The Joy of the Pride

“We have heard of Moab's pride-- her overweening pride and conceit, her pride and her insolence-- but her boasts are empty. …  Joy and gladness are taken away from the orchards; no one sings or shouts in the vineyards; no one treads out wine at the presses, for I have put an end to the shouting.” (Isaiah 16:6, 10)

One of my cousins had a baby boy last Friday.  Her husband shared the baby pictures on the Kakaotalk so I shared couple of them on the family facebook.  And of the family member came up to me and said “Be careful when you upload those pictures.’  Do you know what she said that to me?  I think the reason was because those pictures show the baby’s naked body.  Well  … Don’t worry!  The private part cannot be seen.  Also, the family facebook is closed to only family members.

When you look at Ecclesiastes 5:15-16, this is what the Bible says: “Naked a man comes from his mother's womb, and as he comes, so he departs. He takes nothing from his labor that he can carry in his hand..  This too is a grievous evil: As a man comes, so he departs, and what does he gain, since he toils for the wind?”  Isn’t this true?  Didn’t we come from our mothers’ womb naked?  Or did we bring something?  Of course not.  Are we going to carry something in our hands when we die?  Of course not.  Do you know what Job said after he lost everything?  Look at Job 1:21 - “Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked I will depart. The LORD gave and the LORD has taken away; may the name of the LORD be praised.”  And Job did not sin by charging God with wrongdoing (v.22).  But why do we strive to increase our wealth? (Ecc. 5:11)  And why do people try so hard to hoard money to the harm of its owners? (v.13).  When people increase their wealth (Ps. 73:12) our covetous hearts will not know its limits (v.7).  Also, their heart will become proud (Dt. 8:14) and will say “My power and the strength of my hands have produced this wealth for me” (v.17).  As a result, they will forget the Lord their God (v.14) and will disobey Him (v.20).  Then they will idolize their wealth (Mt. 6:24) and will follow that idol.  We will also love money (Ecc. 5:10) and will trust our wealth and abundance more than God (Job 31:24; Ps. 52:7).  And they will not only love their abundance (Ecc.5:10) but also they will rejoice over their wealth (Job 31:25).  But how long would it last?

When we look at the today’s passage Isaiah 16:6, 10, we see God speaking through prophet Isaiah regarding Moab.  God’s prophecy about Moab was that it would be ruined and destroyed (15:1).  As a result, the Moabites would lament and grieve (16:7).  What did God ruin and destroy Moab?  He destroyed the production of the choicest vines (v.9)  As a result, the Moabites lost their wealth since they relied on the production of the vines.  Why did God do that?  It was because of the Moabites’ pride.  Look at the today passage Isaiah 16:6 again: “We have heard of Moab's pride-- her overweening pride and conceit, her pride and her insolence-- but her boasts are empty.”  The Moabites boasted about their wealth.  They sang and shouted in the vineyards(v.10).  They rejoiced because of their abundant production of the vines.

Like the Moabites, we tend to rejoice and be happy due to our abundant income.  At the same time, we can become proud of ourselves and boast about what we have.  Then, what God does is he disciplines us in love.  He will take away our joy and gladness over our possessions (v.10).  In fact, God makes us to lament and grieve by taking away our material possession (v.7).  And He does this for our own good.  Taking away our gladness and joy of having abundant possession is profitable for us.  It is profitable for us because our sorrow will lead us to repentance.  Look at 2 Corinthians 7:9-10 - “yet now I am happy, not because you were made sorry, but because your sorrow led you to repentance. For you became sorrowful as God intended and so were not harmed in any way by us.  Godly sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation and leaves no regret, but worldly sorrow brings death.”  You see, godly sorrow that is produced by God taking away our material possession is God’s gracious blessing because it will lead us to repentance.  It is worth of loosing the material wealth in order to restore our spiritual wealth.

Now I think many Christians are seeking and pursuing abundant fruits of a vine.  It seems like we long to eat from the vine tree when we see its fruits that are “good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom” (Gen. 3:6).  So we pick fruits and eat them.  And we are satisfied and happy.  Likewise, we Christians are seeking many blessings from God.  And when we receive them, we are satisfied and happy.  But the problem is that as we keep on enjoying those blessings, we become lazy in guarding our hearts (Prov. 4:23) and thus Satan harbors greed in our hearts.  When we have greedy heart, we want more and more blessings.  And our hearts become arrogant.  Thus, we boast who we are and what we have.  By doing so, we glorify ourselves instead of God.  As a result, God disciplines us because He loves us.  He takes away our blessings that we used to enjoy so that we cannot enjoy them anymore.  He takes away our joy and gladness.  And there is sorrow in our hearts.  This is an opportunity for us to repent our sins and turn to the Lord.  Also, this is an opportunity for us to enjoy the Giver of the gifts instead of the gifts.  We must no longer focus on the blessings.  Rather, we must focus on the Lord who gives those blessings to us.  More than focusing on what God does, we must focus on who He is.  Because if we focus on what God does, we tend to give thanks to God when He blesses us but when He doesn’t bless us we tend to complain and grumble.  This is not the Lord-centered faith.  Instead, this is the Lord’s blessing-centered belief.  And when we have the Lord’s blessing-centered belief, we cannot say like Job did after loosing almost everything: “Shall we accept good from God, and not trouble?” (Job 2:10)

We must be satisfied not with the fruits of the vine.  But we must be satisfied with the vine itself.  And Jesus said in John 15:1 “I am the true vine ….”  He is the One whom we should be satisfied and not His blessings.  And whether we are in need or in plenty we should learn to be content in any and every situation by the Lord Himself (Phil. 4:12).  As we do so,  His Word will be “my delight” (Ps. 119:24. 92, 143).  And we will experience the joy of obeying His Word.  May this blessing be upon you all!

Wanting to experience the joy of humility,

Pastor James Kim