Pride, on the other hand, is the mother of all sins, and the original sin of lucifer…. An instrument strung, but preferring to play itself because it thinks it knows the tune better than the Musician.
C.S. Lewis: Family letters 1905-1931 (ed. 2000)
It had not been very long since I had encountered Pride Rock; only a few weeks had passed. I was content, knowing that my pride was well and properly dealt with and was now safely part of the foundation of my place. I was also wrong. The Lord was far from done with me and my pride.
Another Side of Pride: Selfishness
During my time in Pops’ Workshop, I noticed a pattern of God speaking to me through corporate confession in church. At my church, like at many other churches around the world, we often have a liturgy of corporate confession that includes time for silent reflection. It was during those times that I would hear from the Lord.
It makes sense that we would hear more readily in those times. He is always speaking. When we are full of ourselves and our ideas, we crowd our minds with our grand thoughts and don’t leave much space for other voices, making it harder to hear what the Lord is speaking. When we confess our sinful thoughts, actions, and desires, we empty ourselves or ourselves, making it easier for the voice of God to break through.
During a Sunday worship service, as we paused for silent reflection during our corporate confession, I heard the word “Selfish.” More than just hearing that word, it was being thrust upon me. There was no gentle suggestion or Holy Spirit “nudge.” It was more of a siren than a word, an in-my-face, insistent, almost shrill voice repeating over and over again, “Selfish, Selfish, Selfish!” That got my attention. It could not be ignored any more than a ten-foot-tall flashing neon sign placed directly in your path could be ignored. As I sat with that “word,” I became aware of several areas of my life where I was being very selfish indeed.
I had been in a funk because things were not turning out the way I wanted. I was in an in-between space. I was being healed but not whole, being called to ministry but still in a grueling “day job,” seeing how much I had changed and was changing but having those closest to me tell me I must be “faking it.” I wanted to be on the other side of healing. I wanted to be able to focus on ministry. I wanted my loved ones to acknowledge the depth of the change God was working in me.
Those are reasonable frustrations and reasonable wants. It was not selfish of me to want those things. However, I wanted what I wanted without considering what others might want or need. I was thinking about only one person: myself! And, to make it worse, I was sulking and withdrawing when I didn’t get my way. That is why the warning klaxon, “Selfish,” sounded for me that Sunday morning.
I wasn’t thinking about Pride or even the Workshop, but unexpectedly, my thoughts jumped back to Pride Rock. I saw it once again standing upright. As I watched, it was lifted up, and I could see its underside. Carved there, where it was otherwise invisible, was the word “Selfish.” The Lord was directing me to recognize my selfishness as another side of Pride.
I am sure that many readers are right now saying, “Well, duh!” of course, they are related. But I hadn’t ever thought about that,1 and it makes sense. What, besides Pride, thinking we are really something special, leads us to believe that we should have whatever we decide we want. What, aside from a pride-fueled sense of entitlement, makes us think we should have our wishes granted as soon as we wish them? What, besides Pride and conceit, leads us to believe that our needs, wants, and desires are, without question, more important than anyone and everyone else’s needs, wants, and desires?
Pride need not look boastful and preening. It can also appear selfish and demanding. Clearly, God was not yet done with me and my pride. My pride was more pernicious and more toxic than I had imagined, and I was about to learn yet another lesson about pride and selfishness.
Even Another Side of Pride: Discontent
The more time you spend being attentive to what God may be saying, the more often you’ll find him “breaking in” to your everyday activities. That can lead to getting revelation in the oddest times. I was still a road warrior, flying across the country most weeks of the year. While boarding a flight to Virginia, I thought about how hard it was for me to exercise and tend to my diet while on the road. Suddenly, an image of the exterior of my Pops’ Workshop flashed in my mind. It was as if the Lord was saying, “Pay attention, this is me.” Instantly, I saw with bitter clarity that not exercising and eating poorly were other manifestations of selfishness.
They really had nothing to do with my travel schedule; they had to do with me wanting to eat what I wanted and to do (or not do) what I wanted and when I wanted to do it. If I didn’t feel like exercising, I shouldn’t have to. I deserved to spend my time the way wanted to, not how I “should.” If I wanted to have a seconds at dinner or have fries instead of a vegetable, why shouldn’t I have it? I deserved to have what I wanted!2
The hits just kept on coming, and next, the Lord spoke to me about dissatisfaction. Earlier that morning, as I was walking from my car to the airport terminal, I was feeling a bit depressed at having to leave home again after a very short weekend home. I had returned home on Friday, a day later than usual, and on Sunday, I was already headed back to the airport. I felt stuck, despising my life on the road, and feeling anything but contented.
Back on the jet bridge, waiting to get on the plane for Virginia, I realized that my discontent was yet another side of pride. Discontent: a “lack of satisfaction with one’s possessions, status, or situation; a sense of grievance; dissatisfaction.”3 Pride-born selfishness is the progenitor of discontent and the enemy of contentment. It says, “I should have my life how I want it. It is unfair, unjust, and unacceptable for me not to have things my way.” How dare the world not deliver life on my terms? But as a Christian, am I not really saying, “God, not your will be done, but mine?” In my discontent, I am, in effect, saying to God, “I know what is needed in my life better than you do.”
To put a little icing on the cake of discontentment, my Bible reading for that day included Philippians 4. Paul, writing to the church at Philippi, says:
I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances. I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. I can do everything through him who gives me strength.
Philippians 4:11-13 NIV
If anyone had reason to be discontented, Paul certainly did. Scholars tell us that his letter to the Philippian church was written after he had been, at various times, threatened, arrested, beaten, stoned and left for dead, imprisoned, and shipwrecked, with most of those calamities happening more than once. Yet he was content. I was seriously put out that I had to travel for my job. I think I was missing something important.
An Object Lesson in Selfishness
On that travel day, now aboard the plane and en route to Virginia, I was journaling some of my reflections on selfishness and discontent when I was suddenly convicted of yet another instance of selfishness.
I was seated next to an older woman who was traveling by herself. She had accidentally left all her reading material in her checked bag and had nothing to do except peruse the in-flight magazine.4 It was obvious that she wanted to talk to somebody. I did not want it to be me. Usually, when on a plane I was quick to put on my noise-canceling headphones and immerse myself in a book, a movie, a game, or almost anything besides engaging a seatmate in conversation. So, knowing that my neighbor was bored and wanted to talk and knowing that she was left with nothing else to do, I did what you would expect. Put on my headphones and piously and pointedly spent my time catching up on my Bible reading and praying.
As I ended my prayer time and started journaling, with my seatmate sitting silently beside me, I finally woke up and stopped analyzing what God was saying and started actually listening to it. I put my things away and engaged my seatmate in conversation for the next two and a half hours. I had to set aside my selfish desire for solitude to ease someone else’s anxiety and boredom. I had to put a stranger’s ill-defined needs above my needs. Incidentally, but not surprisingly, it was a very pleasant conversation with a caring woman who had led a very interesting life.
Pride: The Mother of All Sins
Self-glorifying pride has been the mother of all manner of sin in my life. Pride births selfishness, greed, anger, discontent, impatience, jealousy, lying and deceit. That list gives us a pretty fair start on Paul’s enumeration of the works of the flesh in Galatians 5.5
We should not be surprised by the destructive power and malignancy of Pride. It is the first sin the enemy taught our Mother and Father in the Garden of Eden. “God is holding out on you. You deserve better. Why should you be kept from having what you want? Go ahead, take it!”
The antidote to Pride is Jesus. By knowing him and spending time with him, we begin to learn that we have been chasing the wrong things. Joy and contentment, so much greater than our desires and happiness, are ours when we know that we are known and loved by he, who is the beginning, center, and end of all things. In him, we find what our souls long for. Then, we can become lovers of others instead of prideful lovers of self.
- I wonder how much our spiritual health could be improved by spending time thinking about how our sin patterns overlap and intersect. ↩︎
- Full disclosure: Years later, I am retired, and I still struggle with getting enough exercise and eating properly. The problem was not traveling! ↩︎
- “Discontent.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/discontent. Accessed 14 Nov. 2024. ↩︎
- It may seem strange to think of it, but there was no on-board WiFi at this time, and many flights had no on-board entertainment. They did have airline magazines, which most people read only as a last resort. ↩︎
- “Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.” Galatians 5:19-21, ESV ↩︎
From Pops' Workshop 
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