-Transcript-
00:35 Amen. Glory to God. Welcome to the cafe.
00:42 Welcome to the program. I’m so glad you’re here today. Thank you for joining me.
00:48 Hopefully you got yourself a coffee, tea, something, maybe soda, you know. I know that’s controversial in this day and age, but let’s have something to drink here as we get into the Word. Maybe a pen and paper, the Bible in hand.
00:58 Is that asking too much? I guess that’s a lot if you’re driving, but if you’re not driving, why not? Get the Bible out. Amen. Let’s take some notes here as we dive into God’s Word.
01:06 We’re talking about the most important thing I think we’ve talked about in a long time. We talk about a lot of very important subjects, but here today we’re talking about what it means for young people to be at peace.
01:17 Pride, humility, and the perfect plan for your problems aimed at young people.
01:24 Now 1st Peter is all about Christian living and in 1st Peter we have a section of verses, some which are very familiar. 1 Peter 5:5-7, “Likewise, ye younger, submit yourselves unto the elder. Yea, all of you be subject one to another, and be clothed with humility: for God resisteth the proud, and giveth grace to the humble. Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time: Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you.”
01:53 And looking here at the latter part of 1 Peter 5:5,for God resisteth the proud, and giveth grace to the humble. You know, if there were two little sections of Scripture that would sum up this message, this is one of them.
02:07 That if we figure out how to get pride out of the way, and I’m not talking about like overt pride, you know, people that are just real boastful.
02:15 We used to call them in school peacocks, people walking around showing off their feathers. I’m not talking so much about that pride, though that pride is absolutely needing to get out of the way.
02:23 But the subtle pride that creeps in, the pride that keeps us away from God and His Word, that’s the pride I’m talking about here today.
02:30 And giveth grace to the humble. And then of course, later on in 1 Peter 5:7, that those two really get to the crux of this message. And we spent last message talking about the problem with pride,
02:44 that God resists the proud, that pride leads to shame, that God hates pride, it’s an abomination to Him, that we’re only fooling ourselves when we’re proud, that God commands us not to glory in anything but the cross.
03:00 Don’t glory in your wisdom, or your might, or your riches, it’s glory in the cross. And that’s really where we left off, and now we’re gonna get into the root of pride. What is the root of pride?
03:09 I mean, isn’t that important to look at? Hey, you know, where does this pride come from? 1 John 2:16, For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world.
03:28 I mean, think about this, was pride, did it exist before the fall of man? When Adam and Eve were in the Garden of Eden, before they ate that forbidden fruit, was pride evident?
03:43 Was it there? I don’t think so. Pride entered the picture after sin entered the picture. Pride entered the picture when death entered the picture, when Adam and Eve were kicked out of the Garden of Eden.
03:54 I believe it was perfect, I believe they would have lived forever, I believe there was no problems there, until the serpent, the devil, beguiled them, tricked them to eat of the forbidden fruit, and that’s when sin entered the picture, and that’s when I believe pride entered the picture.
04:06 1 John 2:16, For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but of the world.
04:25 And who’s that little g god of this world? That’s the devil, that’s the temporary little g gonna get his back broken, already had his back broken at Calvary, but gonna get fully sent to hellfire for an eternity very soon,
04:37 that devil, amen, and that devil let pride creep in, and that devil’s culture promotes pride, and again, not just overt pride, but subtle pride. And think about it, if pride is so destructive, what’s the opposite?
04:52 Humility, right? And this is what is powerful, and that God tells us, humility. Think of this, okay, we know that pride is dangerous, and again, Peter’s addressing young people, and you think of young folks just wanting peace, and acceptance, and wanting a life that’s not so like up and down, and full of hurt, and pain, and all these other things.
05:16 Humility, humility, God says humility. What does it mean to be humble in a biblical manner? Philippians 2:3, let nothing be done through strife or vainglory, but in lowliness of mind, let each esteem other better than themselves.
05:33 So humility is lowering ourself and elevating others.
05:39 It’s not my will, but thy will. It’s the idea of John 3:30, he must increase, but I must decrease. The idea that we don’t look at ourselves as someone that needs to be important, that needs the acceptance of this world, that needs to wear the latest clothes, or fashion, or whatever it is, don’t get me started on that.
06:00 It seems like the latest fashion is eliminating a lot of clothes, and it’s crazy, and disgusting, and I’ve got a young girl, and I mean, I’m gonna have to deal with this for many years, explaining you don’t have to be like that, you don’t want to be like that, cover yourself up.
06:14 All right, on and on we go, I’m not gonna go on a tangent here. Christ is our example for humility.
06:21 Romans 12:16, be of the same mind one toward another. Mind not high things, but condescend to men of low estate. Be not wise in your own conceits.
06:31 See, be of the same mind one to another. Mind not high things. Go down to men of low estate.
06:39 Don’t be wise in your own conceits. How do we see Christ living this out in his earthly ministry? How about Philippians 2:7-8, but made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men, and being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even the death of the of the cross.
07:02 So we see here in Philippians 2:7-8, that Christ embodies humility beyond anything else we could ever see or hope for.
07:11 Christ is it. He made himself of no reputation. Imagine that, that God made himself of no reputation.
07:17 You read about the great creations of God, the scary creations of God. I think it’s Psalms or Job, one of the books there, it talks about Leviathan and all of these crazy scary beasts that you can’t even look at.
07:32 You know, I research, sometimes I’ll be reading my Bible and I’ll read about the unicorn or Leviathan or something that sounds like a dragon, and I’ll read about, you know, commentaries on it and stuff, and these are massive creatures.
07:50 Certainly you would never even want to stand in front of one, and is that not how God could have came? Okay, he’s gonna come as a human. Well, could he not have come as a just absolute, the greatest human to ever live in terms of looks and riches and so forth?
08:05 He took upon himself the form of a servant, of a servant. You know, who’s saying I want to be a servant when I grow up, right? They’re all looking to get served, amen. Being God, he made himself man.
08:18 Think about that. I mean, he could have done so many other things, but he made himself man. He was obedient to allow himself to be mocked and ridiculed, scorned, and betrayed.
08:26 He suffered on the cross at Calvary despite having all power to relieve himself of such. He willingly died. He was obedient unto death, the scripture says, even the death of the cross, which was the most brutal death you could even imagine.
08:40 And so that is our example, and that is the type of humility that we have to have. That humility deals with very deep sacrifice. It deals with very much focus on God and not ourselves.
08:55 Focus on not instant gratification, but delayed gratification. Because we now know who Christ is. He’s the Lord of Lord and King of Kings.
09:03 He’s at the right hand of the Father. He’s highly exalted for an eternity, amen. He is our Savior and Lord. He is the only way to be saved, amen? He is the name above all names.
09:11 He is our comforter. He is our friend. He’s our provider, amen? He is the light, amen. There’s no sun in heaven because he is the light, amen.
09:21 I love what has happened with who Christ has become, but that doesn’t take away what he endured, amen, before being exalted, amen. He had to go through all of that to get to where he is today.
09:34 And so how can we embody this in our lives? Number one, let’s start with this. Don’t worry about earthly reputation or status, okay? That shouldn’t matter at all. Christ didn’t worry about his status.
09:46 He wasn’t trying to fit in with the Pharisees and scribes, amen? He wasn’t trying to elevate his name or his position. It was the opposite. He was telling people, don’t talk about what I’ve done, amen. He would always say, I came to do the will of the Father.
09:59 Don’t worry about reputation or status. Look to serve others and not be served, amen. Society today is all about being served, right? It’s all about being taken care of.
10:11 And you say, well, how can I make that example? I will say this, the more disposable income you have, the more wealth you have, what do you look for? You look for going to the best hotel where they’ll serve you.
10:23 Are you looking to go to a good restaurant where they serve you? You’re looking to have help that serves you. You’re looking to be served, amen. And yet Christ came to serve and not to be served. And those that are served are often the most depressed.
10:40 Those that have all of this free time and wealth are often having to get treatment and help because they are so depressed and they don’t feel valued. They don’t have any kind of proper self-esteem. They don’t have any relationship with God.
10:59 So look to serve and not to be served. Understand that Christ knows your every need. He was made man, so don’t worry.
11:01 Take away those anxieties. You don’t have to worry about anything. If you have been saved, amen.
11:09 You know, the Bible tells us not to worry about anything but to cast all our cares upon him, for he careth for you. Endure God’s chastening like a good soldier. When God does chasten us, we need to endure it.
11:22 2 Timothy 2:3-4, Thou therefore endure hardness as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. No man that woreth entangleth himself for the affairs of this life, that he may please him who hath chosen him to be a soldier. Think about that.
11:37 11:37 If we’re a soldier for Christ, we’re not worried about the affairs of this life. You know, if you’re a high school girl, you’re not worried about going to the prom. You’re worried about handing out gospel tracts.
11:47 You’re worried about your friends being saved, amen. You’re worried about spreading the gospel. Does that make sense? You don’t entangle yourself with the affairs of this world.
11:54 You’re not worried about whether you saw that movie over the weekend or whether you went to that party or anything like that. You’re worried about sharing the gospel.
12:00 Maybe you’re a young man, you play baseball and you’re, you know, you want to do good.
12:05 You want to start and you don’t get to play a lot and it bothers you, you know. And what the Bible is saying here is don’t worry about whether you start, whether you play at all, but use that opportunity to tell others about Christ.
12:17 Serve the Lord.
12:19 Pray for your teammates. Love your teammates. Love your classmates.
12:22 Love your peers. Serve them. Help them.
12:25 Be a good citizen. Be a good young person and give all glory to God. Give all glory to God and He’ll exalt you in due time.
12:32 See, it flips everything on its head from popular culture. And as I’ve alluded to here, share the gospel. To be Christ-like, to be humble, is not to be ashamed of Christ.
12:41 You know, share the gospel, spread the gospel, no matter what others think or say. And in this, in this world, and I can tell you from experience, if you make an absolute statement that Jesus Christ is the only way to be saved and there’s a real heaven
13:03 and a real hell and that eternal balance is hanging there on whether one will accept Christ as Savior or not, you will definitely have your humility tested because people will criticize you and call you a bigot, call you old-fashioned or all kinds of names I can’t even mention on air. But be humble.
13:23 You know, Christ was humble, you know, and when you’re humble, you almost become defenseless and you’ll encounter trouble. The Bible talks about us being like sheep headed for the slaughter,
13:33 but God is sovereign over all the world and He will only allow you to encounter what you can bear and He will be there for you every step of the way as you serve Him. And so you pray to Him, you live for Him.
13:46 Of course, you’ve accepted Him as your Savior and that pride gets out of the way and humility takes over and you can have true peace in your life.
13:55 And I wish I had more time here today, but the main lesson to take away is that pride is subtle and is all around us, especially for young people, and if we seek the Lord, He will bless us as we serve Him and we’ll have true peace.
14:08 I thank you so much for listening today.
14:12 Tune in next time as we get to the third part of this three-part series. Take care, God bless, and amen.