DBD - A Heart of Pride

Series: Don’t Be Deceived

Series: Don’t Be Deceived

Lesson Title: The Danger of Pride

INTRODUCTION

As we go out into the world as servants of God, there are many great dangers that we face. We saw many of these dangers in our previous series on Nehemiah. We talked about the ways that Satan attacks God’s people and how he uses his servants in the world to discourage God’s people — to distract them in their service to God or to get their faith to waiver. I would like to talk about one of these ways Satan attempts to get God’s people to fall in detail — the topic of deception.

It is amazing how many times, in both the Old and New Testaments, that the Spirit talks about God’s people being deceived. One example is . This was a concern that Paul had about the Corinthians:

“But I am afraid that as the serpent deceived Eve by his cunning, your thoughts will be led astray from a sincere and pure devotion to Christ” (, ESV).

Paul defines the goal here in this passage — sincere and pure devotion to Christ — that is the goal for each of us as God’s people. This goal is something we can be led astray from. Satan finds way to complicate things for God’s people

Lord willing, I have seven sermons planned that will deal with this topic — showing many ways Satan can lead us astray and deceive us.

TITLE

For our first lesson, I would like to talk about the topic of pride and how it can lead us to be deceived.

One of the best passages that shows this concept is a passage we studied towards the end of last year: .

“3 The pride of your heart has deceived you, you who live in the clefts of the rock, in your lofty dwelling, who say in your heart, “Who will bring me down to the ground?”” (, ESV)

They deceived themselves. They thought that they were unassailable because of their location. The arid mountains, intense heat, lack of water, and rough terrain would make it difficult for any large army to come in, so they thought arrogantly to themselves, “who can take us down?” It is arrogant because they did not consider that the LORD could overcome any obstacle. The LORD could take them down.

Also, in verse 5, Obadiah says that their wealth also led them to pride. Edom possessed tremendous ore deposits and was on a major caravan route between the Middle East and the Far East. Much money would have been made from the tariffs imposed on caravans coming through their territory.

And in verses 8-9, they had great wisdom among their people that they trusted in. Location, wealth, wisdom. These are things that they took pride in — things that they thought made them somebody — that made them a nation that could not be brought down.

They deceived themselves by the pride that was within their hearts. Their location, their wealth, their military power, their wisdom, and anything else you can list would not protect them from being humbled and humiliated by the Lord’s judgment.

A BIG DANGER FOR US!

In this world, it is so easy to fall into the trap of becoming proud. The message that the world preaches is one that encourages self-fulfillment, self-esteem, and defending your rights no matter who you need to knock down in the process. The world teaches that if you accomplish certain things — if you get your high school diploma or your college degree, or if you get the big promotion at work, or if you live in a certain place, etc, etc — that these things make you somebody — that these worldly things make you great, no matter what it cost you ethically to get these things…

Let’s talk about two applications from our text in Obadiah regarding pride

APPLICATION 1

First, regarding wisdom and knowledge. This is an area where we can often fall into pride. Whenever we talk to others about religion, politics, or an area that we may be well-studied in, we can fall prey to this “know it all” attitude that can lead us to look down on others and not value the opinions or perspectives of others who we may deem as “less-versed” on a specific topic.

There are two specific groups who can especially fall prey to pride in this area.

First, this is a temptation for those who are young. Younger people have the tendency to be those who look at the older generation and think, “they are ignorant. They don’t know what they are talking about. They are out of touch with how the world is.” And these thoughts lead young people often to look down on their parents, older brothers and sisters in Christ, and others, and leads them to either not honor or submit to those who are in authority over them. It is pride that leads to these types of thoughts or responses to authority.

Another group of people who struggle a lot with the sin of pride are those who are well-educated. There are many blessings that can come from secular education, but there are also dangers for us. It can lead us to become proud. It can lead us in conversations to talk down towards someone thinking we are better than them or more qualified to speak on an issue because of our education. This is important to keep in mind especially for those who are going to college. There is a danger of becoming proud in seeking secular education, but you are also going to be on the receiving end of pride also. At times, you will have professors who will despise your religious beliefs and arrogantly talk down to you and try to make you feel stupid because you would believe in such a thing as life miraculously being created by God while they believe life miraculously came into existence out of non-living matter on it’s own by chance. But what fuels their looking down on your beliefs while exalting their own is pride. What leads them to not what to listen to your position? Pride.

In the context of wisdom and knowledge, here is what Paul says to the Corinthians: “18 Let no one deceive himself. If anyone among you thinks that he is wise in this age, let him become a fool that he may become wise. 19 For the wisdom of this world is folly with God. For it is written, “He catches the wise in their craftiness,” 20 and again, “The Lord knows the thoughts of the wise, that they are futile.”” (, ESV)

They had wise teachers in the world that they looked up to and followed. They had preachers that they did this with also. Based on these things, they even looked down on others who followed another teacher or preacher. But there is a lesson for us here in the area of seeking earthly wisdom and following the wisdom of the age. It can be deceptive. This is not always the case, but it is especially when the wisdom of the age contradicts the wisdom of God or if the wisdom we gain leads us to thing that we are wiser than we truly are. Paul says in , “3 For if anyone thinks he is something, when he is nothing, he deceives himself.” (, ESV)

Don’t assume that you “know it all”! You don’t know it all! I don’t know it all! We have all been wrong in the past, and we will ALL be wrong in the future!

APPLICATION 2

Second, What do you trust in? What do we believe makes us secure or safe physically? This was a problem with Edom, and it can be the same for us. We can trust in physical things to be the reason why we have security and comfort in this life — things such as our economic status, or the country that we live in, or the jobs that we have, and we forget who has given us the privilege of living in this country or having the jobs that we have or to be in the financial situation we are in. We can think that we got all of these things for ourselves and trust in ourselves and these things instead of the Lord.

And what about spiritually — can we be blinded and deceived by pride spiritually? Definitely! We have many examples in the Bible of those who claim to be religious and proudly think that they are right with God based on their knowledge of the law and based on their own righteous acts. The Pharisees are the best example of this.

Their pride blinded them from all that they were neglecting to do, and their righteous acts could not cover up or make up for the weighty parts of the law that they were neglecting. And they would look down on those who were better off than they were spiritually. We see this in the parable of the Pharisee and the tax collector in . The Pharisee thanked God that he was amazing because of his obedience to the law and that he wasn’t a sinner like the tax collector. His pride blinded him. It was the humble tax collector that left right with God and not the Pharisee.

We can be just like the Pharisees, looking at what we are doing outwardly when we come together and think, we got these things right, and proudly think that just because we got the outward things right and worship twice a week that we are saved. And we may look down on others who don’t follow our traditions and say they are sinners. Sometimes we are way too quick in saying that someone is “disrespecting God or sinning against God.” What is often the case is that we are guilty of arrogantly condemning someone based on cultural norms of the past or based on man-made traditions. It is easy to see pride in others and miss it in ourselves as we condemn others for not keeping in line with our customs and traditions or for not being like us.

APPLICATION 3

Along with these points, we also see a sinful attitude that often appears with pride: partiality. We see this in .

“1 My brothers, show no partiality as you hold the faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory. 2 For if a man wearing a gold ring and fine clothing comes into your assembly, and a poor man in shabby clothing also comes in, 3 and if you pay attention to the one who wears the fine clothing and say, “You sit here in a good place,” while you say to the poor man, “You stand over there,” or, “Sit down at my feet,” 4 have you not then made distinctions among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts?” (, ESV)

The natural tendency is to be more comfortable with people who are like you, whether that be they are near your age and have kids your age, or if they are family, or if they are near you in regards to economic status. And it is a natural tendency we have to only want to be around people who are like us or to treat people different if they are too different from us. This is what James is talking about in this situation. They were treating those who visited their assemblies differently based on their economic status, which was visibly seen in their clothing. One wore fine clothes while one wore shabby clothes, and they treated the wealthy man better. It is pride that does this. It is pride that leads someone to discriminate based on worldly things like this, and it is usually the case that we treat the people who are like us favorably, and those who are different than us — those are the ones we look down on. Brethren do this based on things like:

Wealth and influenceClothing/fashionSkin colorNationality ReligionPolitical positionsEtc.

If we are showing partiality and pride based on these things, we are not being too different than the Pharisee who looked down on the tax collector because of who employed him and the friends he had. The Pharisee was being impartial in his attitude towards the tax-collector.

Pride and partiality, as is seen in , is the antithesis of love. Love and humility seek to exalt others and serve others while pride and partiality look down on others and seek to exalt self and be self-serving.

CONCLUSION

Pride is deceptive. It is one of the many attitudes that leads us to deceive ourselves into thinking we are right with God when we are not. Pride will blind us, making us think that we are somebody when we are nobody. And what is interesting about pride is that we are often the only ones we deceive into thinking we are somebody great. Those who are around us see our pride for what it is. And most importantly, God sees our true condition. Pride is a deadly condition spiritually.

As we saw in our 1 Peter class, in , God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble. Pride makes us an opponent of the Humble Jesus, and an enemy to the cross. There is no justification for it — no good excuse to allow it to continue.

Jesus says, “12 Whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted.” (, CSB)

Which of these two categories do we find ourselves in?

Those who exalt themselves, whether this be because of our education, our economic status, our heritage or religious upbringing, or any other thing. Those who humble themselves — those who impartially serve in the kingdom of God and use the blessings that have been given to them in service to the One who gave them.

PRAYER

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