The Measure - Luke 18:9-14

Everybody welcome back to church.

You're glad to be here.

If all are, let's praise God together.

We are glad you're here as well.

Okay.

Part two of the sermon series, Tools of a Carpenter.

Before we get started, I wanna ask this question.

I need a volunteer, actually two volunteers

for this sermon, but I gotta begin by saying,

I'm not gonna pick you out, I'm not gonna point you out.

I just wanted somebody to volunteer,

but for the first one, you have to be taller than six feet,

which I would know nothing about.

How many of you in this room are taller than six feet?

Raise your hand, raise your hand taller than six feet,

raise your hand real high.

Man, those are some big hands too.

That's it.

Raise your hand real high.

How many of you are taller than six feet

and don't mind me picking on you a little bit?

Raise your hand, all right?

Okay, four people, okay, very good.

This is a short church.

Vertically challenged, we'll say.

Let's be nice to the shorties, all right?

Six feet tall, don't mind me picking on you.

Raise your hand real high.

Let me see, okay, all right, okay, okay.

How many of you are bigger than six foot three?

Six, three and above, raise your hand.

All right, keep, oh, wow, all right.

Six, five and above, raise, keep your hands up.

Six, five and above, oh, wow, okay.

Well, yeah, forget what I said about shorties.

I mean, small, small people here.

We've got no Michael Jordan's in the room, huh?

Okay, so six, four, raise your hand, six, four.

Six, four, six, four, okay.

All right, do you mind me picking on you a little later?

All right, give him a round of applause, ladies and gentlemen.

This is my friend.

We're just hanging out on, yeah, just the other night.

That was fun, all right, very good.

Now, we have our tall guy.

We need the other side of the spectrum.

Volunteer, somebody that is not as tall as six foot five.

Somebody shouted out, Sarail, my mind goes there.

Buddy, I'm telling you, man.

Sarail, how tall are you?

Five four.

Five four, and he's a powerful five four.

Give him a round of applause, five four.

Come on, a lot of power in that five four.

Anybody smaller than five four that's an adult

that would not mind me picking on them later today?

Raise your hand, okay.

No, please raise your hand.

I'm kidding, my friend, Doc, Doc, how tall are you?

Five foot, even, wow, give this man a round of applause.

I love that, wow.

Okay, so we're gonna pick on you guys a little bit later

in the sermon today.

Luke chapter number 18, go ahead and turn there.

Luke chapter number 18 and verse number nine.

If you're new here, my name is Josh.

I'm the teaching pastor, senior pastor here at the church,

and we're gonna be studying from Luke chapter 18,

Luke 18 · chapter mention

which is what we've been doing.

It's a four week sermon series in the book of Luke

chapter number 18 called Tools of a Carpenter,

where Jesus interacts with disciples, with followers,

with Pharisees, with the community around him,

and he's teaching them truth.

And in Luke chapter 18, we've noticed that these four

Luke 18 · chapter mention

stories that deal with Jesus actually can be symbolized

by four different carpentry tools that Jesus would have used

in his early job.

In the first sermon, we talked about chisel.

We talked about how Jesus Christ chisels away in our lives

by removing the things that are not helping us.

And in this sermon, it's called the measure.

And throughout history, all carpenters have used

different measuring tools to help us understand the length

of what needs to be compared to the length of what should be.

And so today we're gonna talk about that main concept

by asking the question, not do you measure up,

but to what are you measuring yourself?

Let's pray.

Father, today's sermon is gonna be so good

because it comes from your teaching.

But even though it's gonna be so good,

it's gonna be hurtful

because what you deal with in this passage

is very personal and pointed.

It hit me hard as I've studied it.

And as I tell a story even in my youth,

how this passage and others pointed out my pride

and arrogance, I pray, Father,

that you would do the same thing for my friends in the room.

You would point out our pride and arrogance

so that we can maintain humility

so that we can become the masterpiece

that you're carving us into.

God help me because I cannot help my friends without you.

Help me explain this passage and apply it

to their lives and mine.

In Jesus' name we pray.

Amen.

In Luke chapter 18 and verse nine,

Luke 18 · chapter mention

it says, then Jesus told this story

to some who had great confidence in their own righteousness

and scorned everyone else.

If you'll notice in Luke chapter 18,

Luke 18 · chapter mention

it's story after story that Jesus is telling.

And in verse one, it says, here's a story from Jesus

so that the people could learn to always pray

and never give up.

That was last week's story, and then he told the story.

This week it opens up very similarly.

Jesus told a story and he told it

to a specific group of people.

Look at the people that Jesus tells the story to.

They had great confidence.

How many of you believe you should have confidence, amen?

Don't you believe young men and young women

should have confidence, amen?

We should have confidence, but notice this.

They had great confidence in their own righteousness.

It's called pride.

It's wonderful to be confident,

but confident in God and confident in the people around us.

But this person had, these people had confidence

in their own righteousness,

and they despised or scorned everyone else.

This story, Jesus says, is a story for arrogant people.

Now, if your first thought is good,

I need to share this with somebody I know

who's an arrogant person.

Then mark it down, this sermon is for you.

Can I get an amen?

If you're like, ah, there's a lot of prideful people

I know who need this, I'm gonna share this

on social media immediately, because everybody that follows

me, boy, they are sure prideful and arrogant.

Woo!

I'm gonna send this to my dad.

I'm gonna send this to my friend.

I'm gonna send this to my son.

If you feel like this sermon about pride

is for somebody else, guess what?

This sermon is God's gift to you.

And to me, now let me be honest,

as some of you honestly, genuinely,

you don't need this sermon as much as you need another.

And this is true, this is why Jesus told some stories

to some and some stories to others.

And you could be at a point in your life

where this sermon is not the sermon you need.

What you might be needing is a sermon

where you already think of yourself

as the lowest of the low.

You have been beat down by the world.

You've been beat down by your flesh.

You've been beat down by the devil.

And you need somebody to remind you that God loves you

and he likes you and he wants to bring you to himself.

Some of you need that sermon and I preach

that sermon quite often.

That is not this sermon.

This sermon is for the individual who knows

that God likes them and loves them and isn't surprised.

Not surprised at all.

Because they clearly deserve all of that love.

And you say, well pastor, who needs a sermon like this?

We all need a sermon like this,

but I gotta tell you some people that are especially like me.

You see, I can really fight the sin of pride.

Pride is a big sin.

Have you noticed in our society today,

we actually celebrate pride.

Now I know in your mind that immediately goes

to a certain segment of society,

but in reality it seems like our entire society

celebrates pride.

This is who I am and this is who I will be

and nobody can tell me different.

I am proud of my sin.

And so though that is true in our society as a whole,

we as the church love to point at the society and say,

look how prideful they are, not like us.

And society then points their finger at the church

and says, look how prideful they are, not like us.

And so now you have a group of people in a society

that's split down the middle where everybody likes

to point at the other person and point out how wicked

they are, but how prideful they are,

we are about who we are.

And God puts it all away and says, no,

all of your pride is sin.

It's arrogance, it's wickedness.

And again, I probably struggle with pride

far more than you do.

You say, oh that's a nice thing to say for a pastor

to say, no, no, genuinely those who knew me early on

knew that I was an arrogant little fella.

You say, I don't believe it, let me show you a picture of me.

Here I am, this is Josh Thais ready to save the world.

Just about to graduate from my seminary,

I was preparing to be a pastor.

Look at how good I dressed, do you see how nice I look?

Do you see the contemplative stare off into the distance?

Ask yourself this question,

who has a picture of himself taken like this?

Not only was I extremely good looking,

but I also was studious.

Now remind you, this is before iPhones and selfies.

How did we set up this photograph?

At what point did we say let's put out all of my seminary books

and show me contemplatively studying the Bible?

This is me.

This is me when I was about 21, 22 years old,

ready to save the world.

And I came to Las Vegas and we worked at a church

for a few years and after that we were ready

to start our own church because I didn't need a pastor

telling me what to do, I'm the pastor.

And so we started our own church,

and we started our own church,

and we started our own church,

our own church, my wife and I,

and two things can be true at the same time, two things.

I don't wanna paint myself as somebody

who wasn't walking with God.

Two things can be true at the same time.

I totally 100% loved Jesus and wanted to serve God.

I also truthfully was an arrogant little jerk.

I was.

Both things were true.

And for God to truly use me,

he had to sand me down.

He had to change me.

And he did so one day by, I was at the gym

and I had a man approach me at the gym

and he came up and he said, excuse me.

And I said, yes.

And he said, are you the new pastor

of the new church plant on La Costa Canyon Court?

I said, yes I am.

I said, would you like to come and hear from the Bible?

And he said, no, no, I'm actually also a pastor in town.

And as soon as he said he was a pastor,

I immediately, all of my defenses went up.

Really?

He said, yeah, I know you're new to the community.

I wanted to know, would you like to go to coffee

with myself and a few other community pastors?

We get together once a month at Starbucks

and we pray for each other and for our churches.

And immediately I thought to myself, yes,

what an incredible opportunity.

Because of all these other pastors in the community,

I have an opportunity to demonstrate

what a true pastor is supposed to be.

This is God's opportunity for them to learn.

I know some of you are like, that's funny.

Those who know me, that's exactly how I thought.

Is that true, Derek?

That's exactly what I thought.

And I'm like, absolutely, I'll come.

Where are we meeting at Starbucks at this location

at this time and I remember thinking of Starbucks.

That's literally what I thought.

And I'm like, absolutely, I'll come.

Where are we meeting at Starbucks at this location

at Starbucks, that's liberal, but whatever, you know.

Like some of you have, whenever I've invited you.

So we did.

So I remember showing up and I remember getting up that day.

Now back in the day, I genuinely, I thought to myself,

okay, I've noticed how pastors like to dress when they preach.

They don't wear suits and ties anymore

and they don't use the King James Bible anymore

and they don't act with a serious decorum like you should.

And I can remember thinking to myself,

when I go into that Starbucks,

I'm going to wear my suit and tie.

I wore it every day of the week, except for Monday.

Tuesday through Sunday, I wore my suit in the community.

When I went to Albertsons, I wore my suit and tie

because I was a community leader.

I was a pastor and I was better than you.

Now, let me be very clear about this.

Some people like to dress up

because they just like to dress up.

That's awesome.

Some people like to dress up

because they like to make people look,

they think of themselves as better.

I was in the latter category, for sure.

And I remember I got to that Starbucks meeting,

I walked in, I opened it up and I remember,

well, before I got in, I remember getting in my car.

I was dressed in my three-piece suit,

had my King James Bible and I prayed,

this is 100% true, Emmanuel, I prayed,

God, give me a chance to demonstrate to these pastors

what a true Christian actually is.

And if I have the opportunity,

let me save them so they don't go to hell.

Because in my mind, I genuinely questioned

whether or not they really knew Jesus.

You see, the pastor, that part of the story is not so funny,

but it's what I honestly thought.

Why?

Because I really did love Jesus.

But I also really, really loved myself.

This type of passage is written to people like me.

Jesus told a story to some who had great confidence

in their own righteousness and scorned everyone else.

You know, I've noticed about pride,

that pride completely blinds you to reality.

It makes you delusional, living in a fabricated reality

where you are the hero better than everybody else.

And when everybody finally gets to the place

of understanding and enlightenment like you've gotten to,

then the world would be a better place

if everybody was like you.

But God loves you.

And God does not want you to live in this fantasy world

of pride and self-righteousness.

So, to change you, He measures you.

And instead of allowing you to pick the standard

by which you are measured, He picks the standard for you.

All of that is set up to say this point, to craft you,

to mold you to make you, to chip away and sand you,

to craft you and create you.

Jesus points out the reality of your size

and strength.

Again, look at verse nine.

Jesus told the story to some who had great confidence

in their own righteousness and scorned everyone else.

Here's the question.

Are you ready for the carpenter to measure you?

Are you ready to become his masterpiece?

How is it that Jesus the carpenter

will sand away your pride and arrogance?

How does it happen in your life like it happened in my life?

Well, the way I've noticed him doing so in my life

and in the passage is that Jesus will sand away

your pride and arrogance by number one,

by pointing out the source of pride

and by pointing out the root of humility.

That's the sermon.

This is how pride and arrogance gets sanded away.

He points out the source of pride

and then He points out the root of humility.

If you're ready to learn these two truths, give me an amen.

Let's talk about the source of pride.

The source of pride, very simply stated,

is flattering comparisons.

I'm not saying get rid of your pride.

What I am saying is ask yourself

to whom are you comparing yourself?

Because where pride comes in

is you're comparing yourself in a flattering way.

Look what it says in verses 10 and 12.

What did Jesus do?

He's telling a story about two individuals.

He's gonna tell a story for arrogant people.

He says in verse 10,

two men went up to the temple to pray.

How many men went to pray?

How many men went to pray?

Two men went up to the temple to pray.

One was a Pharisee.

The other was a despised tax collector.

When I say Pharisee, you say boo, Pharisee.

Tax collector.

Yeah, both, right?

The Pharisee, for those who don't know Bible background,

the Pharisee was a religious leader in the community,

and they were extremely holy.

I mean, they were holy and they knew it,

and they let everybody else know how holy they were.

They had incredibly rigid standards of righteousness,

and they looked down upon everyone else.

Yet inside, Jesus says, they were like dead men.

Jesus says they were like dead men's bones

on the outside, a whited sepulcher,

but inside they were filthy and rotten.

So two men went up to pray.

One was a Pharisee.

The other was a despised tax collector.

The tax collector was just a guy who wanted to earn a living.

Say it doesn't sound so bad.

So the way he earned a living is he would turn in

his neighbors and friends and family to the government

to get money from them and the government.

So you have a tax collector who is hated

because of their outward wicked sin,

and you've got a Pharisee who is often privately hated

because of their arrogance.

And Jesus says both of them go up to pray.

Now let me ask you a question.

These two men couldn't seem to be so different

from one another, but notice they have something in common.

Do you see it in the first verse there?

Verse 10.

What is it that these two men have in common?

If you found it, I want you to shout it out.

What is it that these two men have in common?

Pray.

Pray.

They both go up to pray.

Hey, that's a good start.

Can I get an amen?

No matter how bad off you are, it's a good thing.

And by the way, you might say,

well, not everybody prays.

Oh, my dear friend, I have a secret for you.

Everybody does pray.

Even if you say, I don't believe in God,

I never believed in God.

We know in the deepest, darkest moments of your life,

you call out to the God who made you just like the rest of us.

You cry to him, you ask him, and you pray.

And I am not mocking you.

I'm celebrating the fact that you're going to your God.

Go to him.

Both these men go up to pray.

One was a Pharisee, the other was a despised tax collector.

They went to the temple to pray,

and this is what the Pharisee prayed.

The Pharisee stood by himself and prayed this prayer.

Now, we understand not from this passage,

but from another story of Jesus,

that the Pharisees like to pray,

they like to pray publicly.

They like to pray out loud.

And when they prayed publicly,

they like to stand in the place,

in the marketplace, or in the synagogue, or in the temple,

in a place that could echo their voice

as big as it possibly could.

They didn't like to go privately and pray.

They like to pray where everybody could see them

and hear their prayer.

So imagine he's standing in the temple,

and he's ready to pray,

and as he prays publicly and out loud,

this is his prayer.

I thank you, God,

that I am not like other people.

Now, stop.

If your prayer begins by thanking God

that you're better than other people,

you're doing it wrong.

Dear God, do you see these people?

You ever scroll through social media,

and you're like, dear God,

I thank you, I'm not like them.

That is not the heart of Christ,

that's the heart of the Pharisee.

I thank you that I'm not like other people.

Cheaters, sinners, adulterers.

Here this man is, and he's praying out loud.

Now imagine you're like, just like at church that day.

And you're like, oh, jeez, this guy again.

And he gets up and he's praying,

and he's like, dear God, I thank you that I'm...

And as he's praying, we're about to find out

that the tax collector is in the corner,

and he's praying.

And so he's praying, dear God, I thank you,

I'm not like other people.

Cheaters, well, tax collectors,

cheated people for their living.

Sinners, well, of course they were a sinner.

Adulterers, what they often spent their money on

was sexually explicit things.

I'm not like other people, cheaters,

and sinners, and adulterers.

And listen to the rest of his prayer.

How arrogant.

I am certainly not like that tax collector.

He calls him out publicly in the prayer.

Dear God, I want to thank you, I'm not like him.

Wow.

And then he begins to list off all of his accomplishments.

I fast twice a week.

I give you a tenth of my income.

Can I just stop and say that if you have to

constantly list off your accomplishments

to God, yourself, or others, you might have a problem.

An arrogant, prideful issue.

By the way, is it good to fast?

Yeah, it's in the Bible.

Is it good to give a tithe?

Sure, it's in the Bible.

But what is this man doing?

He's measuring himself.

And he feels pretty good.

Hey, I began the sermon by asking for two volunteers.

All right?

I'm going to have those two volunteers

come to the platform at this time.

Give them a round of applause.

Both of our volunteers are on their way

to the platform at this time.

Fantastic, great, good, awesome, wonderful.

All right, very good.

Yeah, there we go.

Hey, can we go ahead and use the blue mic here?

Can we get that on?

Thanks, guys.

All right, come on over.

I want you to begin by introducing yourself.

Come on over.

Here we go.

You are a tall drink of water, as they say.

Stand back over here.

Not so close.

All right.

Hey, buddy, good to see you, buddy.

Stand over here.

All right, yeah, stand right here.

Yeah, please stand up.

All right.

All right, stand over here.

Stand over here.

All right, very good.

It's been pasteurized.

Okay.

I knew this was the right decision.

He just said he's been pasteurized.

No, you're not for that.

It wasn't good.

You don't even have a mic yet.

Hold on.

This is going to be fun.

Okay, introduce yourself.

My name is Frank.

I'm from Las Vegas.

There we go.

There we go.

And how tall are you?

6'4", 6'5".

6'4", 6'5", somewhere in between.

Very good.

Introduce yourself.

It takes two hands to...

Whatever you got to...

I'm from Dock.

I'm from Cali, but now I'm a Nevadian.

California, ladies and gentlemen.

Give them a round of applause.

No, no, boo.

Not to mention...

But you converted to Nevada.

I'm from Bassist, California.

What's Calibassist?

Oh, my God.

There are Dashians living there.

Oh, do they?

Yeah.

I didn't even know.

My name is David Will Smith.

You're next to David Will Smith.

I'm not going to brag.

Yeah, well, good.

It's a sermon about pride.

Yeah, there you go.

So I'm not pride.

It is what it is.

Okay, head to God.

Head to God.

I'm sharp and not stupid.

As I wrote this sermon, I literally thought to myself, I sure hope Doc volunteers.

I really do.

It would be so fun.

Doc.

Not Doc.

Doc.

I said Doc.

Give me the mic.

It's my word.

All right.

Okay.

Now.

Now.

I want to just obviously say how much I love standing beside Doc.

I look up to him.

It's one of my favorite things.

Every Sunday he'll come up.

He'll give me a hug.

We'll high five.

You know, it's not, it's not, it's not time.

Swear to you.

Frank over here.

My goodness.

Don't you get enough attention?

I mean, seriously, what's it like up there?

Do you have better air?

Yeah, it's two degrees cooler.

I hate that man.

Can't trust tall people.

As much as I like standing beside Doc.

This is not nearly as fun.

I feel like a child about to be taken on a Disneyland ride with his dad.

Give him a round of applause, ladies and gentlemen.

They say, what's the issue, pastor?

The past, the, the issue is this.

Your pride and arrogance might be directly related to the individual you're comparing

yourself to.

The reason why you struggle with pride is because when you look around the world, you're

like, I'm pretty good compared to them.

I mean, look at what I've done.

Look at what they've done.

And so as you compare yourself and measure yourself to the wrong individual, your pride,

the source of pride is this flattering comparison that you allow yourself to indulge when in

reality who you should be comparing yourself to is not the lowest, but the highest who

you should be comparing yourself is not the center, but the savior.

When a Christian gets to a place where they start lining themselves up and comparing themselves

to God, their entire world changes.

Notice what happens in the second point.

In the first point, how does God sand away this arrogance and pride?

Well, he points out to us the source of our pride is flattering comparisons.

Then he says the second thing he points out is the root of humility.

And the root of humility is seeing God.

Look at what happens here to the tax collector, verse 13.

Of course, the Pharisee prayed, I'm so glad I'm not like one of these people.

And then the tax collector prayed, and it says, the tax collector stood at a distance

and he dared not even lift his eyes toward heaven as he prayed.

Instead, he beat on his chest.

And in sorrow he said, oh God, be merciful to me for I am a sinner.

When was the last time that you got on your knees before God and you could not even look

up into heaven?

When was the last time out of a great sense of who he is and a great awareness of who

you are that you only could cry out, holy, holy, holy is God, and I am a sinner who needs

mercy and forgiveness?

The source of your pride might be flattering comparisons, and the root of future humility

might be seeing God in your life.

I'm not saying get humble today.

I'm saying spend time with God and you will be humbled.

Look at what Jesus says, I tell you this sinner, not the Pharisee, returned home justified

before God, for those who have exalted themselves will be humbled and those who humble themselves

will be exalted.

Don't you understand what I want for you?

What I want for you is for your prayers to be answered.

And the Bible says that God resists the proud, but he gives grace to the humble.

Could it be possible that you've been seeking God and you've been praying for this and you've

been praying?

I just feel like my prayers just don't go before God.

They might not, because if you're filled with arrogance and pride, God is actively resisting

you.

But if you humble yourself by seeing who God is and who you are and you bow before him

in prayer, God gives grace to the humble.

You see, when somebody stands before God and says, I'll do what I want, you get nothing.

But when you get on your knees before God and say, I want to do what you want, he lifts

you up and gives you what you need.

Arrogance, pride, versus humility, and answered prayer.

See he clearly, this man, what was the difference?

Here's what I believe happened.

I believe this tax collector clearly had an interaction with God.

Offscreen, it's not told in the story.

How did he get so humble?

It was probably the same way that Isaiah felt when Isaiah stood before God.

The prophet Isaiah was a good man, but then he stood before God and Isaiah got on his

knees and said, well, it was me.

I am a man that is unclean with unclean lips.

Ezekiel, Ezekiel chapter one, Ezekiel, the prophet stands before God.

And the first thing that happens is he falls on his face and he says, you're holy, I'm

not.

All of Israel did this when they arrived at Mount Sinai and the voice of God came out.

And they saw God, they bowed before him.

The same thing happens in the book of Revelation when the apostle John finally sees God in his

glory in the throne room.

He falls on his face and says, you are God, I am not.

This is how humility is obtained, not by trying harder, but by seeing God.

Once you've seen God, once you've seen God, this is what happens.

You'll despise no one.

You remember how the story begins?

Jesus was going to tell a story to those, oh, hey, thank you, does it sound like I need

water?

Give this man a round of applause up here helping out.

Wow, thank you.

Do you remember how the story begins in verse nine?

This was going to tell a story to those who had confidence in themselves and despised

everybody else.

Do you know what happens when you see God?

You see God for who he is, you see you for who you are.

You don't have time to despise everybody else.

You know what else happens?

You'll start valuing mercy more than accomplishment.

Instead of you constantly saying about how great you are, you'll just be like, man, I'm

sure God, glad God's been merciful to me.

I'm sure glad God's been good to me.

And when you see God, you'll start to be crafted into his masterpiece.

He's chipping away.

He's cutting you down.

He's sanding you and making you into what God wanted you to be.

So I arrived at the coffee shop in my suit and tie, white pressed shirt, beautifully

dimpled tie, perfect.

The whole time I'm thinking God helped me to be an example to these men who might not

know you, pastors of other churches.

I opened up the door with my briefcase because at that point I thought pastors should use

briefcases like attorneys.

I walked inside, sat down with those pastors.

Now I got to tell you, if you're a funny person, I'm sure if you're one of those pastors,

you could think of a thousand different jokes to give at that moment.

And for me telling the story, putting in a joke right now would be a perfect moment,

but they didn't joke with me.

They just said, hey, Josh, we are so glad you're here.

Thank you for spending time with us and honoring us with your presence.

I'll never forget, and it hit me.

It struck me.

We sat down and we read a Bible verse.

They opened their Bibles.

This is before everybody had Bibles on the app, you know.

And I opened mine, my big King James.

I interrupted.

I said, could we read out of the King James, do you mind?

Because I wanted them to know what a real Bible was.

When we spent time in prayer, I can remember specifically looking around and thinking about

what they were actually wearing.

I remember looking around thinking, I cannot believe a pastor in the community is wearing

a t-shirt and shorts.

While they were talking to God about my problems, I was thinking about what they were wearing

on the outside.

If you come from very pharisaical background, it's really hard for you to stop thinking

about what everybody else is doing.

I remember even as they prayed, I remember thinking, you hear they pray, God, you hear

that?

I mean, it's just so emotive and so much emotion.

And like, who are they trying to impress here?

I'm literally judging their prayers.

When I left burdened, God helped me to save these men.

And I genuinely thought if I could save one of the men, I could actually save an entire

church.

I mean, that's a big catch for Jesus.

You think I'm joking?

That's exactly what I thought.

And it took about six months of patience and kindness and grace on their behalf that I

was in my own personal devotion spending time with Jesus because I did love Jesus even though

I was an arrogant jerk.

And I was reading the Gospels.

I'm not sure if it was Luke 18, but somewhere in the Gospels.

And for the very first time, the God of the Holy Spirit said to me this.

He said, you are not one of the disciples.

You're one of the Pharisees.

It was as clear in my soul as anything I'd ever heard.

And for years, I'd always read the Gospels thinking, look at how I'm one of the disciples.

And God was like, nope, you're a Pharisee.

And it broke my heart.

And I began to cry and I began to call out to God.

And I began to allow God to humble me because for the first time I had seen God for who

He was.

And I began to see me for who I really was.

Does this make sense?

That was so helpful for my life.

And maybe this sermon is one of those moments in your life to help you see God and bring

about a sense of genuine humility by asking, if I'm so great, to whom am I measuring myself

against?

Thank you for watching the Southern Hills YouTube channel.

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And remember, we exist to make disciples for Jesus Christ.

Have a great week.

Peace.