SCRIPTURE
Genesis 11:1 Now the whole world had one language and a common speech. 2 As men moved eastward, they found a plain in Shinar and settled there.
3 They said to each other, “Come, let's make bricks and bake them thoroughly.” They used brick instead of stone, and tar for mortar. 4 Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves and not be scattered over the face of the whole earth.”
5 But the LORD came down to see the city and the tower that the men were building. 6 The LORD said, “If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. 7 Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other.”
8 So the LORD scattered them from there over all the earth, and they stopped building the city. 9 That is why it was called Babel—because there the LORD confused the language of the whole world. From there the LORD scattered them over the face of the whole earth.
Pride as the book of Proverbs sees it:
Proverbs 9:12 If you are wise, you are wise for yourself; if your heart is full of pride, you only will have the pain of it.
Proverbs 11:2 When pride comes, there comes shame, but wisdom is with the quiet in spirit.
Proverbs 15:25 The house of the man of pride will be uprooted by the Lord,
Proverbs 16:5 Everyone who has pride in his heart is disgusting to the Lord: he will certainly not go free from punishment.
Proverbs 16:18 Pride goes before destruction, and a stiff spirit before a fall.
Proverbs 19:29 Rods are being made ready for the man of pride, and blows for the back of the foolish.
Proverbs 29:8 Men of pride are the cause of violent acts in a town, but by wise men wrath is turned away.
Proverbs 29:23 A man's pride will be the cause of his fall, but he who has a gentle spirit will get honor.
OBSERVATION
God is very clear that he does not like pride (conceit or arrogance), nobody else likes that kind of people either. The problem with pride is it allows you to set yourself up as “in charge” but the truth is that the only one that is truly in charge is God.
The people at Babel were supposed to spread out and populate the earth but instead they found an awesome location and everybody said “let’s hang out here” and they said “let’s make a name for ourselves”, direct disobedience to God’s command and looking for recognition.
The power of “they said” is a mighty force, often peer pressure to go the wrong way but peer pressure can be good if we have the right peers:
Psalms 122:1 I rejoiced with those who said to me, “Let us go to the house of the LORD.”
Isaiah 2:3 And the peoples will say, Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob: and he will give us knowledge of his ways, and we will be guided by his word;
APPLICATION
Be careful in your successes that you don’t think highly of yourself. Listen to the right crowd so you don’t get off track.
PRAYER
Keep me humble in everything that I do, for there is nothing good that I can do in my own power.
