“Your heart was proud because of your beauty. You corrupted your wisdom for the sake of your splendor. I cast you to the ground. I expose you before kings to feast their eyes on you.”
– Ezekiel 28:17
Did you hear those phrases? Ezekiel 28:17. First, “your heart was proud,” a proud heart. Oh, doesn’t that just lead us to pray? God, give us humble hearts. We don’t want proud hearts.
“Because of your beauty,” and who is the author, the giver of beauty? Is it not God? So even that which is good in us should not lead to pride in our hearts because anything good in us is a gift from God. Goodness in us should lead to humility in our hearts. So that’s the phrase in the very beginning of this verse, “Your heart was proud.”
Ezekiel 28:17 Leads Us to Ask God for Humble Hearts
Then listen to this phrase, “You corrupted your wisdom for the sake of your splendor.” So God, again, gave a good gift, wisdom, and the people took it and corrupted it for their own sake.
Do you see the picture here? We have good gifts from God that we can steward for His glory, or we can steward for our glory. We can steward His good gifts for His purposes, or we can steward His good gifts for our own purposes.
Ezekiel 28:17 Praises God for His Goodness
So God, we pray in light of this language in Ezekiel 28:17, we pray for humble hearts. God, we praise you for your goodness in our lives. We pray for a recognition in each of our lives as we see good things in us, and around us. That all of these things come from your hand and may goodness in us and around us lead us to humility before you to humbly thank you, God. Keep us from proud hearts. Remove pride from my heart. Remove pride from our hearts.
And, God, we pray for wisdom so that you might be glorified in our lives. God, we pray for your forgiveness for the ways we corrupt wisdom for our own sake. For the ways we use skill and wisdom that you provide us without regard to living and using it for your glory, how we use it for ourselves to live for the things of this world. God, we pray that you keep us from corrupting wisdom for our own sake. Help us to steward wisdom for your sake.
Pray for the Unreached People in Pakistan
Oh God, we pray for good gifts like wisdom for the spread of your splendor. God, we pray you’d help us to steward all the good gifts you’ve given us so that 6 million Awan people in Pakistan, none of whom have access to the gospel right now, might be reached with the gospel. We pray, help us to steward your good gifts for their sake and for your glory among them. God, we have the wisdom to get the gospel to all the people groups in the world. Help us to use your wisdom toward that end, all the good things you’ve given us toward that end for your glory among the nations.
God, we pray that you would forgive us for and keep us from proud hearts and corrupted wisdom. We pray for humble hearts and for faithful stewardship of the wisdom you provide for your name’s sake in our lives, right where we live, wherever you lead among the nations. In Jesus’ name, we pray. Amen.
David Platt serves as a pastor in metro Washington, D.C. He is the founder of Radical.
David received his Ph.D. from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary and is the author of Don’t Hold Back, Radical, Follow Me, Counter Culture, Something Needs to Change, Before You Vote, as well as the multiple volumes of the Christ-Centered Exposition Commentary series.
Along with his wife and children, he lives in the Washington, D.C. metro area.
