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PRIDE The Genesis Of Sin
by Alex Tung PJN1
Christians today
stand witness to an
epoch of humanity
that prizes narcissism like
never before. The image of
someone oozing boundless
egotistical self-confidence
and an aura of superior
self-assuredness, which in
the past would categorically
classify the person as being
vain and obnoxious, is today
considered attractive. Whilst
there is nothing wrong with
self-confidence per se, such
confidence, if it were to
remain a positive attribute,
must pass the litmus test
of recognition – do we
acknowledge our abilities
as God-given gifts and in turn
praise Him for the confidence
we have, or do we relish in
our advantage over others
while taking full credit for
our abilities and bask in the
compliments that follow our
triumph?
It is high time that humanity
(including Christians,
especially) takes stock of our
egoistical competitive ways
and re-evaluates how badly
we have been corrupted by
the sin of pride. So malignant
is the sin of pride that C.
S. Lewis devoted an entire
chapter in his book Mere
Christianity to expound
on it. Aptly entitled “The
Great Sin”, Lewis says in this
chapter that:
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.
C. S. Lewis
THE ROOT OF SIN
The question is not whether
we have been corrupted
by the sin of pride – we all,
undoubtedly, have. The
correct question, rather,
is how deeply we have
allowed this sin to corrode
our integrity. The unchecked
perpetuating rust of pride
on a man’s soul manifests
as symptoms in the form
of other sins as all other sins
originate from the sin of
pride. It is pride that fuels
a man into an obsessive
competition with his
fellow man. This ungodly
competitive nature (read:
jealousy) reveals its visible
sting in an array of immoral
conduct that man stumbles
into, all for the sake of having
an advantage over others.
In his jealous pursuit to outdo
another, mankind lies, bribes,
lusts, and even murders.
Pride gets no
pleasure out of
having something,
only out of having
more of it than the
next man... It is the
comparison that
makes you proud:
the pleasure of
being above the
rest.
Once the element
of competition is
gone, pride is gone.
C. S. Lewis
The sin of pride has
corrupted the heart of
man so deeply that even
the virtue of humility, the
moral opposite of pride,
risks being tarnished by our
ego if we are not careful.
Whilst we should all aspire
to be humble, the moment
we consider ourselves
sufficiently humble, will
bring that feeling of selfsatisfaction
which triggers
the undoing of all our efforts.
The pursuit of humility,
then, is akin to our pursuit
of Godliness; regardless
of how repentant we may
be, we would never be as
sinless as Christ was and is
– in that same tangent, we
would never achieve perfect
humility.
[As a senior devil writing to his
apprentice, a junior devil] Your
patient has become humble; have
you drawn his attention to the fact?
All virtues are less formidable to us
once the man is aware that he has
them, but this is especially true
of humility.
C. S. Lewis
PRIDE – THE CORE OF
SATANISM
To fully comprehend the
severity of the sin of pride,
consider this statement –
Satan would not exist if it
were not for the sin of pride.
If this seems an exaggeration
of the devil’s origin, consider
Isaiah 14:12-14 which recounts
how Lucifer, one of God’s
angels, as a result of his
pride-driven ambition to
be as great as, if not greater
than God, was ultimately
cast out of heaven and
condemned to the depths
of hell. Before he became
Satan, Lucifer was a perfect
creation of God – he was
beautiful, powerful, intelligent
and gifted – and did remain
so until he became absorbed
in his own greatness that led
to his conceit and eventual
condemnation (Ezekiel
28:15).
The other, and
less bad, vices
come from the
devil working on
us through our
animal nature.
But [pride]
does not come
through our
animal nature.
It comes direct
from Hell. It is
purely spiritual:
consequently it
is far more subtle
and deadly.
C. S. Lewis
THE EVE ACCOUNT
Genesis 3 records man’s
fall into sin, a curse which
all humanity inherits to this
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