A Slice Of Humble Pie….

What’s so bad about pride? To be brutally honest, pride breeds selfishness, which is the opposite of love. Pride wants to preserve self over anything else. It’s what God hates. Pride is the motivating factor of all sins. Murder, lying, slander, gossip, criticism, and the list goes on. In order for pride to continue on, it must put to death what opposes it. Here in Luke chapter 4 we get a clear example of this. Jesus is teaching in His hometown synagogue. He reads scripture out of the book of Isaiah. He tells the people that the only person healed out of many was a gentile, Naaman. He then tells the people the only widow that was helped was a gentile as well, the woman from Zaraphath. The pride of the Israelites swelled up and they wanted to kill Jesus by pushing Him off a cliff. How someone goes from praising Jesus to wanting to kill Him is exactly how pride works in the human spirit. It’s only when you know your place, Who you are responsible to, that you learn how to deal with pride. And it’s the Holy Spirit that helps keep pride in check. Humility is one of the fruits of the Spirit. And it’s the antidote for pride. Ask God today to set you straight, even if it means eating a slice of humble pie. You’ll save yourself a lot of future pain if you learn and practice this principle. Pride opposes Love, the very thing God says He is.

14 Then Jesus returned to Galilee, filled with the Holy Spirit’s power. Reports about Him spread quickly through the whole region. 15 He taught regularly in their synagogues and was praised by everyone.16 When He came to the village of Nazareth, His boyhood home, He went as usual to the synagogue on the Sabbath and stood up to read the Scriptures. 17 The scroll of Isaiah the prophet was handed to Him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where this was written: 18 “The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me,for He has anointed Me to bring Good News to the poor.He has sent Me to proclaim that captives will be released,that the blind will see,that the oppressed will be set free,19 and that the time of the Lord’s favor has come.” 20 He rolled up the scroll, handed it back to the attendant, and sat down. All eyes in the synagogue looked at Him intently. 21 Then He began to speak to them. “The Scripture you’ve just heard has been fulfilled this very day!”22 Everyone spoke well of Him and was amazed by the gracious words that came from His lips. “How can this be?” they asked. “Isn’t this Joseph’s son?”23 Then He said, “You will undoubtedly quote Me this proverb: ‘Physician, heal yourself’–meaning, ‘Do miracles here in Your hometown like those You did in Capernaum.’ 24 But I tell you the truth, no prophet is accepted in His own hometown.25 “Certainly there were many needy widows in Israel in Elijah’s time, when the heavens were closed for three and a half years, and a severe famine devastated the land.26 Yet Elijah was not sent to any of them. He was sent instead to a foreigner–a widow of Zarephath in the land of Sidon.27 And there were many lepers in Israel in the time of the prophet Elisha, but the only one healed was Naaman, a Syrian.”28 When they heard this, the people in the synagogue were furious. 29 Jumping up, they mobbed Him and forced Him to the edge of the hill on which the town was built. They intended to push Him over the cliff, 30 but He passed right through the crowd and went on His way. Luke 4:14-30