In our journey through discovering God’s love, we have studied the source of love and now we have turned to what God’s word says love is and is not. We have looked at hoe God’s love is patient and kind. We have looked at how God’s love is not envious and today we are going to look at how God’s love is not boastful.
The different translations use the following words:
CSB: brag
NIV: boast
KJV: vaunteth not itself
NLT: boastful
The original Greek word is perpereuomai and means a self display, employing rhetorical embellishments in extolling one’s self excessively.
Paul tells us:
in order that, as it is written: Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.
1 Corinthians 1:31
The Greek word for boast in this scripture is kauchaomai and means to glory (whether with reason or without). It is interesting that the Greek for for boast in 1 Corinthians 13:4 for boast is only used in this verse throughout the New Testament! Can you see the difference between boasting in the Lord and boasting for one’s self?
In our scripture for today, Paul says, the type of boasting that is not loving is extoling one’s self excessively. It is bragging and the root of bragging is pride and giving a testimony of self and not God. Let’s look at scripture concerning bragging about one’s self.
‘This is what the Lord says:
Jeremiah 9:23
The wise person should not boast in his wisdom;
the strong should not boast in his strength;
the wealthy should not boast in his wealth.
Jeremiah says, do not boast about how smart you are, your own strength, or wealth.
But as it is, you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil. 17 So it is sin to know the good and yet not do it
James 4:16-17
James reveals that boasting is arrogance (we will dive deeper in understanding of that tomorrow) is evil. Evil is the absence of God’s love. It is a sin to be a boastful person.
2 In arrogance the wicked relentlessly pursue their victims;
Psalm 10:2-4
let them be caught in the schemes they have devised.
3 For the wicked one boasts about his own cravings;
the one who is greedy curses and despises the Lord.
4 In all his scheming,
the wicked person arrogantly thinks,
“There’s no accountability,
since there’s no God.”
Someone who only speaks about themselves and vaunts themselves us are wicked. They devise schemes, speak about their heart’s desires and are greedy. A boastful person despises the Lord and thinks there is no accountability for their actions and words because there is no God. Yikes! When we engage in boasting about who we are, what we have, we are testifying to others that there is no God.
4 I say to the boastful, ‘Do not boast,’
Psalm 75:4-5
and to the wicked, ‘Do not lift up your horn.
5 Do not lift up your horn against heaven
or speak arrogantly.’”
16 These people are discontented grumblers, living according to their desires; their mouths utter arrogant words, flattering people for their own advantage.
Jude 1:16
Those who boast about themselves are discontent grumblers who live according to their own selfish desires. They use their words to flatter people and impress people for their own advantage.
18 For by uttering boastful, empty words, they seduce, with fleshly desires and debauchery, people who have barely escaped from those who live in error. 19 They promise them freedom, but they themselves are slaves of corruption, since people are enslaved to whatever defeats them.
2 Peter 2:18-19
Boastful words are empty and used to seduce people with seduction and debauchery. That is a word that is not really used in modern English. It means excessive indulgence in pleasures. People who boast are those who seek sensual pleasures. They are slaves to corruption and their own defeat.
King Nebuchadnezzar is out best example of someone who was boastful.
30 the king exclaimed, “Is this not Babylon the Great that I have built to be a royal residence by my vast power and for my majestic glory?”
Daniel 4:30-33
31 While the words were still in the king’s mouth, a voice came from heaven: “King Nebuchadnezzar, to you it is declared that the kingdom has departed from you. 32 You will be driven away from people to live with the wild animals, and you will feed on grass like cattle for seven periods of time, until you acknowledge that the Most High is ruler over human kingdoms, and he gives them to anyone he wants.”
33 At that moment the message against Nebuchadnezzar was fulfilled. He was driven away from people. He ate grass like cattle, and his body was drenched with dew from the sky, until his hair grew like eagles’ feathers and his nails like birds’ claws.
He stood overlooking “his: kingdom and spoke look at what I built. In an instant God struck his mind and he went insane for seven years acting like an animal.
Jesus speaks about the boastful pharisee and the humble tax collector.
10 “Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. 11 The Pharisee was standing and praying like this about himself: ‘God, I thank you that I’m not like other people—greedy, unrighteous, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. 12 I fast twice a week; I give a tenth of everything I get.’
Luke 18:10-14
13 “But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even raise his eyes to heaven but kept striking his chest and saying, ‘God, have mercy on me, a sinner!’ 14 I tell you, this one went down to his house justified rather than the other, because everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”
This person was exalting himself above others. Bragging is elevating yourself above others. It’s the ultimate I statements… I, I, I… and not God is in the midst of I.
The next example is interesting:
21 On an appointed day, dressed in royal robes and seated on the throne, Herod delivered a speech to them. 22 The assembled people began to shout, “It’s the voice of a god and not of a man!” 23 At once an angel of the Lord struck him because he did not give the glory to God, and he was eaten by worms and died.
Acts 12:21-23
King Harod gave a speech and the people began shouting, Herod is God. Harod should have stopped the people and said, it is God who gets the glory….but he sat there on his throne relishing the people’s praise and them calling him a god. Terrible way to die if you ask me.
SO how do we get as far away from boasting as we can?
Cultivate a lifestyle of humility and gratitude.
3 Do nothing out of selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility consider others as more important than yourselves. 4 Everyone should look not to his own interests, but rather to the interests of others.
Philippians 2:3-4
Consider and focus on the needs of others rather than your own. DO not seek to do good acts for your own praise and vaunting. Make everyone else higher on the ladder than you.
in order that, as it is written: Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.
1 Corinthians 1:31
Direct your attention and glory to God and not yourself. Put your energy into pleasing God and not yourself.
Enter his gates with thanksgiving
Psalms 100:4
and his courts with praise.
Give thanks to him and bless his name.
Develop a lifestyle and attitude of gratitude. Take the focus from yourself to setting it on God.
The heart of humility is taking credit from ourselves and giving it to God.
It Starts Small 
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