Resist Pride, Embrace Humility

Let's see. Good morning. Good morning. Welcome to coffee and devotions this morning. We're gonna be talking about Let's have some coffee we'll pray and we'll get into God's Word. Yeah. Yeah, she's like, oh nice. I'm gonna smack in the face You want some coffee? Nope. Nope. Why'd you look? Because it was like, I just want to make sure you didn't like put coffee grounds in it. Yeah. No. All right. All right.
Let's pray. God, we thank you so much for this day. We thank you for your word. We thank you for being able to spend time together. God, we pray that you would please instruct us by your word. God, we pray that your spirit would please teach us and enable us to, Lord, to love you and to do your will. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Alright, we're at James chapter 4, the first 6 verses. I'm going to read verses 1 through 3, and then I'll let Nathan finish it off. Oh, you want to read first? No. Okay.
Where do wars and fights come from among you? Do they not come from your desires for pleasure that war in your members? You lust and you do not have. You murder and covet and cannot obtain. You fight and war, yet you do not have because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive because you ask amiss that you may spend it on your pleasures.
Adulterers and adulteresses, do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever, therefore, wants to be a friend of the world, makes himself an enemy of God. Or do you think that the scripture says, In vain the spirit who dwells in us yearns jealousy, but gives no grace. Therefore, he says, God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble. All right, so we need to ask ourselves our three questions. A, what is this? B, what's a? Best vs. Simon. And C, what are we? Called to do. All right, so what's this about?
Don't lust after the world. You'll probably just think, oh, well, I wish I had that. Thinking about this, this kind of reminds me of Mr. Do Salmon. Oh, pastor dual sermon about envy and pride. Yeah. And so the he was talking about the anatomy of Cain's anger. Yeah, that was a good sermon. And so, yeah, there's, there's definitely like this, I deserve what I want. Right? And you must give me what I desire. Yeah, so it's definitely can be wrapped up. Right. And I think that's what James is getting at. I think you're right. Right.
Where do wars and fights come from among you? Well, it's because we've had these desires, these lusts in our hearts. We want pleasure. And so there's this desire for pleasure. War is inside of our body. And because we can't get the stuff we want, we end up fighting with each other. Going to war, even killing one another. And so, what's he even say about praying here? This is a hard one in verse 3. We ask, but we do not receive because we don't pray sincerely. Yeah, right.
Well, even just before this, it was about heavenly wisdom versus demonic wisdom. And he said that in verse 14, But if you have bitter envy and self-seeking in your heart, do not boast and lie against the truth. This wisdom does not descend from above, but is earthly, sensual, and demonic. For where envy and self-seeking exist, confusion and every evil thing are there." So like this self-seeking, pride is tied into that self-seeking, evil, fleshly, demonic wisdom. Like, I want my honor. I want my way. I want my things. No matter what.
Mr. Duval said that same point that I don't think he read the source, but he said that envy was basically the root of evil. Why did Satan fall? Because he was envious of God. Yeah. Why did he conceive? Yeah. And but mixed into that envy is also his pride. Right.
And so when we when we start being filled with envy, because we have pride, because we want our own our own fleshly desires, how's the Lord going to treat us? Not too good. He resists the proud. OK, he's not going to welcome us into his arms, right? No, hold on. That's not that's not the type of wisdom that he gave us. And what does he say in verse six? This is pointing out to Proverbs chapter three. He gives grace to the humble but resists the proud. Yeah.
So he says, Adulteresses and adulterers, do you not know that friendship with the world is enemies or is enmity with God? So whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. So being a friend of the world is this age of constant self-seeking, pleasure desiring, evil wanting, society we live in. But that was just the Roman world that James is writing in, right?
We don't have any of those problems today. Yeah. We're not so different, are we? No, the human condition remains the same. Yeah. So, uh, okay. So that's what this is about. Well, go ahead. Your mom says, Nathan, in five words, tell me what this was about. What did you do with your dad in the office? Five words. What'd you learn? I'll give you 10 words or less. Envy feeds pride and pride leads to death. Okay. That's fine. All right. All right. Well, what would you say is the best verse to summarize this section? Probably six. Six. OK, I have verse four underlined, but I could definitely see verse six as well. That's fine. OK, so what do you think about seek calling? What are we called to do? And how does this point us to Jesus Christ? Hmm. I think it's for us. Hmm.
Being humble, which is being humble, which is kind of like some people would be like, well, that's just too easy, but it's no humility is hard. Yeah, I know God, God blesses the humble, or what's it say here? God gives grace to the humble. He resists the proud, right? And so yeah, so we have to be humble, which means sometimes we don't get what we want. But instead of getting what we want, we desire what's good for others. We desire what's good for God's kingdom, not just our pleasures and our desires.
That's wisdom. That's the type of wisdom that comes from God. But it's really hard to do, isn't it? Yeah, thanks be to God for Jesus Christ. He did it perfectly. We're always going to wrestle with envy and pride and stuff like that, but some of my favorite people in the entire world Some of my favorite people, like as I've gone to different churches and stuff, are the humble. The people who just love Jesus.
Remember Miss Gloria? Yeah. Remember how, like, she didn't have much? And she, like, in this world, she didn't have much, and yet she would say all the time, I have everything. And she would just beam with joy when we would start talking about Jesus and about heaven. I love getting together with Christians like that. You ready to pray? Yep. You want to pray or you want me to? You pray. Okay.
God, thank you so much for giving us a reminder this morning that if we have Christ, we have everything. Lord, please turn us away from our selfish desires. Turn us away from our envy and our pride. Turn us away from the worldly wisdom. God, make us filled with joy in who you are. And Father, when we pray, we pray that we would not do so with selfish motives, but that we would desire to bless You and bless others.
Lord, please give us the mind of Christ. Let us walk in His ways. Fill us by Your Spirit. In Jesus' name, Amen. May you walk in the humility of Jesus Christ. May you love him with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength. May his spirit fill you with humility and grace. We'll see you next time. Bye. Bye.