Guarding Our Hearts from Prideful Thoughts

Not all our thoughts are good. This daily devotional looks at how our evil thoughts promote pride.

Nuggets

  • Humility helps keep prideful thoughts at bay.
  • Evil thoughts come from the heart.

To read devotions in the Redo for Godliness series, click the appropriate button below.

Here is a running list of what we’ve discussed previously.

We’ve been looking at Charnock’s sermon entitled The Sinfulness and Cure of Thoughts to show us how to cleanse, a.k.a. sanctify, our thought processes. Charnock has taught us so far that we cleanse our thoughts when we return to having a strong relationship with God. We can do that by studying the Scriptures, meditating on God, contemplating on His creation, and praising Him.

Resource

In our last devotion, Barrow was describing industry, but he said this nugget about our thoughts. He wrote, “But the direction of our mind to some good end, without roving or flinching, in a straight and steady course, drawing after it our active powers in execution thereof, doth constitute industry; the which therefore usually is attended with labour and pain; for our mind is not easily kept in a constant attention to the same thing; and the spirits employed in thought are prone to flutter and fly away, so that it is hard to fix them …”

Resource

It is hard to corral our thoughts, but what about when they turn bad? The next section that Charnock looked at was preventing bad thoughts.

I know. Is that even possible? Let’s see what he says.

Let's Put It into Context #1

Here is a running list of what we’ve discussed previously.

Let's Put It into Context #2

Pride doesn’t have to be sinful. “I am very frank with you; I have great pride in you. I am filled with encouragement; I am overflowing with joy in all our afflictions” (II Cor. 7: 4 CSB).

Unfortunately, too often we take our pride to the self-focused and self-elevating level. Oh, yeah. We puff ourselves up with arrogance.

Pride is a sin because it takes our focus off God. In fact, it is considered one of the seven deadly sins.

The problem with pride is it lies to us. “Your arrogant heart has deceived you …” (Obad. 1: 3 CSB). So, pride is an attitude or way of thinking.

Let's Put It into Context #3

  • Wisdom is an enlightened acceptance of God’s principles that leads to knowledge, discernment, and good sense that is put into practice through salvation, increasing our goodness and virtue.
    • Discernment means we can evaluate the situation and recognize right from wrong.
    • Salvation is the gift of life through the deliverance from condemnation and sin to acceptance and holiness and changes us from being spiritually dead to spiritually alive.
      • Sins are actions by humans that disobey God and break one of His reasonable, holy, and righteous laws and commandments, goes against a purpose He has for us, or follows Satan’s promptings.
      • Holiness is the transcendent excellence of His nature that includes elements of purity, dedication, and commitment that lead to being set apart.
        • Purity means possessing God’s moral character, having eliminated the stain of sin.
      • Spiritual death is the spiritual separation from God that occurred as a consequence of Adam and Eve’s original sin. The spiritually alive are those who have ABCDed, so they are no longer separated from God.
    • God’s goodness is His holy, pure, and righteous behavior.
      • Holy means to be set apart, perfect, and morally pure while possessing all virtues.
      • Pure means not being sinful or having the stain of sin.
    • Virtues are standards of moral excellence.

Glossary

Exposure to Evil Thoughts

“When pride comes, then comes disgrace, but with the humble is wisdom” (Prov. 11: 2 CSB)

“Exercise frequent humiliations. Pride exposeth us to impatient and disquieting thoughts, whereas humility clears up a calm and serenity in the soul” (Charnock, The Sinfulness and Cure of Thoughts)

Humility helps keep prideful thoughts at bay.

You would think that, after the original sin and mankind’s fall from grace, we would see ourselves as we are. Warner wrote, “When we consider the nature of man, fallen and far gone from original righteousness, one might well think that men should of their own accord see the propriety, the necessity, of the grace of humility in their character.”

Resource

We not only don’t see the need for humility, but we also go the other way and bump up the pride.

Warner noted that in which we take pride. Pride is a unrealistic high opinion of oneself that is based on faulty self-esteem.

  • Appearances
  • Social status
  • Wealth
  • Talent
  • Intelligence and judgment
  • Bad passion

Resource

This opinion is how we see ourselves. In other words, it is how we think about ourselves.

Thomas made a great point. He said that we not only are faulty in how we see ourselves, but we also do not see the standard of character correctly. He wrote, “When we lose sight of the eternal law of rectitude, and judge ourselves only by the imperfect standards around us, pride is likely to come.”

Resource

Worldview standards feed the chaos of the world because they are divisive. It is real easy to become arrogant and prideful when we buy into the worldview.

Glossary

The worldview promotes the I’m-number-one attitude. God doesn’t.

God wants to be the priority in our lives with us being humble. Humility is a character trait that diminishes pride and places dependence on God while holding a modest view of our importance with respect to others.

Glossary

If we look at pride the way Taylor did, we consider pride as the end result. This end result is dangerous to us and to others.

Resource

Pride means that the picture that we have of ourselves is faulty. It also usually means that the picture we have of others is also faulty. This stops us from fulfilling the second greatest commandment: love others.

Glossary

It does seem somewhat amazing that we do, in some instances, tie our pride to our comparison with others. What happens when they grow? Or we meet someone “better” than us? Our pride takes a kick.

Taylor gave a list of what pride can foster when it focuses on wealth. It can lead to cheating, corruption, violence, and extortion. It can also lead to envy.

The bottom line is humility helps keep prideful thoughts at bay.

Source of Evil Thoughts

“For from within, out of people’s hearts, come evil thoughts, sexual immoralities, thefts, murders” (Mk. 7: 21 CSB)

Evil thoughts come from the heart.

Jesus pinpointed the source of our evil thoughts. They come from the corrupt heart.

Sadler reminded us that the heart isn’t all bad. He wrote, “We should not, I think, have put evil thoughts amongst the things which come out of the heart, because we suppose them to be in the heart. But is not what the Saviour says true of that which He alone knows — the very nature and substance of the soul? In its very centre, or close to its centre, the evil has its root or fountain.”

Resource

The very core of our hearts are sinful. “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?” (Jer. 17: 9 ESV).

But we still have free will. Free will is the ability within us to make decisions, which determine actions that produce character.

When Satan pops an evil thought in our hearts, it is our choice whether we are going to cultivate and water it so it can grow or pull it out by the roots. If our will is right with God, the latter is going to happen. If not, break out the watering can.

Swinnock called it right. He wrote, “Though they cannot sin outwardly, for want of strength of body or a fit opportunity, yet they act sin inwardly with great love and complacency.”

Resource

We know Jesus talked about thinking about sinning was as much of a sin as actually committing the sin. (Mt. 5: 27-28).

Owes argued that our thoughts reflect our character. True, a lot of our thoughts amount to nothing — they are just a waste of time and focus.

Resource

The issue is “For as he thinketh in his heart, so is he …” (Prov. 23: 7 KJV). Our thoughts become who we are. The rest end of Mark 7: 21 and Mark 7: 22-23 talks about what comes from the evil thoughts — a whole laundry list of sins.

Sin starts out simple and hidden. Then, bam! It has us by the throat.

Spurgeon told us how that happens. He wrote, “This is the way of sin, to begin with a proud conceit of our own thoughts, ending with folly and stupidity. What a range there is between these two points, what a variety of sin thus enumerated! Sin is a contradictory thing: it takes men this way and that, but never in the right way.”

Resource

How does that hook to pride? Pride generally tries to justify the sin.

GuardingOurHeartsFromPridfulThoughtsPin

Making the Connections

I am sitting here reading all of this and thinking, I know some will think this is the pat answer. But, to me, it is the answer.

Perfection is about being like God. We go a long way in corralling our prideful thoughts when we focus on being like God.

Perfection is about being. It is about obtaining the character of God.

How Do We Apply This?

When we focus on Who He is instead of who we think we are, the evil thoughts don’t have room to grow. Scriver said that means our devotion has to remain genuine.

Resource

We can’t be on autopilot when we read our devotions or say our prayers. It has to reach heart level.

Owen said throwing a dam in the river of our thoughts isn’t going to stop the evil thoughts from getting through. He wrote, “There are but two ways of relief from them; the one respecting their moral evil, the other their natural abundance.”

Resource

We need God’s grace to help us defeat Satan and the evil thoughts.

Father God. We need You to help us to conquer our evil thoughts. Satan loves to use them to pull us away from You. Help us to remain firmly in Your Will. Amen.

What do you think?

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