Give God the Glory

By: Jen Devlin

Tuesday, October 21, 2025

Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall. Proverbs 16:18

It's a joy to serve the Lord! When Jesus redeemed us from the grave, He called us on a journey of reaching others with His gospel. Being invited to participate in the expansion of God’s kingdom is amazing, but it can be overwhelming when we see the Holy Spirit moving in our lives and changing the lives of others.

Every moment of our Christian life we have opportunities to glorify God. One way is by thanking Him for the amazing things He is doing. But if we aren’t diligent, over time our spiritual walk can become jaded. Instead of pointing people to God and giving Him the glory, we may begin to take partial credit ourselves. If we're not careful, our "look what God did" can slowly morph into "look what I did."

Pride tells us when we serve God we're helping Him out somehow. No matter how many years we've been following Jesus, we can't ever get smug about our spiritual resume. It's a danger Christ followers face, because our pride wants us to rest on our past accolades. Prideful people flaunt their list of past accomplishments like backstage VIP passes, thinking it will give them priority over those "ordinary" people at church.

God's Word is full of reminders about pride because it can be a stumbling block for us all. But God loves us so much, He will correct us if our pride starts leading us astray. It dangerous, because when pride takes over, it can jeopardize everything we've accomplished for God! Jesus gave one of His strongest warnings about that in Matthew Chapter 7.

“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Many will say to me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and in your name drive out demons and in your name perform many miracles?’ Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!’ Matthew 7:21-23

Spiritual growth is marked by humility, obedience, and a love for others. A life lived for Jesus will always point people towards Jesus instead of ourselves. If we have a servant heart, we will produce spiritual fruit (Galatians 5:22-23). True believers won't just produce fruit of the Spirit in their past; they'll produce it for the rest of their lives!

The next time pride creeps in, instead of thinking "Look at me", refocus those thoughts and imagine yourself saying: "Look at the one who redeemed me!"