Is God Resisting You

Is God Resisting You?

James 4:1-10

‘Every baby starts life as a little savage. He is completely selfish and self-centered. He wants what he wants when he wants it — his bottle, his mother’s attention, his playmate’s toy, his uncle’s watch. Deny him these once, and he seethes with rage and aggressiveness which would be murderous were he not so helpless. He is dirty, he has no morals, no knowledge, no skills. This means that all children — not just certain children — are born delinquent. If permitted to continue in the self-centered world of his infancy, given free reign to his impulsive actions to satisfy his wants, every child would grow up a criminal — a thief, a killer, or a rapist.’

This report was produced in 1926 by The Minnesota Crime Commission. It reported on the growth of crime and reached a startling conclusion. Does it sound out of date to you? Is it totally wrong, off-base or biased? This was not a report produced by the church about ‘sinners’, it was written about every person. It was a conclusion on the human condition in a way, our condition of being sinners; sinners who are involved in a war within themselves.

What is this internal war?

James 4:1-10 (NLT)
1 What is causing the quarrels and fights among you? Don’t they come from the evil desires at war within you? 2 You want what you don’t have, so you scheme and kill to get it. You are jealous of what others have, but you can’t get it, so you fight and wage war to take it away from them. Yet you don’t have what you want because you don’t ask God for it. 3 And even when you ask, you don’t get it because your motives are all wrong—you want only what will give you pleasure. 4 You adulterers! Don’t you realize that friendship with the world makes you an enemy of God? I say it again: If you want to be a friend of the world, you make yourself an enemy of God. 5 What do you think the Scriptures mean when they say that the spirit God has placed within us is filled with envy? 6 But he gives us even more grace to stand against such evil desires. As the Scriptures say, “God opposes the proud but favors the humble.” 7 So humble yourselves before God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. 8 Come close to God, and God will come close to you. Wash your hands, you sinners; purify your hearts, for your loyalty is divided between God and the world. 9 Let there be tears for what you have done. Let there be sorrow and deep grief. Let there be sadness instead of laughter, and gloom instead of joy. 10 Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up in honor.

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The root of the human condition is sin, and sin is based in “pride”.

James tells us that God resist the proud, but gives grace to the humble

Why do we fight? Why do we quarrel? Why do people steal, lie, cheat, beat up and even kill one another? Why do we do the things we know we really should not do?

In Romans we see Paul’s understanding of the condition of man.

In Romans 8, we see two laws at work in our lives, “the law of sin & death”, and “the law of the Spirit of Life in Christ Jesus”.

Just as there is a pulling effect to the law of gravity, pride is the pulling effect of the law of sin.  Pride will always pull us in the direction of sin!

Pride’s root is selfishness, it’s about me and I’m the most important, pride keeps us from seeing others needs and situations, just our own.

If lying is the language of the Kingdom of Darkness, then pride is the attitude of the Kingdom of Darkness.

The hugest thing about the problem with pride is that “God resist the proud!”

I’m going to take some time and share something’s about “pride” from a study by “Freedom in Christ Ministries”. 

1. Pride makes us feel special and unique: This does not refer to the uniqueness of being created in the image of God; rather, it's the undue self-esteem which makes us feel more important than other members of the Body of Christ.

2. Pride leads us to concentrate on our rights instead of our responsibilities: We're always looking at how our rights have been violated instead of looking at how we can be responsible and accountable to God and people.  One statistic out says, that 98% of Americans, won’t take responsibility for their own lives.

3. Pride produces hardness of heart: We become insensitive to the needs of others. The first sign of hardness of heart is when we begin to withhold love from others.

4. Pride produces a lack of forgiveness: "Why should I forgive them? They hurt me."

5. Pride produces self-pity: Self-pity is a bottomless pit; it's never satisfied. Usually we get into self-pity because we violate the scriptural injunction not to compare ourselves among ourselves (2 Cor. 10;12)

6. Pride produces fear of man: We become more concerned with what people think than with what God thinks. There are usually two causes:

1.                  We haven't seen the greatness of God for the situation, or

2.                  Our focus is on ourselves rather than God.

7. Pride produces an un-teachable spirit: How long does it take us to repent when conviction has been brought by the Spirit of God? If it takes a long time, there is some work the Holy Spirit needs to do in the area of pride.

8. Pride prefers selfish interest over other's needs

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9. Pride will not admit mistakes: We blame others and excuse ourselves; and then we say, "You're picking on me. Why are you doing that?"

10. Pride leads to stinginess: We are afraid there will not be enough left for us.

11. Pride is sarcastic in humor: We cut other people down with humor. Sarcastic humor implies, "You're not going to be elevated above me in any way; therefore, I'm going to cut you down so that I can look down on you." Sarcasm is not of God. Godly humor edifies; it builds up, and it's very creative.

Pride leads us to rely on our own wisdom and understanding: It brings about an inability to see clearly, to think things through, and to hear the Word of the Lord. If pride has a place in our hearts, we'll misunderstand what God is saying.

12. Pride produces an independent of non-submissive spirit: This leads us to adhere to the letter of the law, neglecting the spirit of the law.

13. Pride causes impatience with others, calling it a personality conflict: It's not a question of who's right or who's wrong, but how I respond.

14. Pride responds with judgment, slander and criticism: Sometimes speaking the truth to someone who doesn't have a right or a need to know.

15. Pride produces discontentment: Are we discontent with where God leads us and the people He has put us with? Are we always wanting to be somewhere else, doing something else? If God has led you to where you are, get your heart in the situation until you are content with where He's led you; stop looking somewhere else! God does not authorize spiritual butterflies nor spiritual bumblebees.

16. Pride needs to be begged to do something: If you need to be begged to do something that's within your gifts and abilities, ask yourself why. Is it because you want to become the center of attention?

17. Pride makes excuses before it begins: If the Spirit of God is going to receive the glory in and through your life, don't make excuses that rob the Spirit of God from receiving any glory. Just shut up and do what you've been asked to do.

18. Pride produces insecurity and low self-image: The way we can become the center of attention is by concentrating on our insecurity and our low self-image. Usually there is insecurity in our lives because we haven't seen God for who He is. If we'll see God for who He is, we'll be so excited and expanded with who God is that we'll then be able to handle the revelation of who we are and put our lives in proper perspective;

                                                                                                                                        Then we won't need to be insecure anymore.

19. Pride expects others to consult us, and is offended when we are not consulted

20. Pride demands that others go through what you went through: If something was a requirement for you to get to a certain spiritual plateau, then it's got to be a requirement for everyone else.

21. Pride is envious or jealous: We don't rejoice with other's blessings, but rather concentrate on why we weren't blessed. Pride is at the heart of this selfishness,

22. Pride tries to touch God's glory: In relating the stories of what God has done through our ministry, if we find ourselves taking credit for God's work, and we will find ourselves dying spiritually.

23. Pride always wants to be strong: We don't want to receive from others or to be vulnerable so that we have to receive.

24.  Pride produces selected submission: You have no doubt heard it said, "I'll submit to them because I feel they are spiritually mature; but I won't submit to this person." We'd better learn to submit to each person under whose authority God puts us because He does it for a purpose.

Pride creates disloyalty and undermines authority: It is Absalom meeting the people when they come out from David; he hugs and kisses them and says, "Oh poor David doesn't understand; tell Absalom about it." Have you been guilty of undermining authority?

25.  Pride is ungrateful: Nothing is ever quite good enough.

26.  Pride is suspicious: It is wondering what others are saying about you; suspecting what somebody may be thinking, when there hasn't been any word communicated. But somehow you think you know; therefore, you act and make decisions based on what you think he's thinking, which is totally in error.

27. Pride leads us to find unity anywhere other than in the cross of Jesus: We look for unity in our culture, our gifts, our callings, in tongues and languages, in denominations, in our theology; we look for unity anywhere other than the cross--but that's where our true unity is.

28. Pride concentrates on what has not been done: "I've never been invited to their home. They've never had me for a special meal." Stop concentrating on yourself. Have you ever invited them for a meal? Have you invited them for thirty meals?

29.  Pride produces a defensive and argumentative spirit: Pride insists, "I was right; I don't need to humble myself." Have you ever been so right you're wrong?

Back to James 4, in verses 7-10 James gives us the remedy to an attitude of pride.

True Humility rids oneself of prideful issues.

Humility is not being a door mat; true humility is confidence properly placed.

1.  Submit to God:

          a. Recognize our need, and dependency upon God, He is not the co-pilot, He must be the pilot.

          b.  Submission means a complete trust & dependency, in everything.

          c.  Is Jesus really Lord, or are their still self lordship areas in our lives?

2.  Resist the Devil:

          a.  Resistance of the enemy of our souls will never come until there is full submission to God. 

          b.  Any area of pride in our lives, opens the door to the enemy.

          c.  Just as humility comes from submission to God, and the Spirit of Truth.

          d.  Pride comes from submission to Satan, and the Spirit of Lies.

3.  Draw near to God:

a.     Drawing near is different then submission to:

b.     Submission is recognizing the Lordship of Christ in our lives. There are many people who try to draw near to God, without complete submission to Him.

c.      All pride must be removed from our thoughts & attitudes, because we will never be able to draw near to God if God is resisting us!

d.     Drawing near to God, in our walk with Him, experiencing His divine plan, and presence in our lives will only come from true submission.

4. Cleanse your hands: (you sinners) cleanse our actions!

a.     Submission & drawing near to God, allows God to speak and point out those areas of our lives that need cleansing.

b.     The things we produce with our own hands, are they sanctified?  The things we have our hands in, are they areas that support our pride, or our humility?

c.      Cleanse your hands!

5. Purify your hearts: (you doubled minded)

a.     Purity of heart is the results of submission, drawing near, and cleansing our hands. 

b.     Purity of heart produces singleness of vision.

c.      James 1, double mindedness leads to spiritual instability, double mindedness, double vision are always considered as un-pure motives.

James 1:6-8 (NLT)
6 But when you ask him, be sure that your faith is in God alone. Do not waver, for a person with divided loyalty is as unsettled as a wave of the sea that is blown and tossed by the wind. 7 Such people should not expect to receive anything from the Lord. 8 Their loyalty is divided between God and the world, and they are unstable in everything they do.

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d.     Our faith must never be divided, either we believe God or not. 

e.     When pride rules our hearts and lives, our faith will always be torn between what we want and what we know God wants.

In verse nine, James tells us what it will take to rid ourselves from the pride issues in our lives. 

1.     A true repentant heart, and attitude, not just words of repentance but actions and attitude changes toward our prideful self-centeredness.

2.     He uses strong words like lament, mourn & weep over the condition of our hearts.

3.     This is true repentance, when we truly recognize how our actions and attitudes repel God and break His heart, and how disappointed He is with us.

4.     When David realized how he had broken Gods commandments, all through the Psalms we hear his cries of brokenness, and wails of a contrite heart before God.  David said, “I have sin greatly before my God, and man”.

Last we see that James, says one more time, to humble ourselves in the sight of the Lord, and He will lift us up.

Promotion always comes from God, but promotion will never come if God is resisting us!  When we learn to walk in brokenness of heart, and spirit then we can truly began to see the promotion of God in our lives.

We must never produce a sense of false humility for the sake of promotion, for the desire to be promoted itself, comes from the attitude of pride.

Only true humility produces promotion!

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[2]  Tyndale House Publishers. (2004). Holy Bible : New Living Translation. (2nd ed.). Wheaton, Ill.: Tyndale House Publishers.