TEEN TREE 
OF LIFE
The Doctrine of Arrogance
Part 2
January 6, 2019
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.”
Sin is never an issue in the Christian life. Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ died on The Cross for every sin that has been and will ever be committed. Sins are equally bad but there are actually some which God hates more: Here are six things God hates, and one more that he loathes with a passion: eyes that are arrogant, a tongue that lies, hands that murder the innocent, a heart that hatches evil plots, feet that race down a wicked track, a mouth that lies under oath, a troublemaker in the family. (PROV 6:16-19 The Message Bible) If you don’t study God’s Word under the right pastor-teacher who is presenting the accurate Word of Truth, you will never know that. Those who don’t have rejected God’s Word. The rejection of Bible doctrine is always related to arrogance: If anyone teaches a different doctrine and does not concur with sound doctrine, those doctrines of our Lord Jesus Christ, even doctrines pertaining to godliness [spirituality], he has become arrogant, understanding nothing. Furthermore, he has morbid obsessions about controversies and verbal conflicts from which originate jealousy, discord, evil speculation. (1TI 6:3‑4) This verse points out the importance of accurate doctrinal teaching.
Arrogance is the basic sin that motivates rejection of Bible doctrine. It destructs post-salvation rehabilitation. The idea here is that once you’re saved, if you keep ignoring the fact that you’re committing the sin of arrogance, you won’t recover from it. And Satan’s world – the cosmic system – will swallow you hold! Arrogance corrupts your soul! If a person is arrogant, you can be sure that the old sin nature is dominating his or her soul.
The word volition is one we’ve seen many times in our studies. Volition means the ability or power of exercising choice. God gives us volition or free will, as we learned last week. In 1TI 6:3‑4 (above), “has become arrogant” is actually translated from the Greek as “has received arrogance.” Arrogant people reject Bible doctrine at the point of receiving it because they fail to be consistent in studying it. They also reject doctrine at the point of retaining it by rejecting it when it’s presented. It follows through that they also fail to apply God’s Word to their lives.
As we learned in last week’s Teen Tree, arrogance is the original sin of the greatest genius creature of all time. We call him Satan or the devil, but his original name was son of the morning or dawn – Heylel. Satan was the first creature to enter into this sin and it motivated him to rebel in the prehistoric Angelic Conflict. The Angelic Conflict is the result of prehistoric creatures (angels) opposing God. One third of all of the angels in Heaven chose Satan over God; these are the fallen angels. The Angelic Conflict began with Satan’s fall and continued until all angelic creatures had made a decision for or against God. The Angelic Conflict refers to the two trials of Satan and the fallen angels. The first trial occurred prehistorically: “What a comedown this, O Babylon! Daystar! Son of Dawn [Satan]! Flat on your face in the underworld mud, you, famous for flattening nations! You said to yourself, ‘I’ll climb to heaven. I’ll set my throne over the stars of God. I’ll run the assembly of angels that meets on sacred Mount Zaphon. I’ll climb to the top of the clouds. I’ll take over as King of the Universe!’ But you didn’t make it, did you? Instead of climbing up, you came down—Down with the underground dead, down to the abyss of the Pit. People will stare and muse: ‘Can this be the one Who terrorized earth and its kingdoms, turned earth to a moonscape, Wasted its cities, shut up his prisoners to a living death?”” (ISA 14:12-17 The Message Bible) The second trial will occur during human history: “Then He will also say to those on His left, ‘Depart from Me, accursed ones, into the eternal fire which has been prepared for the devil and his angels…” (MAT 25:41) This is also taught in REV 20:10: And the devil who deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are also; and they will be tormented day and night forever and ever.
Arrogance is also the one sin that motivated the woman in the Garden of Eden. She was looking for something different with which to amuse herself. Imagine being in that environment with Our Lord teaching her Bible doctrine each day and being bored? It’s hard to fathom. Her boredom caught the eye of the most brilliant creature of all. In the conversation that followed, Satan convinced the woman that God didn’t want her to be as smart as He is. Satan persuaded her to believe that eating from the tree was the answer to improving her perfect environment. Sounds ridiculous, right? But think about what’s going on nowadays. People spend their lives trying to improve their environment. If it’s not by working day and night to make enough money to buy a better house with better furniture, it’s by wasting their time trying to clean up our natural environment from pollution which they believe will destroy the earth. They don’t know God’s Word. Man will not destroy the earth – God will! This is taught in 2PET 3:7: But by His word the present heavens and earth are being reserved for fire, kept for the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men.
Arrogance makes you completely absorbed with yourself while at the same time making you think you’re better or not as good as the people around you. There are people who spend their entire lives comparing themselves with others. Arrogance is not only self-centeredness and conceit, but it dissociates you from the realities of life. Believers need, above all else, to face the realities of life head on. Remember there is no solution without confrontation but you must face problems by applying Bible doctrine.
Another thing arrogance does is produce inconsistency and double mindedness.
A double minded person has respect for God but serves another god instead. Look at 2KI 17:32-33 The Message Bible: They honored and worshiped God, but not exclusively—they also appointed all sorts of priests, regardless of qualification, to conduct a variety of rites at the local fertility shrines. They honored and worshiped God, but they also kept up their devotions to the old gods of the places they had come from. 2KI 17:32-33) EX 20:3 puts it this way: “You shall have no other gods before Me.” And “no other gods” can mean anything – money, material wealth, success, relationships and anything else that gets in the way of your relationship with God and His Word.
Satan has his own doctrine. That’s where negative thinking and ungodly wisdom come from. His doctrine is demonic and unspiritual: But if you have bitter jealousy and selfish ambition in your heart, do not be arrogant and so lie against the truth. 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. But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, reasonable, full of mercy and good fruits, unwavering, without hypocrisy. (JAM 3:14-17)
{to be continued}