When you have eaten and are satisfied, praise the Lord your God for the good land he has given you.
Be careful that you do not forget the Lord your God, failing to observe his commands, his laws and his decrees that I am giving you this day.
Otherwise, when you eat and are satisfied, when you build fine houses and settle down,
and when your herds and flocks grow large and your silver and gold increase and all you have is multiplied,
then your heart will become proud and you will forget the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.
He led you through the vast and dreadful wilderness, that thirsty and waterless land, with its venomous snakes and scorpions. He brought you water out of hard rock.
He gave you manna to eat in the wilderness, something your ancestors had never known, to humble and test you so that in the end it might go well with you.
You may say to yourself, ‘My power and the strength of my hands have produced this wealth for me.’
But remember the Lord your God, for it is he who gives you the ability to produce wealth, and so confirms his covenant, which he swore to your ancestors, as it is today.
For rebellion is like the sin of divination,
and arrogance like the evil of idolatry.
Because you have rejected the word of the Lord,
he has rejected you as king.’
There are six things the Lord hates,
seven that are detestable to him:
haughty eyes,
a lying tongue,
hands that shed innocent blood,
a heart that devises wicked schemes,
feet that are quick to rush into evil,
a false witness who pours out lies
and a person who stirs up conflict in the community.
When pride comes, then comes disgrace,
but with humility comes wisdom.
Where there is strife, there is pride,
but wisdom is found in those who take advice.
Haughty eyes and a proud heart –
the unploughed field of the wicked – produce sin.
Pride brings a person low,
but the lowly in spirit gain honour.
This is what the Lord says:
‘Let not the wise boast of their wisdom
or the strong boast of their strength
or the rich boast of their riches,
But when his heart became arrogant and hardened with pride, he was deposed from his royal throne and stripped of his glory.
‘Blessed are the poor in spirit,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are the meek,
for they will inherit the earth.
‘Be careful not to practise your righteousness in front of others to be seen by them. If you do, you will have no reward from your Father in heaven.
‘So when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets, to be honoured by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full.
But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing,
so that your giving may be in secret. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.
At that time the disciples came to Jesus and asked, ‘Who, then, is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?’
He called a little child to him, and placed the child among them.
And he said: ‘Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.
Therefore, whoever takes the lowly position of this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.
Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant,
and whoever wants to be first must be your slave –
For those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.
For all those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.’
To some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everyone else, Jesus told this parable:
‘Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector.
The Pharisee stood by himself and prayed: “God, I thank you that I am not like other people – robbers, evildoers, adulterers – or even like this tax collector.
I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.”
‘But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, “God, have mercy on me, a sinner.”
‘I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God. For all those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.’
For who makes you different from anyone else? What do you have that you did not receive? And if you did receive it, why do you boast as though you did not?
But he gives us more grace. That is why Scripture says:
‘God opposes the proud
but shows favour to the humble.’
In the same way, you who are younger, submit yourselves to your elders. All of you, clothe yourselves with humility towards one another, because,
Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time.
‘Very truly I tell you Pharisees, anyone who does not enter the sheepfold by the gate, but climbs in by some other way, is a thief and a robber.
The one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep.
The gatekeeper opens the gate for him, and the sheep listen to his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out.
When he has brought out all his own, he goes on ahead of them, and his sheep follow him because they know his voice.
But they will never follow a stranger; in fact, they will run away from him because they do not recognise a stranger’s voice.’
They will do such things because they have not known the Father or me.