Beware of Arrogance

It’s Heartbreaking

It’s heartbreaking that this pattern that begins on childhood playgrounds never seems to end. It’s painful that it infects our relationships, communities and churches. It’s tragic that we carry the wounds of being put down and the shame of having put others down ourselves with us. And it’s devastating that we do this to one another, we who bear God’s image, we who are called to love.

But perhaps what’s most heartbreaking is when this arrogance attaches itself to our faith, when we use theology as a weapon to feel superior to other believers.

This is precisely what the apostle Paul saw happening in the first century, and it’s precisely what he warned against with urgent, pastoral intensity. Writing to Gentile believers in Rome, Paul saw the seeds of a terrible arrogance beginning to sprout, an arrogance that would elevate Gentile Christians by diminishing Jewish people, God’s covenant people, the very root from which their faith had grown.

In Romans 11:20, Paul’s words cut through with stark clarity: “Do not be haughty, but fear.”

Don’t be arrogant. Don’t think highly of yourselves. Don’t elevate yourselves by putting down the Jewish people. Don’t forget where you came from. Don’t forget what God has done for you. Fear. Have a healthy, reverent awareness that the same God who broke off branches because of unbelief can do the same to you.

Paul knew what I learned on that playground: that arrogance comes naturally to us. That we don’t need to be taught to elevate ourselves at others’ expense. That unless this tendency is confronted, corrected and replaced with something better, it will poison everything it touches.

In our day, I’m watching this very arrogance play out again. I’m seeing it in the rise of voices within Christianity that dismiss, diminish and even hate the Jewish people. I’m hearing theological arguments that sound sophisticated but carry that same spirit I felt on the playground, the one that needs to put someone else down to feel elevated. I’m encountering an air of certainty, an unwillingness to be corrected, a lack of the very fruit of the Spirit that should mark those who follow Jesus.

This is not a new problem. It’s an ancient one. But Paul’s warning is timeless. And it’s a warning we desperately need to hear today.

Understanding Arrogance Biblically

When the apostle Paul warned Gentile believers saying, “Do not be haughty, but fear” (Rom. 11:20), he wasn’t thinking with a Greek mindset. We must remember that Paul was a Pharisee, steeped in the Hebrew Scriptures, and his mind would have been filled with the warnings his ancestors had received and too often ignored.

The Hebrew Scriptures use vivid, powerful language to describe arrogance. The primary word is ga’on, which means rising up, swelling or lifting oneself high. It’s the same root used for God’s “majesty,” but when humans claim it, it becomes grotesque. God declares, “The fear of the Lord is to hate evil; pride and arrogance and the evil way and the perverse mouth I hate” (Prov. 8:13). God doesn’t merely disapprove of arrogance. He hates it.

Another Hebrew word, zadon, means presumptuous arrogance, a defiant lifting of oneself against authority. We are warned, “By pride comes nothing but strife, but with the well-advised is wisdom” (Prov. 13:10). Arrogance doesn’t build community. It destroys it.

But the most instructive passage comes from Deuteronomy 8:11–14, where Moses warned Israel about prosperity. “Beware that you do not forget the Lord your God...lest when you have eaten and are full, and have built beautiful houses and dwell in them...when your heart is lifted up, and you forget the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage.”

This passage uses the Hebrew phrase rum levavkha or “your heart rises high.” This is the anatomy of arrogance: blessing received, credit taken, God forgotten. When the heart rises high, memory fails to forget being a slave, forget being rescued and to forget it was all grace.

The Jewish sages understood this danger. The Talmud (rabbinic commentary on Jewish tradition and the Hebrew Scriptures) teaches, “Whoever has arrogance in him is as if he worships idols” (Sotah 4b). Arrogance equals idolatry because the arrogant person places themselves where only God belongs. Maimonides wrote, “Pride is the worst of all evil traits...One who is arrogant denies the fundamental principle of faith” (Hilchot De’ot 2:3).

This is what Paul knew when he warned Gentile believers not to be arrogant toward Israel. He knew that arrogance always begins with forgetting grace, where we came from and who holds us up. And he knew that arrogance toward God’s covenant people was not just a relational mistake but a theological catastrophe.

It was, in the words of the sages, as if worshiping idols.

Jesus and the Arrogant Heart

Jesus spoke frequently about arrogance, though He often called it by a different name. He told a parable specifically aimed at “some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and despised others” (Luke 18:9). The Pharisee stood and prayed, “God, I thank You that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this tax collector” (Luke 18:11). Meanwhile, the tax collector couldn’t even lift his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast saying, “God, be merciful to me a sinner!” (Luke 18:13),

Jesus’ conclusion was devastating: “I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other; for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted” (Luke 18:14). The arrogant heart needs someone to look down on, so the Pharisee claimed righteousness by comparing himself to others. This is the essence of Paul’s warning in Romans 11.

Jesus taught this principle repeatedly. He declared, “Whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.” (Matt. 23:12). The kingdom of God operates on an economy completely opposite to the world’s and completely opposite to our natural inclinations.

Paul echoes precisely this warning to Gentile believers: “Do not boast against the branches. But if you do boast, remember that you do not support the root, but the root supports you...Do not be haughty, but fear.” (Rom. 11:18, 20).

The Gentile believers were in danger of becoming like the Pharisee, thanking God that they were not like those unbelieving Jews. They’d been grafted into the olive tree by grace through faith, yet some were beginning to feel superior to the very people whose tree they’d been grafted into. They were forgetting the root that held them up. 

The Antidote to Arrogance

If arrogance is the disease, humility is the cure. Biblical humility is not self-hatred or false modesty but simply seeing ourselves truthfully in light of God’s grace.

Paul continues in Romans 12:3: “For I say, through the grace given to me, to everyone who is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think soberly, as God has dealt to each one a measure of faith” (Rom. 12:3). We stand by grace through faith. That’s the sober truth.

James reminds us, “God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble” (James 4:6). This is not a minor preference. God actively resists the proud. The Greek word means “to set oneself against in battle array.” In contrast, He pours out grace to the humble. 

What does humility look like practically? Paul answers: “Let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit, but in lowliness of mind let each esteem others better than himself. Let each of you look out not only for his own interests, but also for the interests of others” (Phil. 2:3–4).

Notice the focus: others. Humility doesn’t obsess over proving itself right or elevating itself above. Humility looks outward. It honors. It serves. It loves.

And love, Paul tells us, “does not parade itself, is not puffed up” (1 Cor. 13:4). Love is the ultimate antidote to arrogance because genuine love cannot coexist with a heart that needs to put others down.

When it comes to Israel, this means we speak with honor, serve with gratitude and remember, always remember, that the root supports us.

Choosing a Better Way

As I reflect on that playground incident so many years ago, I realize something I didn’t understand as a child: we have a choice. The pattern of elevating ourselves by putting others down may come naturally, but it doesn’t have to define us. God offers a better way.

Arrogance is a spiritual danger, not merely a personality flaw. When we become arrogant toward Israel, or toward anyone, we place ourselves where only God belongs.

The truth is we stand by grace through faith alone. We were grafted in as wild branches into a cultivated tree. The root supports us; we don't support the root. God’s gifts and calling to Israel are irrevocable (Rom. 11:29). When we dismiss Israel, we dismiss God’s character.

Ultimately, love that honors rather than diminishes is the antidote. I think back to that child on the playground, wounded by another’s need to feel superior. That wound taught me something precious: people matter. How we treat them matters. And in God’s economy, the way up is down. The path to exaltation runs through the valley of humility.

Paul’s warning still echoes: “Do not be haughty, but fear.”

May we heed it. May we choose humility. May we honor the root that supports us.

And may we never forget that it’s all grace.