This morning I read the chapter in C.S. Lewis’ classic, Mere Christianity, entitled, “The Great Sin”. Before going any farther, what would you say the great sin is? For C.S. Lewis, the sin that gets the top spot is pride. I am going to share some of what he wrote with you:

“According to Christian teachers, the essential vice, the utmost evil, in Pride. Unchastity, anger, greed, drunkenness, and all that, are mere fleabites in comparison: it was through Pride that the devil became the devil: Pride leads to every other vice: it is the complete anti-God state of mind.”

“Now what you want to get clear is the Pride is essentially competitive – it’s competitive by its very nature – while the other vices are competitive only, so to speak, by accident. Pride gets no pleasure out of having something, only out of having more of it than the next man. We say that people are proud of being rich, or clever, or good-looking, but they are not. They are proud of being richer, or cleverer, or better-looking than others.”

“The Christians are right: it is Pride which has been the chief cause of misery in every nation and every family since the world began. Other vices may sometimes bring people together: you may find good fellowship and jokes and friendliness among drunken people or unchaste people. But pride always means enmity – it is enmity. And not only enmity between man and man, but enmity to God.”

“Pride is spiritual cancer: it eats up the very possibility of love, or contentment or even common sense.”

And his answer to pride is humility –

“God is trying to make you humble in order to make this moment possible: trying to take off a lot of silly, ugly, fancy-dress in which we have all got ourselves up and are strutting about like the little idiots we are. I wish I had got a bit further with humility myself: if I had, I could probably tell you more about the relief, the comfort, and taking the fancy-dress off – getting rid of the false self, with all its ‘Look at me’ and ‘Aren’t I a good person?’ and all its posing and posturing. To get even near it, even for a moment, is like a drink of cold water to a man in a desert.”

Paul put it this way in Philippians 2:3-11 “Don’t be selfish; don’t try to impress others. Be humble, thinking of others as better than yourselves. Don’t look out only for your own interests, but take an interest in others, too. You must have the same attitude that Christ Jesus had. Though he was God, he did not think of equality with God as something to cling to. Instead, he gave up his divine privileges; he took the humble position of a slave and was born as a human being. When he appeared in human form, he humbled himself in obedience to God and died a criminal’s death on a cross. Therefore, God elevated him to the place of highest honor and gave him the name above all other names, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”

Sure something to consider.

Tim