Just as the experience of being tempted is a universal human experience, so is pride, and therefore, the theme of this second week of Lent is blinded by pride. Since the fall of our first parents, each of us has an innate tendency to exalt ourselves at the expense of our fellow humans who also bear the image of God and even to exalt ourselves above the Creator himself. Further, we find it easy to hate anyone whom we feel is raised over us. The very opposite qualities are seen in Jesus, who humbled himself in his incarnation, in an earthly life of obedience to the Father, and most of all at the cross. Ironically, the way that seems right to our fallen instincts leads to death, while the path of humility leads to life through and with Christ.
Some scriptures traditionally associated with this week in Lent include Genesis 37, which tells of Joseph’s sinful pride and the murderous anger that his self-exaltation stirred in his brothers and the hatred that led them to sell him into slavery. Psalm 32, the confession of David after his sin with Bathsheba, shows us the only path out of the quicksand of pride: repentance, confession, and God’s gracious forgiveness.
In Luke 6, Jesus, who lived what he taught, challenges our common assumptions about the good life and invokes the eternal priorities of the Kingdom of God in their place. Similarly, in John 3, Jesus tells Nicodemus about a kingdom that can only be entered by radical reversal of pride, a new birth. All of this warns us that to follow the way of the world leaves us blinded by pride, and tells us that the only path to life is through repentance and reliance, not upon ourselves and our gifts – but upon the one who humbled himself and became obedient to death, even death on the cross.