Let's look at the prior verses to this one:

But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism, he said to them, "Brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Therefore bear fruits worthy of repentance, and do not think to say to yourselves, 'We have Abraham as [our] father.' For I say to you that God is able to raise up children to Abraham from these stones.

Matthew 3:7-9

We see in this picture John the Baptist displaying humility and condeming the religious leaders of the day because of their prideful acts. Today we will be touching on the evil of pride:

What is pride? It is a sense of greatness on the things that we do. Is there anything wrong with being prideful? Well yes and no...some people take a lot of pride in their work, their success and even their kids. There is a fine line between what is right and wrong when it comes to pride. For example, if you're a parent and your kid does something great in school or in life, there isn't anything for feeling good about what he or she did, but if you are going to take pride for the things that you have acomplished...then you might want to double check and remember that it is all because of God.

God has really done a big deal of work in my life regarding the sin of pride, I used to like to take credit for things I did and be like "wow, look at me" or the typical "look what I did!". I think that it is in our human nature to want to be recognized and patted on the back for the things we do, I know it is in my nature.

Who gets the credit for the things we do? God does! We are to give God all the credit. Do you have a good job? Guess who gave it to you! Are you successful in life? Guess who is responsible for that happening! Not you, that's for sure. I think the worldly point of view differs a lot from the Christian when it comes to pride. The world congratulates people who do things, in the eyes of the world if you are successful it's because you have done it, because something about you is so special that you deserve what you are.

Pride attacks all areas of society and is a terrible sin. Pride caused the downfall of humanity and it was what Satan used to deceive Eve into trying the forbidden fruit in the garden of Eden in Genesis 3. Pride caused Satan to be cast down to the burning fire because "he wanted to be like God".

One thing that I liked the most about this specific passage and really jumped out to me was the fact that John mentioned:

Even though he had never met Jesus, John knew that He was someone of higher authority than him, and not just that, picture the fact of him considering himself so unworthy to even walk in His own sandals.

That is the kind of humility we should have, it is easy as Christians to take credit for the things we do, I have heard of even Pastors that have fallen into that pride when things go great, worship leaders and elders and anyone who serves at a church can fall to that too. We all can fall into that too!

I know personally I have fallen into pride before, I have taken credit for things that God has done through me. We need to guard ourselves and give all credit to God for what He does through us!

I do a lot around my church. I am the Hospitality ministry leader, I am in charge of the Ushers, greeters and fellowship, on top of that I help the pastor around in anything he needs like do his powerpoints and run miscelanious errands sometimes, not just that I am also leading the young adults study on tuesday nights at church. Sounds like a lot and people have often asked me why is it that I do so much? Is it because I want to get that pat in the back by the pastor or be congratulated for my good works? Not at all! All these responsibilities were given to me through time, it was nothing that I did that made me worthy of doing so much. I love doing every single thing and it has to be God who gives me the strength and energy to do all that I do, but I give it all back to Him, I do my best and pray that pride doesn't consume. I think that God could have picked the person sitting next to me to do it and that I am just a tool in His church.

Do you think there is something special about you? Not really...if you look at some of the people in the Bible that God used you can note that most were common people, look at the 12 disciples for example, Jesus picked 12 men who were fishermen, tax collectors, uneducated and they are the ones that started the Church!

God doesn't want the next Paris Hilton, Lindsay Lohan or Angelina Jolie to preach His message. Don't you think if that is who He wanted to use He would have done it a long time ago. Celebrities are so full of it and tend to exalt themselves for everything the do. Take for example, the recent disasters in Haiti and in other places of the world, while they did bring unity to mankind and sparkled kindness in the heart of many, many others used it as an opportunity to parade their wealth and "kindness" and show off. This is not a good example of humility, when we do things that point to ourselves.

True humility is what points to God.