Pride, Humility, and the Day of Atonement – John W. Ritenbaugh cgg.org

The Day of Atonement and fasting – God devotes one Feast Day, picturing being at one with Him. A day in which He commanding us to go through an exercise in self-affliction designed to promote humility. This is done to impress upon us that the root of all that is wrong in this world is the result of pride. This also foreshadows the great humbling that will be required to remove that pride from this world and remove the being that embodies it. The origins of this pride centers around Satan. As a perfect being, He was corrupted by his pride – “Your [Satan’s] heart was lifted up because of your beauty”. That prideful being now influences the whole world.  The book of Psalms said the proud do not seek God and that “God is in none of his thoughts”. The Bible clearly indicates the link between pride and sin – “a proud heart, The lamp of the wicked, is sin.” Pride’s power lies in its ability to deceive us into believing in our self-sufficiency and in turn, that pride feeds off its ability to promote self by finding flaws in others. On the day of Atonement, we afflict our souls to remind us that humility is the key to a relationship with God. God said in the book of Isaiah “on this one will I look: on him who is poor and of a contrite spirit, and who trembles at My word”. Christ prayerfully desired that we would be one with Him and God – fasting is a good start to that end.