Look Out

Eze 28:17    Your heart was proud because of your beauty; you corrupted your wisdom for the sake of your splendor. I cast you to the ground; I exposed you before kings, to feast their eyes on you.

 

What are some of the things our society treasures? Beauty. Wealth. Intelligence. Power. If you are rich and smart, beautiful and have great influence, look out. I mean it. Look out.

 

This was the king of Tyre. This guy had everything and his kingdom had everything. Apparently he was a good looking guy who was given the smarts and the ability to develop a nation that was the envy of the world. It was the center of trade and culture.

"When your wares came from the seas, you satisfied many peoples; with your abundant wealth and merchandise you enriched the kings of the earth." Ez 27:33 And it was all under the leadership of this one handsome, wise, rich, powerful king.

 

So what is the problem with that? Isn't this what we all want? Isn't this sort of thing what the world clamors for? Yes it is, but like I said: Look out. This verse talks about this king's beauty and wisdom and splendor which were cast to the ground. Why? Pride. Unfortunately, when we are rich, or powerful, or beautiful, or smart we, as humans, have a tendency to become full of ourselves. We think we are all that and a bag of donuts. We start to think like this king started to think and believe: "I am a god". 28:2 Oh, we may not say it. We may not be that bold, but we live that way. We put ourselves above God and do the things that we want and not the things that He wants. In fact, this is the basis for all of our sin. Go back to the garden. What was Eve tempted with? "You will be like God.". Pride. This never-ending battle to compete with God. We are all in it. We all do it. And it doesn't matter how pretty or rich we are.

 

It just seems that when beauty, or money, or power or smarts get involved in the equation it heightens it. So should we desire to be plain and poor and unimportant? If those things are getting in the way of humility, then yes. We need to be willing to give those things up if they are a source of pride. We need to desire humility above any of these trappings...for they can trap. We need to understand who we really are...and that understanding will not come until we start to get a glimpse of who God really is. This king of Tyre took his eye off of this. Eve took her eye off of this. We all take our eyes off of this, and that is the beginning of pride. When we truly see who God is, it will shake us to the core. It will throw us on our faces in humility. And we will never, ever think our beauty or riches or power or intelligence are anything of significance. We will, I will bow to the only significant One...so look out.