Pride is the greatest
enemy of sobriety. That is because we need help to stay sober. Beating pride
means we admit our ways don’t work.
By clinging to my rightness, I believed I knew better than God about drinking alcohol.
That is why I couldn’t get or stay sober for a number of years. I only needed God when I wanted to need him..
Pride also has
to do with judging. I judged myself above needing help. I judged others as weak
and unable to cope with life. I believed I could manage on my own. I would
drink and I would succeed. That is why I required humiliating events to come
about in order to be broken of these prideful beliefs. There was no humility in
me. I was right. God was wrong, and so were those who needed help.
The constant
anger I felt while drinking was because of this inability to admit defeat.
Thinking I knew more, and yet being unable to prove myself the winner made me
angry. I thought I was declaring my rightness
in drinking round the clock, and yet, I couldn’t succeed so I got angrier.
God finally
allowed me to come to the place of defeat. There was no escaping the fact that
I had failed at life with drinking.
Pride had to be found wrong. I was not right. I was dead wrong. Drinking
was not something I could successfully do. My life was a failure in all parts.
I couldn’t drink - not even a little because a little meant oblivion and
craziness. The truth came. It was all or
nothing. Pride was finally defeated.
This can still
be true today in other areas of my life. I often have to come to a place of defeat
because I’m simply too stubborn to admit I am wrong and I need help. The good
news is that I have history on my side now. I know I will be a proven looser if
I continue in my own ways, letting pride be the leader again. God is The Proven
Winner. He is Redeemer, the One who paid the price for victory, the ultimate
Defender of the weak. He is the One who proves Himself in us because we are
His.
