Lightly edited for readability while preserving the speaker’s meaning and substantive statements.
god we thank you for your presence we thank you for your glory we thank you we have access lord to you into your presence by the blood of jesus we're thankful lord that you're merciful that you forgive sins and wash them away we're thankful lord that you have a plan for us for each of us lord we thank you that you are real that you died on the cross for our sins and rose from the dead and you're alive forevermore and we are thankful lord today that we can know you we can worship the one true god the creator of heaven and earth we're thankful that you're not like allah you're a god of love and mercy and forgiveness your the truth the way the truth and the life and we we love you today we exalt you today we praise you today in jesus name we pray amen hallelujah glory to god well good to have everyone here this morning we welcome those listening by shoutcast radio those listening my blog talk radio welcome you to fire and grace church this morning um i do have a message this morning for you i told nancy i don't know if we're going to call it the continuation of the soulless christian or not but could be i guess because this is part of the part of the problem but i'm going to address some some issues in our church this morning and not just in our church i guess anybody listening across the world this is a common problem that's in christians lives and our church does not have this all together just yet we got a long way to go i do you do i assure you that we have a long way to go on this issue but what we're going to talk about this morning look at from the scriptures is religious pride religious pride and it manifests itself in some real interesting ways it's a sneaky little snake they can hide behind the most pious and religious uh platitudes or whatever you want to call them but it can hide in the heart of a christian of a sincere christian religious pride you know i was just thinking while we're in worship a minute ago if we could all go back to the day in the sense of our humility on the day we got saved because on the day we truly were born again the day we were truly saved we had a revelation if you really got saved you had a revelation that you were a sinner
you had a revelation that there was nothing in you that could save you that's why you had you look to jesus and when you believe that jesus christ the messiah when you believe that he died on the cross for your sins because you were a sinner and he died there to save you from your sin and you realized you couldn't save yourself that you had to have a savior to wash your sin away and to give you the hope of eternal life in heaven and you believed that he rose from the dead and you were born again and you felt the peace of god come into your soul and you felt the love of god come into your soul and your spirit and you felt the presence of god receive you and love you and forgive you at that moment as a baby christian you didn't really have any spiritual knowledge you didn't really have anything to be proud about you weren't proud of your spiritual gifts you weren't proud of your you weren't you weren't thinking about your status in life whether you're rich or poor you weren't thinking about you know how good you've been no you were all you were thinking about is jesus just forgave me of all these horrible things i've done and i didn't deserve it and the revelation that before you were ever born that he took your sin in his body as he suffered on the cross [Music] that he became sin he took all of our sins on him and that revelation was precious to us then wasn't but then something happens you know all babies are cute and innocent aren't they precious cute innocent little babies and then they start growing up they start growing up and they start thinking for themselves and all of that's got to happen right but what starts happening almost immediately attitudes you know a two-year-old usually starts with mine mine mine right but christians are no different oh but then let us get a little older in the lord and start getting some knowledge right all of a sudden we know more than other people all of a sudden we're better than other people we're superior to other people because we know a little more
maybe than another christian or another person that's why the scripture says knowledge puffs up all right oh and then don't let us get baptized in the holy spirit in the gift of tongues and start operating in the gifts then we really think we're something oh don't let that happen in church now let god use us in the gifts of the spirit in church oh don't dare let it happen that we lay hands on somebody and pray for them in jesus name and they get healed oh boy we've just become the greatest christian on the face of the earth in our own minds right and then we graduate a little further because we think we begin to think well i'm getting my act together in this place or that place i'm a lot better than i used to be and it's good we should improve we should grow we should mature we should become overcomers we there's things once we become a christian that of course we should stop doing you know from things when we that we did when we were unsaved and we should improve the problem is with us is that when we start improving or making changes or getting better or living a holier life or a more obedient life we begin to get pretty satisfied with ourselves we began to get pretty feeling pretty good about ourselves right and then we began to think that now you know we can look at others and start trying to fix them okay to a degree we're supposed to try to help people but that's usually not what it turns into all right now i'm going to read some scriptures this morning because we're going to look at the subject of religious pride but i want to read just several passages before i make a whole lot of comment i'm going to try to not make a whole lot of comment on the scriptures that i'm going to read here this morning just to set the stage but let's start off i want you to turn to romans chapter 12 romans chapter 12. and actually you know in this series of the soulless christian we dealt with romans chapter 12 verses 1 and 2 a few weeks ago we didn't get to verse 3.
everybody get there romans 12. let's read from verse 1 but we're going to go to verse 3 and focus in on verse 3. i beseech you therefore brethren by the mercies of god that you present your bodies a living sacrifice holy and acceptable unto god which is your reasonable service and be not conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of god you know we've been talking about that over the last few weeks about proving what is the will of god by dividing what is soulish emotional what is intellectual uh what is you know in your soul versus what comes from the holy spirit and the word of god and what the holy spirit is saying and doing so we've been talking about that when you talk about presenting your bodies as a living sacrifice living a holy life presenting yourself to the lord and living for him now see all that's good and all that's part of it but he didn't stop there verse 3 is kind of the next step we need to look at once you get your act together a little bit you're in danger of falling into religious pride and that's why the next verse he says this for i say through the grace given unto me to every man that is among you not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think but to think soberly according as god has dealt to every man the measure of faith so immediately he jumps right to this i'm gonna i'm gonna charge every man every woman every person every christian i'm going to charge you not to think more highly of yourself than you ought to think but to think soberly can i just say a short word here i don't care how much you think you have it together you don't have it together the apostle paul put it this way in philippians chapter 3 when he said i count not myself to have already apprehended this thing but i am pursuing the high calling of god in christ jesus right now if the apostle paul could say i don't have it all yet the man who was called up to heaven and heard unspeakable words that he could not even come back here and tell us about the man who had the crippled walk and the blind sea and the dead rays and everything else who planted uh most of the churches of the of the of the new testament who wrote most of the new testament said i don't have it all together here's another thing i'm going to say about the apostle paul here before we go
any further is one of the reasons i believe that god could use him so powerfully and give him so many revelations and give him so many um so many so much ability to lead people to jesus and plant churches all over the place and one of the reasons that he he was so blessed and successful i believe in his apostolic ministry was because he constantly and you can see it in his writings he constantly said i am the least of the apostles he said as a matter of fact i'm not even worthy to be an apostle because i persecuted the church i persecuted christians i shouldn't be an apostle he never lost the sense of his overwhelming humility of looking that i don't deserve this i i don't deserve this honor to be called an apostle but god called me but god anointed me and the only way i can do it is by his grace by his help i do this but i think paul's humility kept him in a place where god can continue to help him and give him grace to do what he was doing and be successful at it i think that our biggest hindrance in our lives is pride because the bible says that god gives grace and grace is not just it's not unmerited favor that is not the definition of grace grace is god's divine power and influence to help you do what you need to do okay and the bible says that god gives grace help power to do what he wants you to do he gives grace to the humble but he resists the proud so to the level that we are humble is to the level that god's power can work through us humility is the key to power humility is the key to honor humility is the key to god using you and you not falling we're going to look at these words but he warns every christian do not think of yourself more highly than you ought to think here's the apostle paul to remember this not only did he say i'm the least of the apostles i'm not even worthy to be an apostle and you know he was talking about sin that jesus forgave him of that i persecuted the church of god he said and wasted it he was destroying christians but jesus had forgiven him of this sin when he got saved yet he never forgot it himself it's one thing there's a lot of people out there that say oh god's
thrown my sins into the sea of forgetfulness yeah god may have forgotten them but you don't need to because the moment you think you're all that you will go back to those sins and paul never ever let himself forget what he was he also knew if you read romans 7 he also knew and admitted that he constantly had evil present with him that his flesh constantly wanted to sin and that he even admitted that there were things that he wanted to do for god that he didn't do and things that he didn't want to do he would do he talked about there was evil that he did now folks now a lot of people take these scriptures and say take them out and say it's a license to sin but not at all paul was letting you know i still as even as an apostle of the lord jesus christ even as one baptized and filled with the holy ghost speaking in tongues even one who sees miracles even one who cast out demons plant churches lead people to jesus all these things that he did he said i still struggle with the flesh i still struggle with sin i still understand that if i get prideful about what god's doing through me i will fall because paul knew the proverbs it said that what a holy spirit goes before destruction pride goes before a fall that's why paul could write in first corinthians 10 verse 12 that's why he could say wherefore let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall how did let's let's read a few more verses let's look at it a real picture of thinking of yourself more highly than you ought to think let's let's look at the attitude let's go to luke chapter 18. [Music] you know while you're turning to luke chapter 18 let me just say i love the zeal of young men who get saved young men and women who get saved and get on fire for jesus and want to serve god and want to see the power of god and want to lead people to jesus and get out and preach and do all these things but hear what hear what i'm about to say here i don't know what it is i had the disease too i have to admit when i was in my 20s i can i just say something y'all listen looking at me the disease after you've been saved three four five years the disease that will afflict you uh is this disease that you think you
have all the answers you know we we live now in the information age where you can google everything right everybody's an expert on everything right but if you've been saved three or four or five years and maybe you have a photographic memory and you can remember everything you google and you remember everything you read you still don't have experience you still haven't been through the storms of life and let me just tell you something like i said i love the zeal of young men and women that are on fire for god that are 21 22 23 that's great i was there at one point myself but talk to me after you've been beaten up by life talk to me after you've been through tragedy you see i'm saying after you've been through the storm for 20 years are you still there i guarantee you what you will be if you made it through all the difficulties and the tests and the trials and the temptations and the ups and the downs and the people betraying you and all the stuff that goes on and your own screw-ups and everything else if you've made it through all that and life and death and divorce and destruction and kids and rebelling and accidents and injuries and surgeries and sickness and you go through life a little bit where are you then [Music] i love it these people have been married for a year think they're experts on marriage christians that have been saved a year or two think they know everything [Applause] the human being is a pitiful thing we really are we're so screwed up by adam's sin everything that's why god had to die on a cross we were unfixable unless he did that you understand unfixable i don't even know if that's a word but we'll say it luke chapter 18. it's an alabama word anyway luke chapter 18. let's read this this is um a familiar scripture but this applies to someone trying to be very religious and very um pious and very holy and look what it says this is luke 18 verse 9 jesus spake this parable and unto certain
which trusted in themselves that they were righteous and despised others now the word despised here it's a correct translation but it's a little strong when you think about what we think about despising somebody it literally just means that they just think of the person or the people as less than them that's really what it means to not esteem doesn't really mean to hate it just means to think oh they're just not as good as me they don't have it together like me i'm righteous right so jesus tells this prayer he says two men went up into the temple to pray the one a pharisee a religious leader and the other republican tax collector the pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself god i thank thee that i am not as other men are extortioners unjust adulterers or even as this republican now let me just ask you they were in church these two men were in the temple and they were both praying at the same time and one is sitting in his chair or his pew or his spot thinking i thank god i'm not like that one over there do you know that this goes on in fire and grace church before i continue reading this i'm gonna say something and somebody and i don't and you're gonna know who i'm talking about y'all are gonna figure this out but i'm just gonna say it and if you get offended with me too bad okay but i'm not gonna name you but you're gonna figure you're gonna know who it is because we're not you know we're not first baptist church right but here's the deal if you have children that don't mind you that don't obey you that you don't discipline correctly do not start looking at other people's children and thinking how they need to parent their kids this is more than one situation going on here it's really as as the pastor of the church and i hear these things that are being said and going on i it irritates the stew out of me and i've just had it up to here with it with this judging each other over these matters get your own house in order before you want to correct and fix somebody else's house also i know there's a bit there there is a
tobacco issue with a few people now i'm just going to say this am i going to judge you and say you're going to hell over tobacco no but i can say this to the adults the kids are watching you i had kids yesterday in this church have a conversation with me about tobacco and they were fully aware of who uses tobacco now i say this to you if you can't overcome a tobacco habit for your witness your christian witness don't run your mouth and think you're better than somebody else do not do it you know what i'm saying again not something you're going to hell over but is it a bad influence on the kids yes it is we've had people not just tobacco around the kids there's been alcohol around kids there's been movies that shouldn't be watched around kids there's been cussing around kids so hear what i'm saying you don't have it together [Music] let's get it together see in church these two are sitting there with their issues everybody's got issues see i'm not trying to be mean to you this morning you know i know y'all probably find this hard to believe but nancy and i don't always get along we have some issues i have some issues and that's why i'm going to be honest with you that's why a lot of times people may feel like i'm neglecting them as a pastor or some people feel like i'm neglecting a problem in the church but it's not about neglect i just realized that it's not me as a christian's job to try to fix every little thing going on in your life all the time and it's not your job to try to fix everybody else's little problems that's going on in their life or to judge them now as pastors we have to hear about it we have to deal with it it is our job to to find out to know the state of the flock as the bible says know the state of the flock
but the reason i don't jump on every little thing that's going on is because i know that i should give you mercy i should give you space i should give you time to deal with it i got my own problems to deal with i'm not the fix at all police right and let me just tell you you should be more focused on fixing your own problems and worrying about somebody else's problems in the church see this pharisee here's what's so sad this pharisee he had it together okay let's say he wasn't an adulterer he wasn't a liar he wasn't a cheater he wasn't all these things but yet his self-righteousness his his joy over what he had together made him look down upon someone else that maybe didn't have it as together as he did and that was just as filthy rotten stinking sin if this publican was an adulterer do you hear what i'm saying pride to god and particularly religious pride is a stench remember it was lucifer the archangel satan halal that angel that was his sin pride it says it his heart was lifted up in pride because of his beauty because of his wisdom because of the position god gave him he wanted more let's read it again two men went up into the temple to pray the one a pharisee and the other republican the pharisees stood and prayed thus with himself god i thank thee that i am not as other men are extortioners unjust adulterers or even as this publican i fast twice in a week i give tithes of all that i possess and the publicans standing afar off would not lift up so much as his eyes to heaven but smote upon his breath saying god be merciful to me a sinner jesus said i tell you this man went down to his house justified you know what justified means justified means made righteous justified means made forgiven cleanse sin made holy he said this man went down from his
house he left church justified made righteous all because his attitude was focused on you know what god i'm a sinner i don't have it all together i'm messed up i got these problems i'm not looking over here at somebody else who may have worse problems it doesn't matter the focus is i don't deserve to even look my eyes up to heaven humility humility about yourself now again let me um let me help you understand something if someone's in a sin that's unto death see i don't believe that all sins are the same but if someone is in a sin that's under death like habitual adultery or habitual homosexuality or habitual drunkenness or habitual idolatry what the bible says if you practice these things you will not inherit the kingdom of god i believe that christians who get out of those sins it is our responsibility to tell people hey in a in a heart that is humble a heart that knows if you get haughty that you could be right back in the same sins therein but it is our job to say hey here's what the bible says you can't live in that lifestyle you can't keep practicing that sin you've got to come out of it you've got to ask jesus to forgive you and you've got to do your best to walk away from it yes we do that but there's a lot of little stuff going on other little stuff that we get all hung up about with each other love covers a multitude of sins he [Applause] that what proverbs says he that covers the matter seeks love but he that repeats it separates friends go with me to matthew 7. of course the world misuses this one in the church as well but we're going to look at it because jesus taught it matthew seven of course they only quote verse one but we're going to read a little bit more than that to keep it in its context because this is what i was just talking about matthew 7 verse 1 he says judge not that ye be not judged
for with what judgment you judge you shall be judged now i'm going to give you the definition of the word judged it is one of those that has a long list of definitions but here's what's interesting one of the definitions in the greek in the strong's greek dictionary of this word krino i believe it is i'm gonna i'm gonna look at my paper in a second but one of it is to call into question just to call into question hmm i don't know i don't know about them i don't know about that situation for with what judgment you judge you shall be judged and with what measure you meted out or you give it out it shall be measured to you again now look at verse three and why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's eye and consider us not the being that is in thy own eye or how will thou say to thy brother let me pull out the mote that is out of thine eye and behold a beam is in my own eye you hypocrite first cast out the beam out of thine own eye and then you will see clearly to cast the mote out of thy brothers i give not that which is holy to dogs and he goes on but he's saying here very clearly be careful how you begin to call someone else's situation into question especially if you're dealing with the same problem or a very similar problem what he's saying is deal with yourself first i mean honestly oh i know i'm i'm just going to wait on that i wanted to say something there but see checking myself check it down a little bit right you don't have to say everything you think pastor t alright now let's go to romans two let's look at something he's not saying that it's not you're not supposed to get something out of your brother's eye just get it out of yours first but look but let me ask you this sheree you're a nurse paul you're a nurse if you're gonna get something out of somebody's eye do you just start digging around in there like just crazy you're very what careful why because it's a sensitive place it's a place that if you're not careful you can do more damage right here what i'm about to say to you we damage each other when we get too judgmental
over somebody else's issues and we're not dealing with our own and let me just ask you if you're trying to get something out of somebody's eye in the hospital and you can't see out of but one eye that makes it even what even more difficult exactly you've got to be careful with eyes right gentle would be the key word if somebody's getting something out of my eye i hope they're being gentle and sensitive to the situation right this is exactly i know i told you to turn where'd i tell you to turn romans what two i want you to hold romans two just so you understand we'll come right back there hold romans two and go to galatians chapter six this is where this passage comes in galatians chapter six verse one do y'all and i hope y'all know something as a pastor i don't get any joy out of having to come correct you about something or talk to you about a problem or confront something or tell you you know maybe you're not dealing with your kids correctly or there's something going on in church or i don't like to do that and let me just tell you if you like to correct people if that's really what you enjoy doing you have a problem all right you really do have a mental issue going on there because i'm like who do you think you are right it's necessary sometimes but goodness i don't get any joy out of it i assure you right you know why i don't get joy out of it even though i know as a pastor sometimes that i have to correct you and i have to say okay this is you got to do something about this right but you know why i don't like it because i know there's the potential there for it to hurt you i don't want to hurt you but i don't want to ignore something that could hurt you or hurt your children or something like that right galatians 6 verse 1 brethren so is he talking to
christians brethren if a man be overtaken in a fault now here's what's interesting about this word fault the word fault here could mean an unintentional slip or it could mean a very bad transgression so what he's saying here is whether it's something minor or something major in a brother or sister's life check your attitude and check yourself before you get involved in talking about it let's read it brethren if a man be overtaken in a fault ye which are spiritual restore such a one in the spirit of meekness considering yourself lest you also be tempted bear ye one another's burdens and so fulfill the law of christ and look at verse three for if a man think himself to be something when he is nothing he deceiveth himself meaning if you're going to talk about somebody else's problem or you're going to approach somebody about fixing something or correcting something in their lives you better check your attitude and you better be thinking it better be done in the spirit of meekness gentleness and with the heart that wants to not make them feel condemned but a heart that's trying to help them overcome it you want to see them restored and strengthened and then he has to add here be careful because the way you come at that person's struggle with their temptation or their problem if you don't handle the situation right you're gonna be tempted soon thereafter with similar thing and you're probably not going to stand you're probably going to fall to it because you're in pride and pride goes before a fall see it doesn't matter how much knowledge you have it doesn't matter if you speak in tongues it doesn't matter if you operate in the gifts it doesn't matter how long you've been saved none of that none of that matters doesn't make you any better than anybody else see i've been i've been saved but
walking with god it's really over i say 27 years because that's when i rededicated my life but if i go back to when i first came to jesus goodness we're looking at 30 5 years and my lord the struggles that i've had and the ups and the downs the great successes and the miserable failures and to this day i can tell you i still struggle [Music] i mean there's days i want to run away buy a bottle of vodka and a cigar and a motorcycle and run away you understand y'all think y'all think i'm i'm being funny i'm not there's days i want to run away i understand we deal with such struggles in life mentally emotionally physically financially oh if you have children lord have mercy you're going to deal with struggles their health problems their attitudes behavior discipline oh don't let them get to be teenagers it ain't easy it's not easy being a parent it's it's it's and it's ten times harder being a single parent it's tough this world getting through this world with your faith and your relationship in god intact is near impossible but thank god it's not all dependent on if we do it all perfect if it was we no one would make it that's why revelation 12 says we overcome satan we overcome him in this whole world system and everything that's against us our own flesh and all the temptations and all the vexation from all the junk that's around us the only way we overcome is first by the blood of the lamb by the blood of jesus christ his blood is the only thing righteous
and the only way we can keep being forgiven and cleansed and make it through and then he says by the word of our testimony and our testimony folks is what we go through what comes out of my sharing the realities of our of our successes and our failures you know i love the fact that the bible doesn't hide the great men of god's failures it doesn't hide david's adultery and his in his murder of a of a soldier it doesn't hide peter's denial of jesus it doesn't hide judas's fall it doesn't hide saul's disobedience gideon's fall samson today though if a minister or prophet messed up he's done because everybody will hate him i look at jimmy swagger just he's just a good example jimmy swagger and i'm not ashamed to say it one of the greatest preachers of the 20th century anointed powerful gifted evangelist i still remember some of his sermons they impacted me i would sit and watch jimmy swaggart at eight o'clock on sunday mornings before i would go to church long before i was a pastor or had any big responsibilities in a church and i would sit there on sunday morning and watch him before i went to church because i knew that man would have a message from god because he'd spend two or three hours in prayer he'd be fasting he read his bible through every six months this man was after god he was really after god and i'm going to tell you something i would sit there and the presence of god would be so strong on his services and especially i would watch him in crusades he would have these crusades overseas and i mean all over the world and and you just watch him preach a strong solid biblical message of salvation the cross repentance coming to jesus being born again or turning from sin and and let me tell you the people he would give all to god they would run and i would sit there tears rolling down my face the man was anointed but he did have a couple of problems he was molested when he was young so he struggled with sexual things lust in his mind and heart and he fought it with everything he had for years and he also though he had a lot of religious pride built up and those two things
took him down he fell into sexual sin twice that became very public and people christians and people all over just ridiculed him just abused him just rejected him hated him laughed his enemies in the in the church world and his enemies in the world they just rejoiced that this great man of god fell do you know that leonard ravenhill this is amazing fact that leonard ravenhill before jimmy fell probably around 1985 86 in that time period do you know that leonard ravenhill one of the another one of the greatest prophets and men of god of our time said this about jimmy swaggart he was the best of the lot of them that was a that was preaching at the time but hear what i'm going to say the church world rejected him i know that man didn't want to sin i know that man love god with all of his heart i know that he wanted to do god's will more than anything else but wiped out did he repent i believe he has i believe he did back then is the blood of jesus good enough for him as good as it is to the day we got saved i know i'm not saying he shouldn't go through a restoration process and all that as a minister i i know that's not even about that this morning but just my point is we just throw people under the bus and go on you know there are people that rejoice that jimmy fallon jimmy's gone from tv and jimmy's gone from the big ministry but i didn't ever rejoiced it broke my heart so see here's an attitude where's your heart when you when your brother or sister is is struggling with some sin or they're having an issue with their kids or they're going through a financial struggle or whatever are you job's friends or are you are you praying for them are you realizing that you know you may not be in the struggle they're in at the moment but you could be very soon and if you're thinking oh i need to go correct them i need to go talk to them i
need to go fix them no maybe you just need to pray for them maybe you just need to humble yourself shut your mouth get get rid of your religious pride thing and you got it together and they don't and pray for them a while before you dare open your mouth to them let me just say this you read the book of job we know the story behind the scenes because we get the story after the fact we get the story from god from god's word we see that satan made a deal and god allowed us okay you can do this to job and that job didn't do anything to bring it on himself but job's friends came so we have these church friends boy you start going through something everybody knows how to fix the problem or they start questioning well this is happening to joe he did something well maybe he did maybe he didn't do you know see that's what's so bad is they thought they knew oh they thought they had it figured out job must have sinned job must have been doing something in secret that's why that god let him be attacked by satan we find out we know the back story job didn't do anything bible even says he didn't even see him with his mouth god let's say let me just tell you something sometimes god let saints around you christians around you and even leaders around you go through some hell to test you your reaction is what's getting tested god already knew that job was going to stand strong through it all and what's so funny is he got down to the end and he and he goes you know what y'all don't even talk to me i'll hear joe but i'm listening to you bunch of religious everybody's got an answer for everybody over here i'm not listening to you job will pray for you and i'll listen to him but see they had it figured out i just read it it's amazing right you know what poor job needed poor job just needed his friends to hold their judgment to hold their tongues and to pray for him until he came through that thing and if job told them you know what this came upon me because i committed adultery then you know we can talk about that but if you don't know shut your mouth you don't know what's going on
quit worrying about fixing everybody and love your brother and sister enough to be humble and go you know what if they're struggling with their kids i'm going to pray i'm going to pray pray pray pray pray that god will give them the strength and the power and the grace and the breakthrough y'all hear what i'm saying we're about to go through a period of intense testing some true colors that you know some things down deep in some folks there you're going to see some christians react to some things that that's not going to seem very christian the way they react to them does that mean they're a heathen no what did i tell you romans this is what we got to be very careful of here god takes this very seriously how you treat those that are going through certain temptations and sins especially if they're in your life as well matter of fact it actually makes him angry let's look at this romans two verse 1 therefore thou art inexcusable o man whosoever thou art that judges for wherein thou judgest thou condemnest thyself why do you condemn yourself for you that judges do the same things but we are sure that the judgment of god is according to truth against them which commits such things and thinketh thou this o man that judges them which do such things and you do the same that you shall escape the judgment of god it is a very very dangerous thing to begin to judge someone about something that's in your life it is the epitome of religious pride and arrogance
i'll give you some scriptures here you can just write these down since we're we need to close out this morning here's some i love this one in ecclesiastes 7. verse 21-22 he says he says also and this is in the same passage where he just said there's not a man on earth that doesn't sin and he said and also take no heed unto all the words that are spoken lest thou hear thy servant curse thee he said for often times also thou known heart knoweth that thy thyself likewise has cursed others what's he saying there don't get all worked up if you hear somebody curse you don't get all worked up about it why because you know you've done it too so maybe they're just having a bad day you don't have to deal with every problem right here he said this second corinthians 10 12 for we dare not make ourselves of the number or compare ourselves with some that commend themselves but they measuring themselves by themselves and comparing themselves among themselves are not wise what is that talking about oh well you know our situation is is bad but it's not as bad as theirs our kids have issues but they're not as bad as theirs or you know you get what i'm saying oh i know i still struggle with lust but it's not as bad as his struggle or i still struggle with with anger but it's not as bad as so-and-so you see what i'm saying we do this mess in the church and we're sitting in the chairs of the pews or even at home and we're all about what everybody else is struggling with that it's not quite as bad as ours and we start thinking listen the definition of pride is to think more highly of yourself than you ought to think that you are superior to think that you have it together better than someone else does and in an area or so you may but when you start thinking you are superior to others you are entering into the pride zone i mean i could give you the the definitions listen let's just give you a few definitions of pride here when god says in james 4 6 when he says god resists the proud he gives grace to the humble the word proud here is the greek word hoop hooper a thanos you can look it up in the strong's but here's what it means appearing above others
haughty pride in mark 7 where jesus listed out a list of sins and he said pride is haughtiness haughtiness is defined as being arrogantly superior and disdainful it literally means that you have a superior attitude and you don't esteem others first timothy when it talks about not putting a novice in a position of authority that they will become prideful there's a different where there's there's like three or four words in the greek for pride different words this is or something like that and this pride means to envelop with smoke to inflate with self-conceit high-minded lifted up with pride what does that mean to envelop with smoke if you envelop yourself with smoke you can't see clearly and you stink and you smell like hell right that's good preaching to envelop with smoke to inflate with self-conceit i have it together we can go on and on with that right don't get me wrong knowledge is good it's good to grow in knowledge of god in his word and what's going on in the world knowledge is good don't get prideful in your knowledge don't get arrogant and prideful and self-conceived because you think you know more than other people though right don't do it correcting somebody rebuking somebody that's biblical but approach it cautiously and in humility and considering your own self and what's going on in your own life very carefully when it comes to others be careful with your words to them and behind their back doesn't mean we don't have to talk about some issues sometimes together but be very careful be very careful
pride will go before fall and pride you know the obadiah the big old book of obadiah one whole chapter of course he's speaking to the the prophet obadiah but he says this little phrase that's powerful he says the pride of thine heart has deceived thee and see that's what i just read a minute ago in galatians if a man thinks himself to be something when he is nothing he deceives himself religious pride is terrible you know i could go on with this it manifest itself in not not obeying the scriptures it manifests itself with thinking it has a better way than what god's word says remember it says about jesus in in philippians 2 i love this about it it says though being equal with god as part of the trinity being equal with god he counted himself of no reputation and he humbled himself and became obedient even unto death humbling ourselves and becoming obedient children listen to me when you don't obey your parents you're in pride you hear me you know why because you think you know better and i'm just going to tell you i i heard y'all look at me you two you didn't obey your mother told you some things to do yesterday and you didn't do it just flat out just disregarded and back talked her i heard about it pride it's amazing what i hear some people don't even know i hear it with my own ear somehow i'm listening and folks aren't thinking i'm listening you know what said you you three right here y'all are usually very good very obedient you're lucky your mama didn't put the wood on you me a little lesson about that rattlesnake yesterday the day's coming kids faith emory john all of you listen ian the day's coming if you don't obey you can get you killed you were close yesterday
to getting a rattlesnake bite but something just as simple as mom's saying don't go back there in that back in those woods and you go back in those woods and get a snake bite you see what i'm saying it's important to obey but obedience shows that you are humble disobedience shows you are prideful and arrogant well we can talk about stuff for a long time that's the problem with teenagers they think they know everything i got news for you i don't care listen to me teenagers i'll just be blunt i don't care how much pornography you've seen you don't know you don't understand what sex is about you think you do and your friends talk about everything you think you know you think you ain't got a clue you ain't got a clue what it's going to do to you yeah the clue was going to do your soul your mind your emotion you had a clue you had a clue that your sins if you get into that sin you have no clue you're going to carry that into your marriage you're going to carry that you're going to pass it on to your children they're going to do the same thing you do the same sins we're going to talk about this in the days ahead but the generational curse you're going to carry it to your kids whatever you do they will do and worse actually it will be visited upon them there is nothing nothing new under the sun nothing new same old flesh same old sins same old devils same old attitudes our only hope is to bring all this junk to the foot of the cross and say jesus help me with this mess wash me in your blood and help me overcome this you won't make it otherwise religious pride keeps so many people from truth that'll set them free this morning churches are full all over the united states and there's thousands of people sitting in church chairs and church pews and thousands of people and they think that they're righteous because they went to church this morning they think that they're righteous because their kids act different so it's those kids they think that they're righteous because they don't commit adultery
they got all these attitudes i'm better than this one i'm over this one i'm better because i make more money than this one see that's why god's about to judge america listen people talk about it's it's it's over abortion or homosexuality or our sexual immorality it's in the in america or the occultism that's taking over america it's none of that the number one sin of america and the american church is pride and pride goes before a fall that's why i know america is about to go down the tubes that's why i know that persecution is coming to the american church and that's why i know in economic collapse is coming to america because we're prideful in our success we're prideful in our big buildings we're prideful about our pretty clothes we're prideful about our fancy food we're prideful about our money and our jobs and our economy and our technology and our military everything american pride but the problem is it's the pride in the church of america doesn't even compare to the pride of the world it's worse it's all about big buildings and big budgets and big money and fancy entertainment it's all about how much money how much success how much this how much that all of it's about to come crashing down to the ground and many of these religious folks sitting in church with their religious pride thinking they're better than everybody they're going to crumble under the pressure they're going to turn some of them are going to turn into straight-up savages in barbarians you watch the test is coming here's probably one of the scariest passages of scripture you can find it's in isaiah 13. isaiah 13 is all about the end days and it's also in malachi 4 but it says this god said he will bring down in the last days in the final judgments he said all the proud will be brought down oh think about this god said all the pride of men will be
humbled in that day i said this before and i'm gonna finish with this right here you will humble yourself before god or he will do it and trust me it's better for you to do it first because if he has to do it it's going to hurt and he's about to hurt he's about to hurt america i mean hurt i mean just the thing with this this football player kissing his boyfriend at the nfl draft i think about our nation that just ridiculed tim tebow for praying on the football field kneeling down and saying a prayer and everybody going crazy loving the fact that this homo kissed i'm sitting there going and the the debate now in the church world oh can you be a christian and be a homosexual and there's a bunch of churches oh yeah that's fine oh boy we be in trouble we're in trouble humble yourself now the humble will find mercy the humble will find a place of refuge i tremble i tremble at what's coming i tremble let's pray father we pray today holy spirit bring conviction show us in our hearts where pride has corrupted religious pride arrogance superiority judgmental critical attitudes against our brothers and sisters over frivolous things that we should just be praying about lord i pray in the name of jesus that you'll deal with offenses offenses in the church with each other little offenses about this or about that lord help us to just die to ourselves to die to our pride to realize that we're all wretched sinners capable of committing any sin and finally just say lord help us we need grace to walk this out day by day
we need your power we need your strength we need your mercy we need your help we need you god to help us overcome our sins our temptations our battles our problems and help us to be quick to pray and not quit to to condemn or i pray that love would grow in our church for one another father we pray this in jesus name amen