Thy Kingdom Come: A Blumhardt Reader - Plough

God, often becomes the means by which we are estrangedfrom God. We practice repentance only in such a way as tojustify ourselves, and thus repentance becomes arrogance.There thus come to be two forms of arrogance on earthinstead of only one. The one form of arrogance belongs tothe world. As long as things are going well, the world exaltsitself through its own accomplishments and claims aplace alongside God. The other form shows up in devoutpeople who have justified themselves through repentance—or suppose that they have justified themselves by worshipingGod in their particular way. Thus a religious structureemerges which presumes to set itself up alongside God, oreven against God, just as the worldly structures do. Thesereligious forms of arrogance are the more dangerous becausethe sacred is involved in them...We can see clearly how both sorts of arrogance showedup in the story of the Savior, how they gave him troublein becoming the Savior he wanted to be. There were onlyfew—very few—who were willing to give themselves up tohim. Worldly arrogance—represented by King Herod andothers—as it encountered Christ, obviously could not giveitself up. These people wanted to profit from the Savior: hewas to be good for them, he was to contribute to them; butthey didn’t want to give anything to him, they did not wishto give themselves up.Yet the other side acted no differently, the devout ofthe land, the Pharisees, those in whom resided the actual210