Wednesday, July 11

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Wednesday

“What’s it got to do with Us?”

Now that we’ve covered the historical setting for Obadiah’s prophecy and seen the reason for the condemnation of Edom laid out clearly you’ve probably got one glaring question, “This is sort of interesting Grant, but what’s it got to do with me?” Perhaps I don’t know those reading this blog well enough, but I would assume that most of you are not in danger of leaving here this morning to go and ransack the city that you live in. Even though we’re incredibly far removed from Obadiah’s historical context I believe that this book still has a powerful message for us today. You see even though you’re likely not in danger of ransacking the tri-cities, we all struggle with the motive that led the Edomite’s to ransack Jerusalem alongside the Babylonians. What was that motive? Pride. Jump back in the book with me to Verse 3, remember that the Lord declares, 

“The pride of your heart has deceived you…you who say to yourself, ‘Who can bring me down to the ground?’ Thought you soar like the eagle and make your nest among the stars, from there I will bring you down.”  

  I love that God doesn’t just isolate the Edomite’s pride as the reason they stand under His wrath, but instead highlights the deception of their pride. Many things have changed in the thousands of years since Obadiah delivered this prophecy, but one thing has not, pride is still a powerfully deceptive force and stands as a great and constant danger to all our souls and lives.  

Pride has caused more harm than any other sin in the world. Indeed it was pride that was the mother of all sin. In the Garden, Adam and Eve ate of the apple because they desired to “be like God.” That one prideful decision has resulted in all the death, sickness, and toil that humanity has dealt with since our beginning. As David Baker summarizes, pride makes us think that we are “…independent, self-sufficient, and invulnerable. The person who yields to the temptation of pride surrenders his capacity to think and feel and act without deception. Pride distorts every area of thought and life.”

Pride is dangerous to us for many reasons, perhaps most of all though because it’s impossible to live out the life that we’re called to live as Christians while remaining prideful. After all, our entire theology as Christians is based not on human achievement, but on human wretchedness and God’s achievement. If you’re here worshipping God this morning you’re worshipping Him not because of anything that you’ve done but because of something that He did! Furthermore the Savior that we worship, Jesus Christ has modeled humility for us and commanded us to walk in it. Jesus who though He was in His very nature God did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, and instead exchanged the glories of heaven for suffering, betrayal, and crucifixion on earth. 

To put it simply, pride ruins us for Christian service. You can’t love your neighbor if you think you’re better than He is. You won’t stop to help your neighbor if you’ve constructed a worldview in which you’re more deserving of blessing than he is. You won’t sacrifice for your family if you’ve allowed yourself to believe that you’re the one who deserves to be cared for.  Now look I don’t think that any of you here today would say any of those things out loud. I don’t think that anyone here this morning would say out loud, “I’m more important than my neighbor,” or “I deserve to be cared for more than anyone in my family.” But as soon as we allow pride to have a grip in our lives, that’s what we start to believe and that’s how we start to live. 

Perhaps you’re the businessman whose company has not only survived, but thrived during the recession, and you find yourself feeling judgment, not brokenness for those you know who have not fared as well as you have. Perhaps you’re the Mom who has watched other Mom’s kids take a bad turn and get into all sorts of trouble. And instead of extending a helping hand, instead of loving on that Mom, instead of praying with her, you’ve retreated into your own, safe family and thought, “Thank God my kids will never be like that.” Or perhaps you’re married but things are going poorly at home. At work though there’s someone who cares about you, someone who listens to you, and you’ve started to believe that you deserve to have that in your life, even if the person who can give it to you isn’t your wife. If you find yourself in any of those positions, and again we’re all going to be there at some point in our lives please here me as clear as you can as I say this. Pride is deceptive, and if you don’t fight it, if you don’t cry out to God to take it out of your life, it will destroy you like it destroyed Edom.


Grant Diamond