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Friends in Christ Weekly Message
October 6, 2001
I, the Lord, refuse to accept anyone who is proud. Only those who live by faith are acceptable to me.
Habakkuk 2:4 (CEV*)
We are warned against pride in a number of places in scripture. We are also told to live by faith in several places. The juxtaposition of these two repeated elements in scripture in Habakkuk may be instructive.
The clear implication of this verse is that one can not both be proud and live by faith. If one is proud, one is putting one's faith in oneself. If you truly have faith in God, you will be humble because you recognize that God is the only one who merits our faith.
The implication is not just for individuals. The little book of Habakkuk is more about nations than individuals. The same moral principles that apply to individuals apply to nations.
Perhaps even more so than individuals, nations tend to be proud. The book of Habakkuk warns us that proud nations will fall. If we love our nation, won't we want it to avoid pride and instead live by faith?
Let us each pray that our own pride be taken away, replaced by a greater faith in God. Let us also each pray for our own nation that it not be gripped by the spiritual sin of pride, which is a precursor to failure.
Bill Samuel
* Contemporary English Version ©1995 American Bible Society.
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