Proverbs 28.26
“Whoever trusts in his own mind is a fool, but he who walks in wisdom will be delivered.”
What is truth and where does it come from?
By what standards do you live and work?
What reference points do you use for right and wrong?
These are the most important questions of our time. How you answer has eternal consequences.
Yesterday we saw the Hebrew word zadon, which is translated “pride.” It refers to an arrogant, self-centered ego that rejects God’s standards and authority. It is hubris that is marked by an inflated sense of personal authority.
Zadon has been institutionalized in America. Most of our culture-shaping institutions operate in open disregard for and defiance of God’s truth. Judeo-Christian principles are dismissed and marginalized in the popular culture, and people arrogantly believe they know better than God.
This is precisely what scripture warns against. The fight against the arrogance of the imperial self is no trivial battle. Proverbs communicates the message repeatedly to make sure we get the message:
“Everyone who is arrogant in heart is an abomination to the Lord; be assured, he will not go unpunished.” (Proverbs 16.5)
“Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall.” (Proverbs 16.18)
“Before destruction a man’s heart is haughty, but humility comes before honor.” (Proverbs 18.12)
“When pride comes, then comes disgrace, but with the humble is wisdom.” (Proverbs 11.2)
One of the challenges of arrogance is that it is deeply deceptive, and it blinds people to the truth. In the OT book of Obadiah, the Lord had a message to the nation of Edom that we would be wise to listen to in our generation:
“Behold, I will make you small among the nations; you shall be utterly despised. The arrogance of your heart has deceived you, you who live in the clefts of the rock, in your lofty dwelling, who say in your heart, “Who will bring me down to the ground?” Though you soar aloft like the eagle, though your nest is set among the stars, from there I will bring you down, declares the Lord.” (Obadiah 1:2-4)
This is a prophetic message to any nation (or person) who arrogantly rejects God’s principles and standards. The Lord explicitly says “the arrogance of your heart has deceived you.” Arrogance is incredibly dangerous. It distorts, it deceives, and eventually it destroys.
Where there is arrogance, there will eventually be disaster. Not immediately, but inevitably. Arrogance blinds people to what is eventually coming. Consequences are often delayed, but make no mistake, there is always a high price to pay for arrogance. Do not equate the delay of consequences with the absence of them.
Arrogance and self-centeredness is the mark of the evil one, and he has left this corrupting influence everywhere on our planet. Even secular writers recognize the destructive impact of an arrogant ego.
“The fundamental enemy of moral living is the fat relentless ego of humanity’s inherent selfishness,” writes one sociologist. “Every one of us lives with this enemy. It is that part of each of us that screams out “me first” and demands to be satisfied no matter who gets hurt along the way, and that includes hurting oneself in the long term to gain satisfaction in the short term.”
The prophet Jeremiah warned the leaders and people of Judah to repent of their self-centeredness. Like Solomon, Jeremiah told the people of Judah to trust God, not self. He warned that those who trust in self will not prosper:
“Cursed is the man who trusts in man and makes flesh his strength, whose heart turns away from the Lord. He is like a shrub in the desert, and shall not see any good come. He shall dwell in the parched places of the wilderness, in an uninhabited salt land.” (Jeremiah 17.5-6)
Arrogance is an adversary we must defeat.
