The Problem of Pride, Part 1

I am convinced that in the Church of Jesus Christ we have a severe identity crisis We've had this identity crisis all of our lives And that crisis centers around the fact that we believe we deserve more than we are getting We have misunderstood what God has said in His Word And we truly believe that we are due something, that we rightly deserve a better life, more money, a better marriage. A better preacher, a better church, something better And that's because we tend to think of ourselves more highly than we ought to think of ourselves

Paul would say in the book of Romans, the 12th chapter, he says, I say to every man among you not to think more highly of himself than he ought to think But to think so as to have sound judgment, as God has allotted to each a measure of faith He goes on to say down in verse number 16: Be of the same mind toward one another, do not be haughty in mind But associate with the lowly, do not be wise in your own estimation We truly want to be number one We want to be noticed We want everybody to see us and to recognize us We want to go to a place where everybody knows our name

And we will do whatever it takes to get in the center of attention We love to think about ourselves Now, some of you are here tonight saying to yourself, no, that's not me. I'm not that way. I don't even like myself In fact, I hate myself But let me tell you something No, you don't And I know that because the Bible says in Ephesians 5:2 that no man has ever hated his own flesh So I know what the Bible says And we look at ourselves as if we're nothing, but in reality, we are expecting someone to pipe up and, oh, no, no, no, that's not true You're better than you think you are

The Bible says no man has ever hated his own flesh In fact, the ideal thing for us is to realize that we need to start loving people as we love ourselves And stop wanting others to love us as we love ourselves We need to focus in on what God has said But we had this identity crisis because we don't want to serve, we want people to serve us We don't want to be low man on a totem po We want to be top dog We want to be number one And yet, for the most part, we don't want people to know what's really going on inside our hearts When we walk into a crowded room, when we walk into a mall or a store

But down deep, we want everybody to know who we are, what we're about, and we want them to see us as valuable And all that is, is pride and arrogance, self-centeredness. I'm reminded of the story of the two young boys, a boy named Ryan, who was five, and his brother Joe, who was three And one morning at breakfast, mom was making pancakes, and they began to argue among themselves about who would be the first To get the first pancake that day And mom thought this was a great opportunity to teach them a wonderful moral lesson

And so she sat her boys down and said, You know, let's just think about this for a moment What would Jesus say if He was here? Jesus would say, How about you take the first pancake? And mom thought she had really gotten the lesson home to her kids And so Ryan, the older brother, looked at his younger brother Joe and said, Joe, how about you be Jesus today? Now, as we get older, our means of manipulation might become more sophisticated But you know what? For the most part, that is truly how we are, isn't it? We want people to serve us We want to be number one We want to be first in line

We don't want to be last And yet, pride seems to rule our lives It was C. S Lewis who said this: Pride is a mother hen under which all other sins are hatched That's a pretty good definition of pride In fact, it has been said that it is the only disease that can make everyone sick except the person who has it It was Vance Hav who recorded these words He said, An egotist is a person who talks so much about himself that you don't have a chance to talk about yourself John Stott said these words

He says at every stage of our Christian development and in every sphere of our Christian discipleship, pride is our greatest enemy and humility our greatest friend But we face that enemy every day And so tonight, we're going to talk about what the Bible says concerning pride Solomon was a man of great pride, so much so that whatever he wanted, he got And yet he would write a book, the book of Proverbs And he would write to his sons to help them understand the dangers of pride and the problem it is for all of us And it would be well for us to master this book of Proverbs as parents

That we might be able to wisely teach our children, as well as to understand why it is we are where we are as parents today, because Proverbs tells us And so when we study this book, we come to grips with many real And we come to realize that there are six things that God hates, yea Seven are an abomination to him And the very first one on the list is the proud look or the haughty eyes God hates pride God hates it The Bible says in 1 John chapter 2 that we are to love not the world

Neither the things that are in the world, the lust of the eyes and the lust of the flesh, and the boastful pride of life Now that's a unique phrase The pride of life is one specific word, a la All is a word that speaks primarily of an individual or individuals Who tend to look at themselves one way when in reality they are completely the opposite It is the exaltation of self, but that boastful pr of life is that life. that is so into putting itself on display and doing whatever it takes to do so, no matter what the cost

It's like the person who spends and spends and spends so he can drive a car like everybody else drives, so people can look at him and say, Oh, wow, he drives a nice car Or spends and spends and spends so that he can wear the clothes that others wear, or live in the same neighborhood that others live in, so people will admire him for who he is All the while, so far in debt that he can't even keep his head above water That's the boastful pride of life Let me show you how Proverbs illustrates that

Proverbs 12, verse number 9: Better is he who is lightly esteemed and has a servant than he who honors himself and lacks bread Now that's a unique proverbs because I think there's 19 proverbs that talk about one thing that is better than another And in this one, it's better to be lightly esteemed That is, it's better for people not to speak that much about you and to have a servant In other words, to be secure and have financial stability and to be able to take care of those you oversee versus being one who honors himself and lacks bread, who seeks honor

And does whatever he can to show that worthiness, but yet not be able to eat Better yet, it's explained this way: Proverbs 13, verse number 7 There is one who pretends to be rich but has nothing, another pretends to be poor but has great wealth That is the boastful pride of life He lives a life of pretend Did you ever play that growing up? Let's pretend. I used to pretend I was a. A gunslinger. I used to pretend I was in army combat. I used to pretend I was a great athlete. I used to pretend all those things There are things we want to be, but in reality, we're not those things

See? That's the boastful pride of life You see, we don't understand how deeply ingrained this is in our soul, but it's here It's here So, I want to talk to you tonight, number one, about the source of pride Where did all this come from? Who is the source of pride? Well, 1 Timothy chapter 3 talks about those who rule in the church And it says in verse number 6 in 1 Timothy 3 these words That those who rule in the church are not to be a new convert, lest he become conceited and fall into the condemnation incurred by the devil

Goes on to say in verse number seven, and he that is the elder must have a good reputation with those outside the church, so that he may not fall into the reproach and the snare of the devil The snare of the devil is pride You see, Satan wants to trap you into the same trap he fell into In fact, it says over in 2 Timothy chapter 2, these words It says this in verse number 24: And the Lord's bonds must not be quarrelsome, but be kind to all, able to teach, patient when wronged, with gentleness, correcting those who are in opposition

If perhaps God may grant them repentance leading to the knowledge of truth, that they may come to their senses and escape from the snare of the devil Having been held captive by him to do his will Folks, the source of pride is Satan him In Genesis chapter 3, he said to Adam and Eve that you can partake of the tree It's okay Because when you do, you will be just like God Satan was the first Mormon Did you know that? See, Joseph Smith thinks that he invented Mormonism No, he didn't do that Satan did Satan was into all these gods way before Joseph Smith was ever even thought of

The bottom line is that he says, Look, you can be like God And so he instilled in Adam and Eve this ego-centered mentality Oh, I can be just like God This is an amazing accomplishment And I want to be able to do that The snare of the devil is pride Remember back in Isaiah chapter 14, Ezekiel chapter 28, two Old Testament passages that deal one with the king of Babylon, the other with the king of Tyre And the king of Babylon, listen, and the king of Tyre both fell into the same trap And that was the snare of the devil And that was the pride of life

And so both are two passages that explain the downfall of those kings as Satan himself was brought down because of his pride Isaiah 14, it says in verse number 12, How you have fallen from heaven, O star of the morning, son of the dawn You have been cut down to the earth You have weakened the nations But you said in your heart, I will ascend to heaven. I will raise my throne above the stars of God. and I will sit on the Mount of Assembly in the recesses of the north. I will ascend above the heights of the clouds. I will make my like the Most High

Nevertheless, you will be thrust down to She, to the recesses of the pit Those who see you will gaze at you It speaks of the king of Babylon and his descent because of his arrogance and his pride But the same is true over in Ezekiel 28 If you got your Bible, turn there with me if you would for a moment, please This is important because as we look at this, we see this king Falling into the snare of the devil, that is the area of pride And as Satan himself was brought down, so this king would be brought down, because Satan is the source of pride He is where it all originated from

It was from this man who wanted to become, or this spirit being who wanted to become God He thought of himself more highly than he ought to think of himself, didn't he? And listen to what the Bible says You had the seal of perfection This is over in verse number 12 Full of wisdom and perfect in beauty You were in Eden, the garden of God And let me stop right there for a second because this is important You need to understand that what the Lord is doing is comparing this king's pride with Satan's pride Now, we know the king of Tyre was not in Eden, but we know Satan Was in Eden

All you gotta do is read Genesis chapter 3 You were in Eden, the garden of God Every precious stone was your covering. the ruby, the topaz, and the diamond, the beryl, the on and the jasper, the lapis, the z, the turquoise and the em, and the gold, the workmanship of your settings and sockets, was in you On the day you were created they were prepared You were the anointed cherub who covers, and I placed you there You were on the holy mountain of God You walked in the midst of the stones of fire You were blameless in your ways

From the day you were created until unrighteousness was found in you, by the abundance of your trade you were eternally filled with violence, and you sinned Therefore I have cast you as profane From the mountain of God And I have destroyed you, O covering cherub, from the midst of the stones of fire Your heart was lifted up Because of your beauty, you corrupted your wisdom by reason of your splendor Now, let me just take a moment to help you understand something here This is very important Because I believe that this Garden of Eden is in Jerusalem today

And I believe that because it talks about this Satan being cast out of the holy mountain of God. 18 times in the Old Testament, the phrase holy mountain or mountain of God is used. 16 of the 18 are irrefutable They all refer to the Temple Mount in Jerusalem There are two, Ezekiel 28 mentioned here, that refer to the Garden of Eden Most Jewish rabbis will teach you, and I concur with them, that the Garden of Eden is the Temple Mount in Jerusalem It's further proved this way

In Genesis chapter 3, in the Garden of Eden, when the Lord God pronounced his curse upon Satan, he said that you will bruise the heel Of the seed of the woman, but that seed will crush your head Now, that was said in Eden And that took place on Mount Calvary Mount Calvary is the same as Mount Moriah, Genesis chapter 22 Mount Moriah is the hill of Zion, is the Temple Mount today And so when God gave the prophecy in Genesis 3:15 that the serpent will bruise the heel of the Messiah, but the Messiah will crush his head

He gave that promise in Genesis 3:15 in the Garden of Eden, knowing full well that in Genesis 22, the place foreseen by God, which is what Mount Moriah means, there would be a sacrifice of a lamb If you go to Israel today and go to Jerusalem, you realize that Mount Moriah is the Temple Mount, which adds credence to the fact That's what God is doing is saying this piece of real estate, which is the most valuable piece of real estate in the history of the world, everybody knows it and everybody wants it, but only God's going to get it because it's His

And on this temple mount, according to Zach chapter 6, verse number 12, the Messiah will build his temple because he is the only one to be worshipped He is the only one to be honored You see, it was on that piece of real estate in that Garden of Eden on the holy mountain of God That Satan wanted to rule, that his pride caused him to be puffed up and want to overtake the throne of God God said no But what God did would provide a way for those who are crushed in spirit, for those who are of a humble spirit, to come to Him by faith and serve Him and worship Him for all eternity

And that's why the Bible says, To this man will I look, to him who is broken and of a contrite heart, and who trembles at my word God doesn't look to the arrogant, he doesn't look to the prideful He looks to the contrite of heart He looks to the broken, to the crushed spirit For those are the ones he will save, and those are the ones who will live, and those are the ones who will worship him forever So we need to understand the source of pride Satan himself, the snare of the devil And he wants to entrap you

The Bible says in 1 Peter 5 that Satan goes around like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour How does he devour you? He catches you in his own snare, in his own entrapment And what's that entrapment? It's the entrapment of pride and arrogance, thinking of yourself more highly than you ought to think He wants you to think that way because that's how he thinks See Number two, the specifics of pride The specifics of pride Remember, over in John 8:4, Christ told the religious leaders, You are of your father The devil, because of their arrogance, because of their pride

And they were following their father, the devil You're either children, a child of God, or you're not a child of God, right? You're the child of Satan or a child of God One of the two And these religious leaders were following the arrogant pride of Satan, and Christ called them on that And so he is that source of pride, but the specifics of pride You need to understand that God hates pride But Proverbs chapter 8, verse number 13, says these words: It says, The fear of the Lord is to hate evil. pr and arrogance and the evil way and the perverted mouth hate The fear of the Lord is to hate evil

And that is to hate pride because God him hates pride Proverbs chapter 16, verse number 5: Everyone who is proud in heart is an abomination to the Lord Everyone who is proud in heart, you see, pride grips the heart It grips the internal part of man And it's an abomination to God And that's why it says down in verse number 18: pride goes before destruction and a haughty spirit before Stumbling Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before stumbling It is better to be of a humble spirit with the lowly than to divide the spoil With the proud

Why? Because the proudful man will be brought down, will be destroyed You see, God hates it because it only reminds him of Satan And Satan is the father of lies, and Satan is the master of deception because of his own pride and because of his own arrogance You know, one of the specific elements of pride is manifested in how we are unwilling to submit to authority We have a problem with authority in today's society, don't we? We don't want anybody telling us what to do And how dare you think you can tell me what to do, right? That's how we think

Who are you to tell me what to do? We get upset when they begin to do road work on the roads because we have to take a detour and go another way How dare they do that knowing that this is the road I travel on and I have to be the work at a certain time? Who do they think they are to hinder my progress? When it's time to go to work, we get this kind of inside of us because someone has infringed on my direction, on my way, see, and they didn't ask our permission And that irritates us But think about it this way

When we look at our lives, the realm of submission, the Bible says in Ephesians 5 that we are to submit ourselves to one another, right? That's what the Bible says Submit ourselves to one another But because we have this identity crisis, because we think that people are going to submit to us And we not to anyone else, we have a problem with Ephesians 5:2 We don't want to submit to anybody else, but we are to submit to one another in the fear of Christ Knowing that because we fear him and we love him and want to honor him, we will serve our fellow man

And yet, we find sub a very difficult thing to do, don't we? Now, ladies, you got to be honest It's kind of hard to submit to your husband, isn it? See? Got the amen What she said, everybody else believes It's hard, especially when they lead the wrong way Ladies have a hard time with that When the Bible says, wives be submissive to your husbands, the Bible also speaks about husbands being submissive to their wives In fact, the greatest submission is not the woman to the man, but the man to the woman We forget that Why? Because the man is commanded to love his wife as Christ loved the church

How was that? By giving him up for her So, the greatest aspect of submission is not the wife to the husband, it's the husband to the wife And yet, men want to beat their wives over the head with the verse Submit to me, you got to follow my leadership, you got to respect me, you got to dignify me All the while, they are unwilling to sacrificially give their lives away And yet the Bible speaks over and over again

We studied 1 Peter, and all through 1 Peter chapter 2, all through 1 Peter chapter 3, remember what it says? Submit yourselves to the Lord's sake, or for the Lord's sake, to every human institution, whether to a king as one in authority or to governors as sent by him Verse number 18: Servants, be submissive to your masters with all respect, not only to those who are good and gentle, but also to those who are unreasonable Peter says you've got to submit yourself to the unreasonable boss He goes on to say down in verse number 1 in the same way, you wives, be submissive to your own husbands

And then he says, verse 7, you husbands, likewise, like what? Like the wives are to you, and like servants are to masters, and like all of us are to be to those who govern in terms of authority, we need to al ourselves. our up under that individual and serve that individual And then he says in verse number eight, to sum it up, let me say it this way, Peter says Let all be harmonious, sympathetic, brotherly, kind-hearted, and humble in sp Peter says, Let me sum it up for you And Peter was an arrogant man, wasn't he? Peter was a man who didn't want anybody telling him what to do

Peter was the leader of the 12, he was the boss But Peter says in chapter 5, cl yourself with humility Be clothed with humility Because God resists the proud, but he gives grace To the humble And you know what? We know we have a pride problem when someone begins to tell us something that we don't like, and the hair on the back of our neck begins to stand up The palms begin to sweat How dare they say that to me? Who do they think they are? We all have that attitude, don't we? I do. I'll confess it. I have that attitude at times

You know, my wife likes to tell me what to do. I don't know about your wife, fellas, but my wife likes to tell me what to do You know? And sure enough, she does And sometimes I say, wait a minute Wait, she can't be telling me that. I say this in my head. I don't say it to her. I say it in my head. I value my life. I don say it out loud. I just say it in my head

And I say, oh man, honey, what do? I want to say, who do you think you are telling me that? But then when I recheck what's happening, I realize that you know what? That's that pride, that's that arrogant spirit, that's that self-centered mentality, that's that ego welling up inside of me, saying, hey, wait a minute Who do you think you are? What a reality in reality. I need to listen, understand Begin to sympathize and empathize with what has taken place And as a leader, begin to lead her properly in the direction that will bring comfort, direction And support for her life

See, we need to rethink some of the things that we're thinking We think of ourselves too highly That's why Paul says, don't think of yourself more highly than you ought to think But we do You know, we think we're better preachers than we really are We think we're better leaders than we really are We think our church is better than it really is We think our marriage is better than what it really is And that's what the boastful pride of life is all about: pre something is better than what it really is

We need to realize that we are servants of the living God, and we are here not to be served, but we are here to serve our fellow man Let's pray.