Individual exceptionalism- the temptation for us to think we are smarter, prettier, cooler, better, special. To think that by virtue of nothing more than our own natural awesomeness, we command more than others – more attention, more pay, more privilege, more power. It is one of the most attractive and deeply flawed beliefs we can entertain.

Pride, the first sin, the deadliest sin, and today more common than cameramen in Charlie Sheen’s driveway - who’s the latest and most sorrowful example of the devil’s temptation, ‘If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down; for it is written; ‘His angels will catch you!’

Because if we think this highly of ourselves – that we’re fireproof, immune to old age, cancer, divorce, bad luck - that there’s tiger blood flowing through our veins, then we are not downright delusional and living a fairy tale, but we are only opening ourselves up for a fall – which is something we all have in common with Charlie Sheen.

The subtlety of pride doesn’t have us casting ourselves off mountains as much as it has us scanning the room behind the person we’re talking with, looking for someone more worthy of our time. Pride makes us take cuts, fib on our taxes, and talk more than listen - after all, my time, and my money, and my opinion are worth more than yours.

That’s why we need the ashes of Wednesday and the kneelers on Lenten Sundays to bring us back to our senses – to help us do the reality check - to look deeply in the mirror at the lines and the bags and the flaws – so when Jesus says, ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test’ – we don’t even want to try. Lent asks us to ponder the thin line between confidence and arrogance as we claim our great worth-ship in Christ that sends us out into the world to clean the toilets.

In what ways are we thinking too highly of ourselves? How might we use the 40 days of Lent as a reality check?


Reading
The Last Train from Hiroshima – Charles Pellegrino
The Faith of the Future – Harvey Cox
Fasting – Scot McKnight