TEEN TREE OF LIFE
The Doctrine of Arrogance
Part 1
December 30, 2018
Before you begin, ask yourself a very important question: Do you believe that Jesus Christ died on The Cross for all of your sins? If you answered yes, you will need to be sure that you are filled with The Holy Spirit. How do you do this? You name your sins to God The Father in His Son’s Name. This is called rebound. As a Christian, you must rebound any time you sin. This is taught in 1JOHN 1:9: If we confess our sins [directly to God], He [God] is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Now, if you have never believed that Jesus Christ died on The Cross for all of your sins, all you have to do is say to yourself that you believe in Him and you are saved! The Bible verse which teaches us this is ACTS 16:31: “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved.”
Arrogance is a major contradiction to God’s Pre-Designed Plan for your life. It’s the primary reason for a believer’s failure to execute God’s Plan and Will for his or her life. God’s Will exists in three categories related to man. One is God’s Directive Will which is basically what He wants us to think or do. This is primarily focused just on believers because unbelievers have only one directive from God: believe in The Lord Jesus Christ and be saved.
Then we have God’s Overruling Will. This is when God steps in and takes over. God steps in when a believer has rejected Bible doctrine and has allowed the cosmic system to take over his or her life. At this point, God will permit us to stay alive but will discipline us until even that has no affect. And this can only be changed by His Overruling Will.
The third is God’s Permissive Will which is when man’s negative decisions are permitted even though they are contrary to God. As we have learned, God gives every person on earth free will or the opportunity to make his or her own choices. He leaves it up to us to choose Him or Satan – Divine Good or bad. But God is a Perfect Gentleman and will never interfere with the choices we decide to make. He gives us His Permission to do whatever we choose.
God did the same thing with Satan who was the first creature to commit the sin of arrogance. This is Satan’s plan: “I will make myself like the Most High God.” (ISA 14:14) The original sin of arrogance is amplified in EZE 28:11‑19 The Message Bible: God’s Message came to me: “Son of man, raise a funeral song over the king of Tyre. Tell him, A Message from God, the Master: “You had everything going for you. You were in Eden, God’s garden. You were dressed in splendor, your robe studded with jewels: Carnelian, peridot, and moonstone, beryl, onyx, and jasper, Sapphire, turquoise, and emerald, all in settings of engraved gold. A robe was prepared for you the same day you were created. You were the anointed cherub. I placed you on the mountain of God. You strolled in magnificence among the stones of fire. From the day of your creation you were sheer perfection . . . and then imperfection—evil!—was detected in you. In much buying and selling you turned violent, you sinned! I threw you, disgraced, off the mountain of God. I threw you out—you, the anointed angel-cherub. No more strolling among the gems of fire for you! Your beauty went to your head. You corrupted wisdom by using it to get worldly fame. I threw you to the ground, sent you sprawling before an audience of kings and let them gloat over your demise. By sin after sin after sin, by your corrupt ways of doing business, you defiled your holy places of worship. So I set a fire around and within you. It burned you up. I reduced you to ashes. All anyone sees now when they look for you is ashes, a pitiful mound of ashes. All who once knew you now throw up their hands: ‘This can’t have happened! This has happened!’”
Arrogance is snooty self‑respect that’s totally separated from reality. It’s the complete opposite of grace. In fact, it’s total blindness to God’s Grace. Arrogance is synonymous with jealousy, bitterness, vindictiveness, stubbornness, self‑pity, conceit, slander, and gossip. If you think about it, just about every sin you can think of is associated with arrogance. No wonder why it’s what God considers to be the worst sin!
Egotism is a sin of arrogance. It’s an excessive pre-occupation with yourself. Vanity is also a sin of arrogance. People who are vain are easily flattered and have an excessive desire to be admired by others. Another sin of arrogance is pride which is an assumption of superiority; in other words, people who are proud assume they are better than everyone else! Conceit is also a sin of arrogance in which a person has an exaggerated estimate of his or her abilities. The conceited are mentioned in PRO 11:2 The Message Bible: The stuck-up fall flat on their faces, but down-to-earth people stand firm. Apply this verse and stay “down-to-earth” and humble!
As you can imagine there are many biblical documentations of the sin of arrogance. Another good one from Proverbs is: First pride, then the crash — the bigger the ego, the harder the fall. (PRO 16:18 The Message Bible)
A very important thing to remember is that most of our sinning is done in our thoughts! Who you really are as a person is what you think – what’s going on in your brain! It’s not the way you appear to be on the surface or the way you dress. It all boils down to whether you have a Divine Viewpoint or a human viewpoint. ROM 12:3 defines arrogance as a mental attitude sin: For I say through the grace which has been given to me to everyone who is among you, stop thinking of self in terms of arrogance beyond what you ought to think, but think in terms of sanity for the purpose of being rational without illusion as God has assigned to each one of us a standard of thinking from doctrine.
Jealousy is also a sin of arrogance according to JAM 3:14‑16: But if you have bitter jealousy and selfish ambition in your heart [right lobe or brain], do not be arrogant and so lie against the truth [Bible doctrine]. This wisdom is not that which comes down from above, but is earthly, natural, demonic. For where jealousy and selfish ambition exist, there is disorder and every evil thing. Arrogant people are also extremely ambitious. They want to outdo everyone. In this verse “selfish ambition” refers to inordinate or excessive ambition.
When God, who is the best shepherd of all, comes out in the open with his rule, he’ll see that you’ve done it right and commend you lavishly. And you who are younger must follow your leaders. But all of you, leaders and followers alike, are to be down to earth with each other, for God has had it with the proud, But takes delight in just plain people. So be content with who you are, and don’t put on airs. God’s strong hand is on you; he’ll promote you at the right time. Live carefree before God; he is most careful with you. (1PET 5:4-7 The Message Bible) This verse brings out the principle that if God does not promote you, the promotion isn’t worth anything. Remember that God only promotes believers who know and apply His Word. He promotes humble believers who treat others with grace. Are you familiar with Grace-Orientation? It’s the fourth Problem-Solving Tool which God has blessed us with to carry out His Plan for our lives. Grace orientation is being familiar with God’s Grace Policy. The grace-orientated believer shouldn’t be arrogant. Arrogance will never lead to promotion in the Church-Age – which is the dispensation in which we live. And if you’re not promoted, you’ll never be an invisible hero. The Old Testament had visible heroes but our dispensation has invisible ones who are the product of Bible doctrine and the filling of The Holy Spirit. The invisible hero is the believer who advances to spiritual maturity and executes the Pre-Designed Plan of God!
{to be continued}