Pride: The Sin Beneath All Sins (Genesis 3:1-7, James 4:6, Philippians 2:5–11)

Hello, everyone. Again, it's good to be here with

you guys. I'm really excited to be here

worshiping with you, but I'm actually really excited.

Pastor Tim's actually going to my church.

Pastor Tim's such a good, faithful, godly, solid man that

China and I, we look up to. I know China left.

It's been almost 10 months, I think, but still to this day, I

think about him sometimes in ministry settings.

I think about what would Pastor Tim, what would Pastor Tim do?

What would Pastor Tim say? You know, not to the degree of

like, what would Jesus do, but like we I think about it and

because of SPMCI can say with confidence that I think come to

believe community really is what God meant for our well-being of

our soul for a Christian life. So I want to thank you before we

turn to God's Word day, I just want to share the heart behind

this message For those of you guys, check the passage on

Instagram Story yesterday or the announcement yesterday.

I brought another passage. Actually, I apologize for that.

One of the reasons is because this is the latest sermon I

gave. But another reason I would say

more important reason is because as I was preparing and praying

for our time together, but I just felt like the Lord was

landing something on my heart that we all struggle together,

which is the root of the things that make us sin or sometimes

drift away from God's love or receiving his love.

So in my church, I started a new series, what's called signature

sins. What churches commonly or

historically called the seven deadly sins or these seven sins

are not the worst since that is not that's not why because

churches call it deadly, but it's deadly because it's the

root sins from which a lot of others sins spring up and branch

out. And I one of the sins I brought,

one of the sins I brought is pride.

We're going to talk about pride today and the reason for it

because I already shared this with you, but in ministry

setting, something I realized, and not just as I minister to

other people, but as I see something going on in my heart

in my Christian walk is that I noticed Sunday worship or even

Christian life sometimes could feel like just managing sins, as

Dallas Willard once put it, that we're just whenever we hear the

gospel, we feel like, oh, there's a remedy.

Good. And then we go back to the old

same patterns that make us sin or make us commit to do things

that we don't necessarily want to do.

And a question in my heart and question that I want to share

was why is it? What causes it?

Why do we still go for it? And that's the heart behind it.

The title is Pride is sin beneath all sins.

So with that, let me read you 2 passages first and we'll pray

together and then we'll go right in.

So one passage from Genesis 3, one through 7, and the other

will be from James 46. I'm reading from ESP.

So here's the word of the Lord Genesis 3.

Now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the

field that the Lord God had made.

He said to the woman, Did God actually say you shall not eat

of any tree in the garden? And the woman said to the

serpent, We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden.

But God said, You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that's

in the midst of the garden, neither shall you touch it, lest

you die. But the serpent said to the

woman, You will not surely die, for God knows that when you eat

of it, your eyes will be open, and you'll be like God, knowing

good and evil. So when the woman saw the tree

was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and

that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of

its fruit and ate. And she also gave some to her

husband who was with her, and he ate.

And the eyes of both were open, and they knew that they were

naked, and they saw fig leaves together, and make themselves

low in clothes. And moving on.

James 46. Therefore it says God opposes

the proud, but gives grace to the humble.

This is God's word. Would you join me?

Bring our hearts to God and ask the Lord to speak to us.

Father, we ask that now, may we worship You through this time.

Help us not to be spectators, help us not to just passively

sit and logically understand what this Word or what this

topic is about, or help us to rely on Your Holy Spirit who

speaks to us through Your Word. You may the words in my mouth

and meditation of our hearts be pleasing and honorable in Your

sight. Allure a rock and a Redeemer.

We pray this in Jesus name, Amen.

Not too long ago there was a national survey done for young

people from the age of 13 through 17.

And the question was what do you want to be when you grow up?

And I don't know about you, but to my surprise the most common

answer was not that I want to be a teacher or a doctor.

The most common answer was I want to be famous.

And now if you think about it now there are different ways we

can analyze to say what's wrong with the new generation or

whatnot. But as I sit and think about it,

I thought what to begin with, it makes sense why?

Because we all as a human beings have a desire to be seen, don't

we? We want to be seen, we want to

be valued, we want to be heard and we want all of that.

We want to matter to someone. We want our lives to matter to

people. So we have that desire in a

sense. I don't think it's a bad thing.

If anything, I think it's a good thing because God made us for

that. He designed us for relationship

with others and with him, not for self-sufficiency.

So when we desire to be connected and to be seen, to be

noticed, it's a it's a, it's an innate desire that we have from

God. But The thing is, even any even

good things can easily turn into something bad, right?

And as we think about it, what we see is that the good desire

to be seen and valued can just turn it into a desire to be

admired for attention, for recognition.

It will start chasing attention. Like just as long as people pay

attention to me and look at me and recognize me, everything

will be OK. It will just fill my empty

heart. It will feel the ache that I

have in my heart. But the truth is that longing to

think about it isn't just a modern thing.

It's not just 21st century issue.

It's actually started in the beginning of all things.

In Genesis 3, we saw that in the garden.

The serpent whispered to Adam and Eve.

He said God knows when you eat of it, your eyes will be open

and you will be like God. And that was a temptation to

begin with. You will be like God.

It wasn't about eating the forbidden fruit.

It was about being centered. It was about it was about being

seen and being in control. And I believe the same voice or

the same heart that whispers still echoes in every human

heart today. But think about some of the

examples I can give you is when we say you can define good and

evil for yourself now in a setting like this.

We're at a church. Many of you guys are already

believers, committed believers, and we, we don't verbalize it.

We don't say, oh, I can define, I don't, we don't say it.

But if you look at our lives practically, that's what we do.

Sometimes we do. You don't need God's help.

You've got this. Again, we don't say it out loud,

but if you look at our lives, when was the last time prayer

really felt like something you have to do and you want to do,

even though we know it's the right thing to do, it felt like

I know what to do. I know how to fix this.

Why would I pray about it? I'll just go to go fix it.

It's more easy for us. Another thing might be if you

deserve more than you have. It's the mentality that we often

have. Maybe we don't verbalize it, but

I think many of us have that. And the result is what we

constantly reach for the throne. But what happens after every

time is that we fall. Every time we reach for the

throne, we fall. So from the Garden of Eden to

all to today, the story of humanity is a story of pride.

And that's the pattern of the Bible.

That's what I want to show you. We just want to in the Bible.

And today we try to live without God, only to find ourselves more

empty, more alone, more disconnected, and less human.

So the question I want to consider reading today is why

does pride still lead us to fall?

Why is pride still effective? Because we saw that in Genesis 3

and after Jesus in redemption. Now we have the Holy Spirit.

Why does it still lead us to fall?

And how can Christ lift us up again?

Three things we're going to see. The first thing is why?

Because we tend to exalt ourselves against God.

There's a innate human nature, a human sinful nature that we tend

to exalt ourselves against God. Pride is not, you know, firstly

not about arrogance. Sometimes we tend to think that,

oh, it's pride is about arrogance.

No, pride is initially not about arrogance.

It's about autonomy. It's the desire to live apart

from God's rule and say, I want to be living under my own rule.

I want to be the center of my life.

In Genesis 3 when the serpent tempted Adam and Eve, he didn't

say, well it didn't say eat this fruit, it tastes good, right?

That's not what the serpent says.

Serpent said eat this and you will be like God, you'll be like

God. And pride begins not in

rebellion against rules. Any sins doesn't start with the

wrong things. Pride and any sins starts in

rebellion against a relationship and that's what the serpent

does. Notice how the serpent works

here. He questions God's word

initially serpent question God's word.

It says, did God actually say that?

Did God actually say you will die if you eat this fruit?

And then he questions God's character, right?

God's holding out on you. He's not, there's something he's

not telling you because if you really eat this fruit, you'll be

like God. But he doesn't want that.

So he's not telling you. Go for it.

And then finally offers the bait.

You can be your own God, right? And that's the root and origin

of pride, self exultation that dethrones God so that you can be

your God. You know, today we don't have a

tree that we literally eat from, right?

But again, we, I think we do the same thing practically almost

every day when we say or when we think in our minds, you know,

I'll forgive that person when I'm ready, not what God says,

I'll talk to that person. I try to take the initiative and

then reconcile when I'm ready. Not necessarily when God says or

when we say. I'll give when it's comfortable,

but not when it costs. I'll serve when I feel like it,

when I want to, but not necessarily when it costs me

something or when we decide. I'll define what's right for me,

what's godly for me, what's working for me.

Every sin whispers it's it's packaged differently, but every

sin whispers the same voice and that is I know better than God.

So CS Lewis, he said pride leads to every other vice.

It's the complete anti God state of mind.

That's why pride isn't just one sin among many.

Pride is actually the soil in which every sin grows.

It's the sin beneath all sins. That's why it's worth paying

attention and uncovering and bringing our heart to God and

see what God surfaces up and see what what's the root of it.

Lord, when do I try to just grasp onto my pride and live my

own life? In the book of Daniel in the Old

Testament chapter 4, we find a great king of Babylon named

Nebuchadnezzar and he's looking over his great nation, you know,

just great troops and everything.

And he tells himself in Daniel chapter 4 verse 30, he says, is

Daniel 4:30

not this great Babylon which I built my by my mighty power as a

royal residence and for the glory of my majesty?

Isn't this great? And God says, oh, you think

you're good and you think you're God.

Let me show you how you're an animal.

And what happens is he lost sanity.

And he begins to crawl on all fours and eating grass for years

until he finally comes to realize and acknowledges that

oh, I am not God, God is God. And just 7 verses later, this is

Nebuchadnezzar's confession. It says now I Nebuchadnezzar,

praise and extol and honor the King of heaven for all his works

are right and his ways are just. And those who walk in pride,

he's able to humble. You see, what we see here is

that pride dehumanizes. It makes us less than a human

being that we need to be and we can be because it disconnects us

from God, whose image we bear when we say God, I know better,

God, I am better, I can do this on my own.

What happens is that we become a less human, not more.

And that's the tragedy of pride. It promises to lift you up and

say you'll be great. And that's what the problem.

That's the how idol promises in the Bible.

All throughout the Bible. If you bow to me, if you give in

to me, I'll give you the world. In the end, no idol keeps a

single promise, and that's what pride does.

So we fall in to pride because we tend to exalt ourselves

against God. Second reason why we give in to

pride is because we tend to elevate ourselves above other

people. That's what pride does, right it

it disconnects us from God and it disconnects us from others.

It's a passage we read in James 4/6 and it says God opposes the

proud, but it gives grace to the humble.

Now, the word opposed in Greek is interesting word because it's

supposed not in the sense that he's just standing against you,

but it's in the battle formation.

It's a military word. So when God says, when God sees

a proud person, he's not saying I don't like it, don't do it,

let's find a better way. He's saying I am standing

against you in battle formation. I'm going to fight you.

I'm going to fight pride. You know why?

Because it disconnects you from others.

It disconnects us from other people.

How does it separate us from other people?

There are probably many things we we find, but at least two

things I want to share. The first thing is because pride

constantly seeks comparison, right?

Always. Pride always needs somebody to

look down on. So it doesn't.

Pride never says I'm good. Pride always says I'm better, I

know better, I know more. That's why pride can exist in

the heart of a Pharisee as much as in the heart of a preacher

and as much as in the heart of a parent and as much as in the

heart of a politician. With all the unbelievable things

that's been happening around this country, I'm not going to

get into that. But as we see these things, we

might be tempted to say, oh, I can't believe he did that or she

said that, or he did that. But The thing is that same

desire and heart is right here in us as well.

We're no better, as the Bible indicates, and it speaks to us.

You can even proud of your own humility.

It's very sneaky. It's hard to detect.

Back in Austin high school, I was part of the praise team and

what we did very in a sneaky and subtle way, is that when we

circle up and share our devotions, what we did is we'll

often end up sounding more like just bragging about how simple

we were and underneath we were bragging to each other.

I'm more godly because I confessed worse sins.

So it's like, hey, I, I, I said that to my parents, I'm worse

and then I cheated on my exam. OK, you're worse.

OK, you're more humble. All right, I did this.

All right, you're more humble. It's like the outset, see, we're

talking about sins and confession and still it can turn

it into as a form of pride. It's very sneaky, you know, have

you ever posted something online on I can't think of anything

Facebook or Instagram or TikTok or different platforms and maybe

about serving or giving or and then have you noticed?

Have you ever caught yourself like constantly checking views

and how many people watched, how many people liked it?

And perhaps you've been overlooked for recognition at

work and life and you suddenly notice the resemble resentment

bubbles up. You think, why don't they

appreciate me? I did all that for them.

And how come nobody says a single thank you?

And I can't believe that. Pride, you see, doesn't need

applause to survive. Pride just needs attention and

recognition. So Rebecca Deyoung, professor at

Calvin University in Grand Rapids, MI, she defines pride as

the excessive desire for recognition and approval from

others. You see, pride is not about

being first. It's just about being noticed.

Pride says look at me or we're going to get there.

When humility says look at Jesus.

Pride constantly draws people into you.

Look at me, what do you think of me?

How do I look? How do I sound?

Another way pride separate us from people is by hiding our

insecurity. That's what pride does.

It hides our insecurity. That's how we disconnect us from

other people. Pride is often the armor we bear

to hide our fear. It says, if I can impress enough

people, if enough people come to believe that I'm good, I'm put

together, I'm OK, then I'm OK. So we spent a lot of our energy

and efforts to look OK, to sound OK, don't we?

Oh, I'm fine, I'm OK. And underneath, you know for a

fact that you're not doing well. But you can't be vulnerable with

other people. You can't share your emotions

with other people. Why?

Because if you do that, you feel like you're going to lose a part

of you. Oh, I can't give that.

But no amount of approval or recognition can quiet a soul

that's disconnected from God's grace.

If we don't know how to receive God's love, you will never know

what it's like to be content. And what's going to end that?

We're going to end up just always chasing after something

more and more and more. And then what happens is that

we're going to constantly try to avoid people because we have to

hide. Or we're going to constantly try

to meet people so that we are going to look, OK, but we're

going to think, Oh yeah, you, you meet a lot of people, so

you're good. The other extremes that

sometimes we see in ourselves. Again, CS Lewis, he says as long

as you're proud, you cannot know God.

A proud man is always looking down on things and people.

And of course, as long as you're looking down, you cannot see

something that's above you, right?

If our eyes are down here, we cannot look up.

And when we are down here, we cannot look to God.

And we're just busy here taking care of our own lives.

And that's the truth of pride. The more we create to be seen,

the less we actually are. And if that sounds modern, let

me tell you, this is something that was already defined and

processed and dealt with in the early church.

Well, we read that in the Bible, but early church in the 4th

century, as Saint Augustine once called pride as the love of own

own excellence. And what we get here is that

it's the pride is really the oldest addiction in human

history, which is the addiction itself.

I love me, me, me saturated society.

In a sense. I'm afraid that our generation

has given pride in microphone when people go for it.

And we live in a world where self promotion is not just

tolerated, it's rewarded. It's celebrated.

What? This is a society that

celebrates Independence Day. When you're 18, what do you do?

You become an independent adult. We love independence, So what we

do is that we create, we add it, we present only the best angles

of our lives to look good. We turn the mirror into a stage.

And yet the more we do that, the more we post in pride, the more

we live our lives with pride, the low near we become.

You know why? Because pride cannot sustain

community. And one way in which I want to

suggest you think about it in your own heart is notice your

heart about CGS, about joining ACG if you're not and in CG, can

you open up your heart with other believers?

And of course, we don't want to share all, everything.

We don't want to over share. That's that's another case.

But can you open up? Can you share your heart?

Or do we constantly think about how to avoid that conversation?

Oh, I'm good. I'm fine.

Life is OK. Yeah, I'll listen to you, but

you're not going to listen anything.

You're not going to get anything out of me.

I don't want you to pay attention to that.

You can't truly love people you're competing with.

That's why James says God gives grace to the humble, because

only grace can break that comparison game.

Only grace can break that our our tendency to hide from other

people, hide our insecurity to say I'm OK, I'm good.

Exactly what's grace? How do we receive that grace?

And that's the Third Point that I want to understand, I want to

consider today, which is instead, instead of elevating

ourselves, we must encounter the humility of Jesus.

We must encounter the humility of Christ.

If pride is self exultation that dethrones God.

Humility is the self surrender that enthrones Christ to say

God, you are God. As Nebuchadnezzar said, you are

God. God is God, right?

We see that in Philippians 2. It gives us the ultimate

reversal. We see in verses 6 through 8

says though he was in very nature talking about Jesus, it

wasn't that Jesus was in very nature of God.

He did not consider equality with God something to be

grasped, but he made himself nothing, taking the form of a

servant, and he became obedient to death, even death on a cross.

What happened is that in the Garden of Eden, humanity grasped

that being like God. And what happened?

We fell at a Calvary where Jesus died, God himself humbled to a

point of dying on the cross. And what happened?

He saved us, right? The cross is a great turning

point of all humanity. Where Adam said my will, not

yours. The same place.

The second Adam, Jesus said not my will, but yours be done.

And he took that cross. Pride built the distance between

heaven and earth, between US and God.

Humiliate breach, that when we're talking about the

humility, sometimes we I don't think it has a good connotation

on us anymore, especially in our society.

But what is true greatness? And I can tell you the greatness

is not grasping for position and giving ourselves for others as

Jesus humbled himself. When Jesus knelt to wash his

disciples feet, have you noticed that Jesus did not?

Jesus did not stop being God when He knelt down to wash the

feet of disciples. Did you notice He always was

God? Even when he was washing the

feet of disciples, He still was God.

What he modelled for us then was that he model for us what

Lordship look like, what it means to live a Christian life.

Can you steep low and wash other people's feet as Jesus did?

Again, CS Lewis hopefully explains humility this way.

He says humility isn't is not thinking less of yourself.

Humility is thinking of yourself less.

In other words, what humility is about is not that you have to

constantly put yourself down. What humility is just stop.

What's a little bit less thinking less of your thinking

just a little about yourself, right?

Kind of slow down. Oh, is it about me?

If you noticed, if we, if you have a tendency to make things

about you, that's when we can slow down and say, oh, is this

about me or is this about this person or is this about God?

What is it about whose is about? It's refusing to build your own

worth in other people's opinions or your own achievements.

And that's the freedom. Pride can never give you the

freedom to love without needing to be noticed.

So how do we live that way? Well, easier said than done.

But James 47 gives us A1 clear way.

It says submit yourselves to God, submit yourselves to God.

Humility begins when you stop fighting for the control and

start surrendering. And this is not something that

we have to go to 48 hours, 72 hour or ten months intense

retreat to actually do it, but something we can practice on a

daily basis. Just as you go about your day,

you can say, Lord, I don't have to be right all the time.

I don't have to be admired. I don't need people's

recognition all the time, but I need to be formed by you, Lord,

would you do that work in my heart?

Lord, I, I need to worship you. Would you prompt in my heart to

do that? Would you work in my heart?

The gospel frees us from proving ourselves because Jesus has been

approved for us. So we don't.

We no longer have to climb up the ladder and say, look at me,

because Christ came down from it.

And when we try to go up that ladder, we're trying to undo

something that cannot be undone. And how about we receive that

grace of Jesus and say, Lord, I will live my life with you.

So the question is, VMC is not if we struggle with pride, we

all do one or the other ways. The question is, where in your

life are you grasping for control instead of surrendering

for grace? Is it in your marriage you feel

like you have to always have the final word?

Or is it work? You just feel like you need the

recognition People need to validate you all the time.

Maybe it's in your heart. You feel like I have to build my

life, build a case for myself to say I'm enough, I'm necessary,

I'm lovable. And the good news is that the

past same passage we read in James 46 comes to us as a

blessing and comfort. It says God opposes the proud,

but he gives grace to the humble.

And that grace has a name, and his name is Jesus.

He gives grace. He gives Jesus to us.

So how about we go to Him now and one way we can do is right

now I just want to give you just a few minutes to bring your

heart to God and just begin this process.

Lord, what's at the root? Where in my life am I trying to

grasp for control and power and my voice to be heard and for my

image to be seen in a certain way to frame but and notice what

surfaces up, what God brings up. And instead of just rushing

ourselves into the gospel and say, oh, God is good, Oh, I'm

good, God is good. How about we slow down and see

Lord, what is it that you're bringing up to surface and how

can I sit in that? How can I receive your love in

that? So one way I can help you.

I wanted to help. Something I share with my church

is I don't know if we're some of you guys have the bulletin or

the sermon note with you on the right side.

I thought I brought one. Oh yeah, for this community

groups, maybe before the community groups this week or or

just by yourself before the community groups or during the

community groups. You don't have to go all you

know in one sitting. But what I would encourage you

just I hope it's self-explanatory, but as you go

over, just ask yourself and the Lord, Lord, where am I still

where am I still reaching for control and all these things am

I won't note that encouragement. Well, I'm sorry, 2 is 1 is try

not to rush into the gospel. We have the gospel so we can do

this without the gospel, we won't be able to pray, right?

We pray because we have the gospel of Jesus because we are

safe in Jesus, we can pray to him, right?

So when things come up in your heart just discomforting and

uncomfortable, sit in that and ask the Lord, what what are you

bringing up in my heart, Lord, and how do I, what do I do with

this? And the second thing is debrief

with your community, with other people.

You don't have to give an ultimate answer or try to fix

each other. We can't, we can't do that.

We know that. But what I the reason I'm

sharing this is because don't get stuck in your own prayer in

your heart and think, oh, I'm miserable.

But as something comes up, just share with your community groups

not to a degree that you'll regret sharing that at night.

And why did I say that? Not to that point, but enough

for you to feel lighter and enough for your community to

pray for you and say, I don't know what we're doing exactly.

I don't know where this is going, but how about this is

what I sense? This is something that was come

up and I just wanted to give it to you.

And can you pray for me, right? No trying.

Let's not try to fix each other, but let's pray and listen

because the Holy Spirit is right among you.

So as you do that, I want to transition into time of prayer

before that main point, as when we stop grasping for glory and

start giving in to God. Grace sets us free.

Will you join me in prayer?