Pride Month. G'day I'm Martyn Iles and this is The Truth of
It and yes unless you've been living under a rock these last
few weeks you know that this month is Pride Month. What's to
be said about it? What's interesting you know in the
marketing hype and in the frequency of use of that word I
think a lot of us have forgotten actually what it
means. The word pride is in fact a word that symbolises a
pretty serious sin. It's one of the seven deadly sins in
Scripture. It's the sin by which we believe from certain
passages in the Bible that Satan from heaven. At its most
basic, pride is the sin that we commit. When we fail to realize
that all that we are and all that we have belongs to God and
comes from God and is for him. We believe that these things,
all that we are, all that we have, it's all ours. We believe
that we are our own. But at its most advanced, pride gets still
worse. I mean, the first part of that is bad enough for
creatures who are created to live that way but at its most
advance pride sees a person exalt themselves to be as a God
in so far as they determine for themselves what is good and
what is evil. This is the origin of that notion my truth.
In other words I get to decide. I'm accountable to nothing
outside of myself. I even get to decide what is right and
wrong. Cuz the only right and wrong is the right and wrong
for me. That was the temptation in the garden for those who
know the relevant Scripture be as God's knowing good and evil.
That's really what that phrase is getting at. It is the
essence. It is the logic of all sin. Namely rebellion. Against
God towards self. Now Pride Month is named after that sin.
And it is in fact pretty well named. Because that is
precisely what Pride Month is really all about. What do I
mean? Well let's take some of the tenants of the sorts of
rainbow things that we're seeing at the moment like to
say that a can be pregnant despite the obvious witness of
creation. You know, only women come with wounds or that a
little girl might be a little boy because that might be her
truth or that our bodies were designed for same-sex intimacy
or that sexual license is good for me or that you know, what I
am made like is irrelevant compared to what I feel in my
mind, what I want to be, what I like to think. In the matters
see God the creator has stamped his will upon us. In certain
physiological realities. We bear in our own bodies a
testimony. A witness to his design and his purpose. To
rebel against that is somewhat difficult usually. Um but that
is why the cancel culture cannons are aimed at all
descent because lies need protecting. They cannot
withstand actual analysis. And because are tender. They hate
to be pricked with this outside of myself truth. See, it's
difficult unless you are caught in pride and that is why the
month is well named. Pride that says that all I have has no
connection to God, my creator. It is mine to use rebelliously
as I like according to my truth. My identity and my sense
of it is all that there is and needs to affirm it because it's
fragile. Children need to be taught that it is good. Others
need to participate in this identity. It needs to grow and
needs to be the identity that others take but also corporates
and individuals need to wear the rainbow and demonstrate
total commitment. We all need to be in on the rebellion.
Incidentally you know corporates only do it because
there's no marketing implication for them in the
sense that it's not going to really cost them anything.
There's there's you know Middle Eastern outfits don't do the
same thing. It's all just a cynical branding and marketing
exercise. The really that virtuous. They're only as
virtuous as the as the popular cultural trends are in play. Um
but incidentally let me make this aside. I mentioned the
rainbow a couple of times. The rainbow is a symbol is awfully
significant. I can't find any analysis of the theological
justification for it but there's gotta be one. In fact
the origins of it a little bit oblique. Uh because the rainbow
in the Bible the origin of it is a symbol of non-judgment. It
was the symbol that God used by which he declared that he would
never judge the earth again in a way. Yet, God says three
times in Scripture that he opposes the proud and gives
grace to the humble, the opposite of pride. So, pride is
judged. God says so but the banner of this kind of
rebellion is God's symbol of non judgement. See, it's really
significant, isn't it? When you see it that way and it doesn't
have seven colors like the rainbows of nature. The pride
flag has six colors and as we know in Scripture, seven is
God's number of perfection and completion but six is the
number of man. So, there is a profound significance in that
flag. It really is a flag to the pride of men rebelling
against what God has said. Maybe it's a coincidence but
I've always found that very hard to believe. There must be
something more in it but what are some lessons? Well, at a
societal level, the west really is on thin ice. When you
shamelessly vaunt this kind of sin like pride as a brand, as a
celebration, it's pretty serious. God opposes the
proud, remember? Three times he says that in the Bible and that
goes along with all the other things he says about the proud
in terms of judgement in terms of bringing them down in terms
of all that kind of stuff and in this respect I think
Christians need to be motivated seeing this all around us the
way that pride is used as a brand and as a celebration with
no second thought of the seriousness of it we need to be
praying for God's mercy and if I really wanted to go into a
theological excursion of what all of this means for the
existence of a culture well like I said the west is on very
thin ice but for God's mercy but I don't want to go any
further down the social societal stuff. I want to think
of a lesson for you and for me. We need to reflect very
seriously on the kind of culture that we're in. If
pride, such a grave sin can be so openly marketed right across
the board, so fully embraced and so celebrated with all of
its implications. I'm not even referring to the rainbow stuff.
I'm just saying that that word pride would ever in a culture
be seen as a good thing or a potentially good thing. Wow,
we're living in a spirit toxic culture. We're surely living in
days and times that are characterized by the sin of a
proud heart from the grassroots upwards into the corporations
and the governments and so on and it must be the case under
those circumstances that this rubs off on us. It must be the
case that pride is so commonplace as a human trait
that we can scarcely recognize it anymore or that we don't
react viscerally against it just like this brand has
managed to worm its way into our culture we haven't reacted
against the word. Certainly, people in this day and age,
it's true and I think we all sense this, take truth as if it
were an offence. They refuse to bow to greater truth than
themselves. They get angered by it when it contradicts them or
confronts them and they tend to live their lives trying to
ignore it. People are unteachable. We don't crave
instruction and the transformation that that
instruction brings and we're more occupied with our own
happiness day by day than we are with God's glory. And that
matters. Because as I say again God opposes the proud. But
here's an important lesson. The other half of that verse but
gives grace to the humble. Just as pride is a hallmark of
rebellion and God has opposed it. So humility is a mark of
God's grace and God's favour. What did Jesus say? He said
blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs. Notice not other
people theirs. The poor in spirit. Those of humble heart
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Or his favourite verse
from Isaiah. For thus says the one who is high and lifted up
who inhabits eternity whose name is holy and the proud
person will never accept that about God. They will never see
one who is high lifted up eternal and holy. He says I
dwell in the high and holy place. Yeah we know that. And
also also with him who is of a contrite and a humble spirit.
To revive the spirit of the humble and to revive the of the
contrite. Humility is God's fingerprint on a life. It's a
hallmark that says God is here or God is at work here. It is
the sign of God's work in a life. Nobody ever repented
except that they were humbled by the knowledge of their own
sin. Nobody ever submitted to Christ except that they were
shown his greatness and their own depravity. Indeed that
they were shown his greatness compared to their own identity
as the buzz word is today. It would be a good thing for us
all to pray for humility that we might receive God's grace
rather than be shaped by this proud and rebellious culture
which is judged and which is passing away. I'm Martyn Iles
and that was the truth of it.