My pride, my pain

“Pride goeth before a fall.” I used to think this verse, Proverbs 16:8, was just a saying. Or maybe a warning that if you become arrogant something bad might happen to you. Like karma will get you if you’re not nice to the little people. But lately I have come to understand it from quite a different perspective.

You see, that phrase is not a warning. It’s a fact. Like a law of nature. Just like, “What goes up must come down.” Like 2+2=4. Like  the fact that humans must have air to breathe and fish, water to…breathe? I don’t know what fish do with their gills exactly…

The point is that when I hold myself in a place of importance and think I’m better than someone else–or when I think I can ignore God’s laws and do my own thing, because I tell myself I know better–I am actually setting myself up for a fall. It’s not an “if”–if I fall–it’s a “when”–when will it come? It will come. There is no doubt. I will hit a wall and it will be painful.

This is what I realized after spending weeks thinking I could avoid a fall. Feeling indestructible. Getting a high on temporary admiration of other people. Letting the praise of man become more to me than the opinion of my God.

And just like gravity, I fell. And just like a scrapes I got as a kid, this fall was painful.

I knew this would happen. I almost expected it, but hoped it wouldn’t. My pride wounded me more than anyone else could.

But, just like parent there to help up the bruised child, my Father was there. It didn’t take the pain away at first, but his love made it bearable.

My heart still aches a little, and I still have consequences to face–but I know he is with me. He forgave me and he loves me faithfully.

Tonight this old song came to mind, and I believe it was from the Lover of my Soul. He is still with me. He’s still lifting my head. Not wanting me to live in shame

“Thou, O Lord, are a shield about me; You’re my glory, You’re the Lifter of my head…Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia, you’re the lifter of my head.”