Blithe Arrogance

For through the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think more highly of himself than he ought to think; but to think so as to have sound judgment, as God has allotted to each a measure of faith. (Rom 12:3)

This verse was a little strange to me for a long time. Paul addresses one side of a question. He says not to think more highly of ourselves than we ought, but any psychologist would tell you that one of the most prevalent problems for humans is poor self-esteem. Why didn't Paul address that? I don't think it was an oversight. I think it was clear-sighted. I think that the universal tendency of all humans is not a potential poor self-image, but, without fail, an overinflated one.

Consider. When we look at what God is doing in our world in general and in our lives in particular, we can get ... judgmental. Judgmental of God. Is what He is doing right? Or do we disapprove? Did He let you down? Did He fail to do what you thought He ought to do? Or in the way you thought He ought to do it? We are very, very comfortable sitting in judgment of God's acts and attitudes. Shouldn't He have the same perspectives on things that we do? He ought to make us comfortable. He should shelter us from difficulties. He is obligated to be kind to us, to give us what we demand. And when He doesn't do what we think He should do, we are angry. We threaten. "If that's the way you operate, I'm not sure I want anything to do with you." I wrote that last sentence with a lowercase "you" because in that moment, He is no longer divine; we are. At least in our own minds.

We are His creation, but we regard Him as our servant, sometimes acceptable and sometimes not. We suppress the truth about Him and worship the creature rather than the Creator. That's the fundamental nature of humans. The supplicant in the foxhole magnanimously tells Him, "If you do what I ask, I'll give you what you ask of me." Really? Are we really that arrogant? Do we really believe we have the right to determine which words of Scripture are true and which are false? Which commands are acceptable and which we can freely ignore? Which truths about Him we will allow and which we won't? We actually believe that God loves us because we deserve it somehow. In fact, even in our "poor self-esteem," we shake our fists in the face of God and say, "You made me this way, and You messed up." Because, at our cores, we are blithely arrogant. We routinely think more highly of ourselves than we ought. Which, I suppose, is why Paul didn't urge us not to think too poorly of ourselves. We may be prone to lying to ourselves about our true nature, too high or too low, but we are always of more value than God's opinions.