What God Opposes

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Pride is what God opposes. It’s not something in which he disapproves. It’s not something in which he frowns out. He down right opposes pride according to Scripture.

Jeff’s message today was sort of intense. He told Amanda that it is the hardest message he has ever had to preach. The weight that he carried this morning is very heavy, because Scripture repeatedly confirms that God exalts the humble and humbles those that exalt themselves.

He began his message with a Johnny Cash tribute.

Johnny Cash

Johnny Cash, before he died, went into a small studio and recorded the following words to a song called “God’s Gonna Cut You Down.” Here are the lyrics:

You can run on for a long time
Run on for a long time
Run on for a long time
Sooner or later God’ll cut you down
Sooner or later God’ll cut you down

Go tell that long tongue liar
Go and tell that midnight rider
Tell the rambler,
The gambler,
The back biter
Tell ’em that God’s gonna cut ’em down
Tell ’em that God’s gonna cut ’em down

Well my goodness gracious let me tell you the news
My head’s been wet with the midnight dew
I’ve been down on bended knee talkin’ to the man from Galilee
He spoke to me in the voice so sweet
I thought I heard the shuffle of the angel’s feet
He called my name and my heart stood still
When he said, “John go do My will!”

Well you may throw your rock and hide your hand
Workin’ in the dark against your fellow man
But as sure as God made black and white
What’s done in the dark will be brought to the light

You can run on for a long time
Run on for a long time
Run on for a long time
Sooner or later God’ll cut you down
Sooner or later God’ll cut you down

That type of song is not normally what you begin a service with in American Christianity. We love to hear messages about how kind and how forgiving and how compassionate Jesus is. And that is very true. But there is another side of the coin: God humbles the proud.

It’s not beyond God to cut you down, in order for you to look up.

The passage about Daniel and Nebuchadnezzer in Daniel 4 still gets me everytime I read it. Here’s a king who keeps encountering the living God and has the opportunity to humble himself, but he keeps exalting himself. Until God cut him down. It happenned twelve months later, it wasn’t immediate, but sooner or later, God humbled him. I don’t know about you, but I would rather humble myself voluntarily than be forced to be humbled by God. Just as a reminder, every sin in your life is just a symptom of pride. If we can deal with pride, we can deal with every other area.

We worshipped to these songs in the last two services at North Side:

Which by the way, when you people were singing “Surrender,” I was overwhelmed. You were singing loudly which is always great. But you were also singing passionately. I honestly can tell a difference. It just seemed like everyone’s heart was attached to God at that moment and really meant what we were singing.

It’s an honor to worship with you guys every week.

Also, we sold out of the Humility book by Andrew Murray yesterday.  This is the book that Jeff said is a great read to accompany the Leaving Planet Self series.  We are ordering some more and might have them in by Wednesday, but we will definitely have some more copies by Sunday.  This is a Puritan classic that will pretty much rip your heart out and show you how prideful you are.  Don’t you want to pick it up today?!

Humility