Throughout our lifetime there are many things we are warned about, such as cigarette smoking is bad for our health, overeating can cause heart disease and diabetes, and so on. How we choose to respond to these warnings can have significant impact on our lives. For example, most of us are familiar with the saying from Proverbs “pride goes before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall”. Yet, something we may not know is that pride and a haughty spirit hinders our relationship with God and others. The prophet Isaiah warns us in the Old Testament reading for today with these words, “The haughtiness of people shall be humbled, and the pride of everyone shall be brought low; and the Lord alone will be exalted on that day.” The day of which Isaiah speaks is the Day of the Lord known to most of us as ‘Judgment Day’ when the Son of God will judge the nations of this world.

All that humanity has built and believed to exalt ourselves will become as rubble. Isaiah tells the people that on that day humanity will flee from the presence of the Lord, because of His great wrath. Isaiah warns the nations, “Enter into the rock and hide in the dust from the terror of the Lord and from the glory of his majesty.” The rock of which Isaiah speaks is the Messiah for He alone will be able to save humanity from complete destruction on the terrible day of which Isaiah prophesizes. Those who seek shelter in Christ alone will be saved.

Personal wealth will be useless on that day to purchase safety and protection from the wrath of God. Only the blood of Christ will give protection, because it is only through the death of Christ that we are able to share in His resurrection. St. Paul writes in his letter to the Romans, “Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?” Although we are baptized physically in water, spiritually we are immersed into the death of Christ and covered by His atoning blood. It is Christ’s blood that marks us as Christ’s own forever.

In Revelation chapter 7, beginning with verse 13 John writes, “Then one of the elders addressed me, saying, ‘Who are these, robed in white, and where have they come from?’ I said to him, ‘Sir, you are the one that knows.’ Then he said to me, ‘These are they who have come out of the great ordeal; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.”

Those of us who have entered into Christ’s death through the waters of baptism have been washed clean of sin in the blood of Jesus’ passion and suffering. There is no other price in heaven or on earth that can redeem us from our sins. Only the blood of the Lamb of God can save us. Because of Christ’s great sacrifice for us, St. Paul pleads with us to think of ourselves as dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.

This is why it is so important to continually turn away from the sin that once bound us to eternal death.  We, who have been bought with the great price of Christ’s sacrifice and washed in His blood, are witnesses on earth and in all of heaven of Christ’s redemption. As witnesses for Christ, we are called by Christ to live our lives daily for Him alone.

In the gospel reading today from Matthew, Jesus says, “Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever does not take up the cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Those who find their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.”

As witnesses for Christ, no relationship in our lives can be greater than our relationship with Christ. This includes even our parents, our spouse and our children.  Christ alone is to be number one in our lives. This is why Jesus warns us that if we do not put Christ first, then we are not worthy of Him. Yet, it is so tempting to take pride in the successes of those we hold dear to our hearts, especially if they are of our household. Even this pride of family can hinder our relationship with God, because all good things come from God.

There is nothing good in this world that does not come from our Creator and Redeemer. Pride is taking credit for something of which we could not have had nor created without the benevolence of God Almighty intervening in our lives. Since all good things come from God when we try and take credit for it, then we are robbing God of His Glory. We may even be deceived to believe that we made it in this world on our own. Yet, it is by the grace of God that we even have air to breathe and a body to breathe it.

Until we comprehend the falseness of living a life led by pride, instead of humility, we cannot know the fullness of the relationship that God wants to have with us. Nor can we experience the joy of godly relationships with one another. In fact, our pride becomes a stumbling block for us in preventing us from living the resurrected life that Christ paid for us to live.

Some of us even take pride in our faithful life we believe we are living for Christ. This pride is the most deceiving of all, because it is the pride of self-righteousness. The scriptures are very clear that there is no one righteous, except Jesus Christ. It is Christ’s righteousness alone on which we are made pure.  In St. Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians he writes, “God chose what is low and despised in the world, things that are not, to reduce to nothing things that are, so that no one^* might boast in the presence of God. He is the source of your life in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification and redemption, in order that, as it is written, ‘Let the one who boasts, boast in^* the Lord.’”

The prophet Isaiah tells us, "All our righteousness is like filthy rags" so the only thing that we can boast of is Jesus Christ. There is nothing else worthy of exaltation. In the End of Days all that will remain will be that which is done for the glory of Christ. May we take up our cross and live each moment for Jesus our Lord and Savior knowing that it is Christ alone who makes us worthy..