We have heard of the pride of Moab, how proud he is of his arrogance, his pride, and his insolence, and his idle boasting. He is not right.
– Isaiah 16:6
Wow, this is one of I don’t know how many places all throughout the Bible where God points out the evil and arrogance and foolishness of pride.
Isaiah 16:6 reminds us of the dangers of pride.
When I read this verse, I think about C.S. Lewis’s Mere Christianity, his chapter called The Great Sin. I remember where I was when I first read that chapter and have gone back to it over and over and over again. He writes that the essential vice, the utmost evil in us is pride. He talks about how pride leads to every other vice. It is the complete, he says, anti-God state of mind.
He goes on, and part of me just wants to read all these different quotes from this chapter, but in the end, he says, “The first step toward humility, which is the opposite of pride, is to realize that one is proud, and a biggish step two”, he writes, “At least nothing whatever can be done before it. If you think you are not conceited, it means you are very conceited indeed.”
In other words, and we see this all over the Bible, this isn’t C.S. Lewis, this is God telling us that we are all prone to pride, that at the core of our sinful nature is pride, is thinking we know better, is thinking about ourself, for ourself instead of centering our thoughts around God and trust in God, and humility before God, and fear of God and obedience to God that flows from that. I just want to lead us today to pray what we need to pray all the time, that God would cleanse us of pride.
Isaiah 16:6 challenges us to ask God for humility.
Oh God, please forgive us today. We confess we are a prideful people. Lord, we think about ourselves more than we think about you, your glory, and who you are. We trust ourselves so often instead of trusting in you. We fear others and compare ourselves with others instead of fearing you and submitting to you in every way in our lives. God, we pray that you would cleanse us of conceit, of arrogance, of insolence, of boasting. Cleanse us of all our pride, we pray.
Cleanse us of this vice that leads to all kinds of other sin and help us God, we pray, to live with humility, in humility before you. God, we pray for this grace in each of our lives, of humility. God, help us to be humble before you, humble before others. Not to think less about ourselves, but to think about ourselves less, to see who we are in you with humility and to trust in you and to fear you and to obey you with humble hearts today. God, we pray for humility in our lives.
Jesus, we praise you as the example for us of humility, humbling yourself, becoming obedient to death, even death on a cross as Philippians 2 says. We pray that your Spirit would overcome, take over, and fill our spirits, that we might be humble as you are humble, Lord Jesus, by your power, the power of your Spirit in us. God, we pray that we would humbly point others to you, that we would humbly work to spread the good news of who you are, and to glorify you in our lives today and our interactions with others.
Prayer for the Hedareb Beja People
God, we pray for the spread of Jesus’ fame to all the nations. Lord, we pray specifically today for the Hedareb Beja people of Sudan, Egypt, and Eritrea, 2.8 million of them with no known followers of Jesus among them.
God, we pray, please bring the salvation of Jesus to the Hedareb Beja people of Sudan, Egypt, and Eritrea, that they might be reached with the good news of your love, that they might turn from their sin and trust in you, humble themselves before you, Jesus, as their Savior and Lord and King. We pray all this according to your Word in Isaiah 16:6. Please cleanse us of pride and help us to live with humility today. In Jesus’ name, amen.
David Platt serves as a Lead Pastor for McLean Bible Church. He is also the Founder of Radical, an organization that helps people follow Jesus and make him known in their neighborhood and all nations.
David received his B.A. from the University of Georgia and M.Div., Th.M., and Ph.D. from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary. Some of his published works include Radical, Radical Together, Follow Me, Counter Culture, Something Needs to Change, and Don’t Hold Back.
He lives in the Washington, D.C. metro area with his wife and children.
