, Mr. Singletary still has all those trophies on this shelf in the beautiful home. He still has the money and the designer suits. And every now and then, someone will shine a spotlight on him and begin going, “Oh Mike, oh Mike, oh Mike.” What does he do?

Notice this life-changing answer. He calls those moments “stabs of pride,” and does one thing:

“Every time someone praises me,” he says, “I transfer that praise immediately to the Lord. I thank HIM, for He is the one that has given me the ability to do what I do. That way the compliment never stops with me; it’s just a continuous flow. I use it as an opportunity to remind myself where true strength comes from. It’s not me. It’s God.”

Isn’t that beautiful? Passing it on to God – acknowledging Him. Basking in Him. Friend, that’s the only way to be handsome and humble – and truly happy – at the same time.