Sermon Tone Analysis

Introduction

A preacher, an Eagle Scout, and a computer expert were the only passengers on a small plane.

The pilot came back to the cabin and said that the plane was going down but there were only three parachutes and four people.

The pilot added, “I should have one of the parachutes because I have a wife and three small children.”

So he took one and jumped.

The computer expert said, “I should have one of the parachutes because I am the smartest man in the world and everyone needs me.”

So he took one and jumped.

The preacher turned to the Eagle Scout and with a sad smile said, “You are young and I have lived a rich life, so you take the remaining parachute, and I’ll go down with the plane.”

The Eagle Scout said, “Relax, Reverend, the smartest man in the world just took my backpack.

Pride is very dangerous isn’t it?

Pride often fools us and blinds us into thinking that we deserve more

or better than we are getting, that our needs are more important than those of anyone else, and pride can cause us to make foolish and rash decisions that can impact more than ourselves.

Pride is the destroyer of relationships.

Because of pride, marriages end in divorce, the parent-child relationship is strained or eliminated, close friends become arch-enemies, and the list goes on simply because one or all parties involved wanted their way or thought their way was the only way.

Conflicts in relationships can be easily resolved by people choosing to show a little or a lot more humility in considering others more important than themselves.

That has really been the purpose of this series…Building Christ-centered Relationships God’s Way…because God created us a relational people…He never intended for us to live on an island by ourselves without interaction with people.

What makes our relationships with people difficult is this ugly thing called sin…sin in our life and sin in their life.

Because of sin, there are going to be times when those relationships get a little dirty…or a lot of dirty…they break down and need repair…the presence of sin in this world and in our hearts makes conflicts in our relationships inevitable.

So we have to know what it takes to fix them and make them better.

The keys to stronger relationships are found in how we choose to build them.

We’ve got to recognize that God has called us to a life that is different than the culture around us…we’ve got to think differently than our culture, we’ve got to act differently than our culture, especially in the way we choose to build relationships and solve conflicts.

Living worthy of the gospel means to some degree that we are making the gospel attractive and alluring…that is why we need to build Christ-centered relationships God’s way.

The Christ-centered relationship is going to built with grace.

The Christ-centered relationship is going to built with encouragement.

The Christ-centered relationship is going to built with faithfulness.

Everything we talked about so far in this series has been counter-cultural…the world around us doesn’t have the foggiest idea of how to build relationships with grace, or how to effectively encourage, or even how to be faithful...

that is what the gospel calls us to be…counter-cultural…not conformed to the world, we are transformed by the Spirit.

Our mission as a church is to win people to Christ and teach them how to think and act biblically…that means that you and I on an individual basis, must be doing our part to think and act biblically…in all facets of life…especially in how we build relationships…the reason our culture does not build relationships with grace, encouragement and faithfulness because God’s people are the only ones who truly know and understand grace, encouragement, and faithfulness because we have experienced them first hand from God in Christ.

So if we are going to accept the responsibility of thinking and acting biblically, then our lives are going to be different, our choices are going to be different, our marriages are going to be different, our parenting is going to be different, our relationships are going to be different…both inside the church and outside the church…

But here’s the problem…when we stop thinking and acting biblically we allow our pride to take over and then our relationships with each other are far less than what God desires or intended them to be.

Why would anyone want what you have, if it is not any different or any better than what they presently possess?

Churches across our country, and even here locally, are not as effective as they could be because God’s people are not modeling what Christ-centered relationships look like and act like, well enough.

Today we are going to add another essential trait to build into our relationships…this is to some degree a follow up from last week in the sense that what keeps us from being all in for God and in other areas of life is the exact opposite trait of pride.

We’re talking this morning about building relationships with humility...the difference between applying humility verses responding in pride is astounding…

Who here does not want a stronger relationship with your spouse, your children, your co-co-workers…by learning what it means to put off pride and put on humility in our relationships can often be the difference between years of heartache and separation of close friends or strengthening the bonds that unite us together…not saying your relationships will be conflict free, but when conflict does arise, the person who chooses humility can find themselves at greater peace and enjoyment.

Main Point: The child of God must put away pride and build relationships with humility.

Humility is the one character trait that really enables us to be all Christ wants us to be.

We could have started with this because we cannot show grace or be an encouragement or be faithful when we are filled with self…pride to a very large degree is our archenemy.

Yes Satan is our enemy…but he and his cohorts don’t have to look very hard at where to attack us...

The apostle John taught us that our sin falls under one of three categories...

For us to truly be all that God wants us to be, and for us to have relationships that are truly Christ-centered, we must build them with humility.

Two truths to consider to help us walk more faithfully in humility.

The first truth to consider is that...

Pride and Humility Cannot Cohabitate.

Pride is one of the most loathed sins in God’s sight…where pride exists, there can be no humility.

Even though we know how much God detests pride, it is still an epidemic among God’s people.

It’s not a matter of do you have it, it is really a matter of where it is and how much of it you have.

“We all have the tendency to think too much about ourselves and to much of ourselves.”

Stuart Scott From Pride to Humility, Focus Publishing 2002

Chuck Swindoll once said “The world’s smallest package is a man wrapped up in himself”

Pride is the root of every sin…through out the Scriptures you see...

Pride of position — Matt 23:6

Pride of ability — 2 Chron.

26:15-16

Pride of achievement — Dan 4:22

Pride of wealth — 1 Tim.

6:17

Pride of possessions — Matt 6:19

Pride of knowledge — Isaiah 47:10

Pride of learning — 1 Cor.

8:1

Pride of spiritual attainment — Luke 22:24

Pride of self-righteousness — Rom 10:3

Pride of being esteemed or liked — Gal.

1:10

Pride of spiritual experiences — 2 Cor.

12:7

In our flesh we lean to our pride…that is why Satan finds it so easy to attack us…it is the worship of self and making sure self has what self needs and wants.

We need to gain a biblical understanding of pride.

Consider the Biblical terms

Six different Hebrew words are used for pride.

All of them convey lifting up, highness, magnification, presumptuousness, or rebelliousness of self.

In the Greek, the words for pride appear in two categories.

straining or stretching one’s neck (as if to hold one’s head up high because of what one thinks he has made of himself or accomplished), to magnify, or to be haughty

blindness and even suggests the idea of being enveloped in smoke

Both in Hebrew and Greek we find proud people are portrayed as having a high view of themselves and are blinded to the truth about God and themselves, and sometimes even reality.

Learn from Biblical Examples

Nowhere in Scripture will you find anything that communicates you have a low self-esteem, you think too poorly of yourself or you need to think of yourself more.

In fact, you find just the opposite…God gives many stories and warnings for us to discourage pride…Scripture tells us to STOP thinking of ourselves or on what we want…it already assumes we love our self (love your neighbor as yourself) and think too highly of ourselves (do not think more highly of yourselves than you ought to think)

The best example of pride in the Scripture is Satan.

Isaiah 14:12-14 turn

In Luke 10:18; Jesus refers to verse 12 to describe Satan’s fall which tells us this is more than just the immediate context of simply words of the king of Babylon…this words spoken are not only from the human king of Babylon who wanted to be higher than his pagan gods, but they originate in Satan who him.

We similar language in Ezekiel 28:12-17 regarding the king of Tyre and Satan behind him.

The point here in Isaiah is that Satan was filled with arrogance and that caused him to oppose God.

We see in Genesis 3:1-5 how he even questioned and denied God’s goodness.

(turn to Gen. 3)

Other examples

Uzziah — 2 Chron 26:16 — served God for many years and grew famous, prosperous and strong.

Nebuchadnezzar — Dan 4:37 — allowed his arrogance to take over and God had to humble him by making him walk the earth like a beast of the field.

Belshazzar — Dan 5:18-30 — did not learn the lesson he needed to learn from the example of what happened to Nebuchadnezzar.

Pharisee — Luke 18:10-14 ended up praying only to himself because he considered himself more righteous and superior.

King Saul — 1 Samuel 18:7-9; King Herod — Acts 12; Diotrephes — 3 John 9

The natural inclination of our heart is to lift up self in pride and forget about God or to be above God.

Time and time again God warns us of this line of thinking and behavior.

Learn to recognize Pride

When someone is proud he or she is focused on self…it is a form of self worship.

Prideful people believe they are the center of the universe or that they should be the center.

they alone are the source of what is good, right and worthy of praise

they, by themselves, have accomplished or should be the accomplisher of what is worthy of accomplishment.

they believe they should be the benefactor of all that is good

In essence, they believe that all things should be from them, for them, to them, because of them, etc.

Pride is that competitive attitude that sets itself up against others, especially God.

Even self-pity is a form of pride.

Self-pity is just the flip-side of the same coin of pride…people consumed by self-pity are focusing on themselves too much.

they are not thinking about or concerned with the glory of God.