Well, the study through 1 Peter I think has both been super good in terms of its depth, but part of it again has been kind of tough. And I think part of that is because although we hit many sections where the scriptures in 1 Peter was giving us specific commands, there was a lot about 1 Peter that actually was reiterating in repetitive fashion, was trying to give exhortation not on the way of like, "I need you to do this specifically," but on the way of thinking and having an attitude that's more godly.

Especially having a worldview, a perspective on life, a perspective on God, a perspective on who we are, a perspective, etc., etc., about how we're supposed to interpret the world as we perceive it, especially because, again, the people that he's talking to, his audience are people who's going through a whirlwind of difficulty, especially intense persecution, right?

So by way of quick review, I want to go through certain perspectives that Apostle Peter challenged the Christians to have in order to have an appropriate attitude, that as they go through this season, these hurdles over their lives, that come out through it, not just simply, "Oh my gosh, we just need to pound out and like bear through this," but rather actually thriving in Christ.

So the first thing, we studied in chapters 1 and into chapter 2, that there was a great calling and salvation. So this is for your fill in the blanks right here. That there was an incredible calling and salvation. Remember he started off by saying, "You who are scattered," and gave this long list of areas that they've been spread out to in the diaspora, so to speak, and he says, "But you've been called and chosen." And he reminds them that this salvation that they've been given, it wasn't a spur of the moment, but it was planned long ago, and even angels and prophets would look intently into this salvation that they have.

And from that flows the expectation. So there was a great calling and salvation and a great expectation. And God gave them many expectations in terms of who they are to be in their character, in their love, in their hunger for the Word, and et cetera, et cetera, right? Number two, then after giving that kind of preface, he says, "God is doing a great work in you," and so he challenges them, "You need to be who you are, who God has made you to be." So it's be who you are, okay?

Be who you are. And that's that section where he starts to say, "And God is purposing to do this and as you're coming to the cornerstone," he says, "you are, as it were, living stones being built up into a spiritual house. You're a powerhouse of God," right? He says, "You are a holy nation.

You're a royal priesthood. You're God's own possession. And so you have an incredible purpose to offer spiritual sacrifices to God. You have a purpose to give God glory and proclaim His excellencies," and he goes on about, "You need to be who you are, who God has made you to be," right?

And that's a perspective that we have to have. What's more, he went on to a lengthy section where he started to describe different categories of people. This is number three, starting from chapter two, verse 13, he describes to them what is real strength found in submission, found in submission, okay?

So there's your word. And he says, "So every single one of you submit to governing authorities, whether governors," and then he talks about the workers or even slaves, and he says, "Even to those masters who seem unfair, unjust, submit." And then he says, "To the wives, even if your husband is disobedient to the word, learn to submit." And he gives the example of Christ saying, "Look what Christ has done, voluntarily surrendering.

This is real strength." And then lastly, starting from the end of chapter three into chapter four at the tail end of it, he basically says, "Glorify God since the end is near." He puts it in other terms by saying, like, "Just don't suffer for being silly. Don't suffer for your own sins." He says, "If you're going to suffer, suffer for the glory of God.

Suffer for doing what's right. Suffer for what He's pleased by," right? Now in all of this, I'm kind of setting the pace that, so all of this, what Apostle Peter has been doing, as I summarize the whole book for us right now, is he's been giving us a perspective of mind.

Where yes, maybe some people are just looking for a way out. Maybe they're just looking for just a small glimmer of hope from Apostle Peter, but he says, "No, I'm going to challenge you to go above and beyond what you thought was natural to you by giving you a big perspective of what God is doing in you." And challenging you to have a perspective, like, "We need to live up to this calling." And what's more, God has given us an immense purpose, even through what's really confusing, which is our persecution and our suffering, right?

That God's going to use all this. So all of that then empowers the Christians to go through these sufferings with a different attitude. Not one of dragging their feet, complaining, and wishing there was somebody else. Maybe even being tempted that they would not name the name of Christ, but rather that they would have power to go through.

And tonight, it's the carry-on of that theme of the right perspective and the right attitude going through these tough times. And what are the two things, the attitudes that Apostle Peter wants us to have? Well, let's take a look at the passage and then we'll jump forward, okay? Starting from verse 5.

First Peter chapter 5, verse 5. He says, "You younger men likewise, be subject to your elders, and all of you clothe yourselves with humility toward one another. For God is opposed to the proud, but gives grace to the humble. Or humble yourself under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you at the proper time, casting all your anxiety on Him because He cares for you.

Be of sober spirit, be on the alert. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion seeking someone to devour. But resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same experiences of suffering are being accomplished by your brethren who are in the world. After you have suffered for a little while, the God of all grace, who called you to His eternal glory in Christ, will Himself perfect, confirm, strengthen, and establish you.

To Him be dominion forever and ever. Amen. Through Silvanus, our faithful brother, for so I regard him, I have written to you briefly, exhorting and testifying that this is the true grace of God. Stand firm in it. She who is in Babylon, chosen together with you, sends you greeting, and so does my son, Mark.

Greet one another with a kiss of love. Peace be to you all who are in Christ. From this passage, I emphasize again that Apostle Peter wants us as concluding marks to have a certain perspective and an attitude resulting from that perspective. And the two I want to highlight today are the ideas of humility and trust.

Humility and trust. So I'm giving you two words just to hang our hats on and think about for tonight. Let's pray and we'll jump into the study. Heavenly Father, we thank you for your grace. I ask, Lord, that you will continue to do a powerful work in us. For God, we want to have the characteristics, the maturity, the wisdom, the transformation that you desire in us.

Ultimately, God, we want to exhibit the characteristics of Christ. And Father, we know that oftentimes through the various circumstances of life, it becomes so difficult. And Lord, we battle with our flesh, we battle with the sin in our hearts and in our minds, but we ask, Lord God, that by your truth and by your spirit working through your truth, Lord, that you would strengthen us.

That we might truly exhibit the power of the gospel in our lives. We thank you in Christ's name. Amen. Okay. So, in this, what I've done when I walk through this passage is on your packet, I made some notes on the superscript and then underlined and bolded the main commands.

Just to show you that in this last section, Apostle Peter just does one of those bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, and gives lots of commands. But if you look at it in total, again, he's giving many summary commands that aren't so specific as to, oh, I want you to give this money to this, or I want you to, you know, apply this word like this, but it's a lot of general insertion of an attitude that we're supposed to have.

And this perspective and attitude carries on from long ago, back in chapter 2, 13, where he started saying, even though you're suffering, I want you to learn how to submit as Christians. And so he says, likewise, right, just like he said before, he says, be subject to your elders and all of you clothe yourselves with humility toward one another.

For God is opposed to the proud, but gives grace to the humble. Therefore, humble yourself under the mighty hand of God that he may exalt you at the proper time. Okay. So in this first two verses, verse 5 and 6, we notice just a very plain and obvious truth and command.

God desires us to have the attitude of humility. And the command simply is, he wants every single individual, not just the young men, although he calls them out and says, I want you to learn to submit to your church elders. Right. Now, that part, we get it. Young men typically are ambitious.

Young men can be stubborn. Young men could have desires for leadership, whatever it may be. And then he commands them again, just like he commanded the previous categories of people, learn to submit. But the application goes to everybody, right? There is a uniform, one size fit all dress code.

I don't know if you guys have gone to high school or something where there's a uniform, everybody looks the same. There's a sense in which Christianity has a uniform dress code where he says, he wants you to be dressed with humility. Okay. Now, as we just look at that simple command, I'm not going to sit here and then go like, okay, what is humility, all this kind of stuff.

I'll do that a little bit later. Let's make an observation of the text. Let's make an observation of the text and let's identify. As we walk through verse 5 and 6, what are the reasons apostle Peter gives as to why we should be humble? Why we need to humble ourselves?

So I want to throw that question out to you guys, if you guys would just shout it out or raise your hand or just raise your hand. What are the observations in terms of why apostle Peter makes this challenge that we should humble ourselves? Yes. Excellent. Okay. You can put that in there as in your pride, you are going to be weak against your enemy.

Okay. That is when the enemy has his claws into you. That is when he's going to set a stumbling block for you. Very good. What else do you see? Excellent. God gives grace to the humble, but he opposes the proud. Right. He opposes the proud. Man, if you think about reasons enough, my goodness, worst thing in the world to have the most powerful being you can possibly imagine who supersedes all that you can imagine be your enemy.

Right. Best thing in the world. God gives grace to those who are humble. What else? And you can look at the whole section together. Let's see. When you look at verse 5, 6, 7 together, that whole concept right there is challenging us to have humility. What other concepts do you see?

So sorry, I didn't mean to just cut it short at verse 6, but inclusive of the other stuff. Oh, very good. Okay. So God has a prerogative and his own timetable and he essentially commands us that we need to humble ourselves because God's going to be the one who will exalt, not us.

Very good. Others? Okay. Good. So we have a couple of those things there and all of those things then come off, just jump out from the passage to us. Apostle Peter reiterates twice, you know, that we should humble ourselves. In verse 5, telling us to clothe ourselves and verse 6 telling us to humble ourselves underneath the mighty hand of God.

So if we were to just make, you know, small detail observations, you can add in their concepts of because God's mighty hand is over us or just a simple fact because God actually cares for us, right? And so these reasons for why we need to humble ourselves start mounting up.

Now as we think about that command then, this is not just a small command for us, this is an imperative that carries an incredible amount of weight. And I want to give a little bit more description here about even that term. In verse 5 where it tells us to clothe ourselves with humility, the verbal imagery is pretty profound, okay?

The literal term in the Greek means to tie oneself either with like a knot or a band, right? And so typically, what do you wear that has some kind of string that you draw or whatever and it's something like an apron, right? A servant who puts on an apron to serve or whatever it may be or an individual who's getting ready to work and so they put on something and they tie it around, right?

And so there's this imagery there. But what's more, we know that Apostle Peter has had an incredible imagery shown to him by Jesus Himself. Let's turn our Bibles to John chapter 13 verses 1 through 17. Story we know well, story definitely worth us giving special attention to as we talk about this important topic of humility, okay?

So I'm going to start reading for us as now before the Feast of the Passover when Jesus knew that His hour had come to depart out of this world to the Father. Having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the end. During supper when the devil had already put into the heart of Judas Iscariot, Simon's son, to betray Him, Jesus knowing that the Father had given all things into His hands and that He had come from God and was going back to God, rose from supper.

He laid aside His outer garments and taking a towel, tied it around His waist. Then He poured water into a basin and began to wash disciples' feet and to wipe them with a towel that was wrapped around Him. Just a quick note there, I just, this story is beautiful and this story hits so many of the topics that we're going to talk about today.

I mentioned today's topic is humility and trust. Interestingly enough, it even talks about Jesus' trust of the Father in this story. Continuing on, verse 6, "He came to Simon Peter who said to him, 'Lord, do you wash my feet?' Jesus answered him, 'What I am doing you do not understand now, but after you will understand.' Peter said to him, 'You shall never wash my feet.' And Jesus answered him, 'If I do not wash you, you have no share with me.'" Just a note there, you look at the reason why Peter did not receive Jesus' humble service of washing his feet.

And we're going to talk about that a little bit later, so just keep that in your mind. Verse 9, "Simon Peter said to Him, 'Lord, not my feet only, but also my hands and my head then.' Jesus said to him, 'The one who has bathed does not need to wash except for his feet, but is completely clean and you are clean, but not every one of you.' For he knew who was to betray him, that was why he said, 'Not all of you are clean.' When he had washed their feet and put on his outer garments, resumed his place, he said to them, 'Do you understand what I have done to you?

You shall call me teacher and Lord and you are right, for I am, so I am. If I then, your Lord and teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet. For I have given you an example that you should do just as I have done to you.

Truly, truly, I say to you, a servant is not greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him. If you know these things, blessed are you if you do them.'" Quite profound. Already, there is this challenge for us to clothe ourselves in humility, that the term itself is incredibly vivid and you could almost hear all the tones of all that Peter experienced with Christ and there is this challenge from Christ's Word Himself asking this question that's so convicting.

When it comes to humility, you need to clothe yourself and as he's teaching that to his disciples, he gives this incredibly convicting question. A master isn't lower than his slave. A slave isn't greater than his master. A pupil isn't greater than his teacher, is he? And there is this question even for us when we think about humility, when we think about our willingness to put ourselves in a lower, lowly position, do we sometimes think that we're too good to serve in certain capacities?

Do we sometimes think that we're too good to stoop down before a brother? Maybe even especially like an actual sibling? Do we sometimes think that we're too good to wash the dirt off of a brother's feet? Did Jesus say, "No, blessed are you when you understand that this is what marks a Christian, a follower of Christ, I've set you an example to do." And so it comes down to our perspective because Jesus in asking that question, asked a very pointed question about what we think of ourselves, that's the lesson learned.

How do you think of yourself and in you answering that question that either prevents you from following the example of Christ or that's going to allow you to say, "No, I never held on to such a high esteem. I never thought of myself so greater than my brother that I would have put myself there.

And definitely, most definitely, I'm not greater than my master." So there is this humility that is a challenge for us. But we would voluntarily not only give respect where respect is due, but give respect in all places that God desires. Give respect wherever God has placed us. Not only we're being humbled because God is humiliating us and putting through all kinds of pain and hurt, but just like Christ as He sees His disciples, as He sees what God has given and as He sees what God has placed before Him, He is more than willing to clothe Himself, tie the apron so to speak, and serve the disciples before Him.

So there's a simple truth, right? Let's be humble, you know. But can I tell you honestly for me, like, you know, one of the struggles in terms of sins that I had early on was just, man, I was such an arrogant individual. And back when I was a new believer and stuff, I really felt like, man, because I struggle with pride and arrogance so much, I just kind of assumed you either are like born with it or you're not.

You know what I mean? Meaning I almost got to a point where I just kind of said, like, "You think a certain way. I'm not going to change." You know? And I remember a time where every time, you know, as a young believer, you're like super gung-ho and you want to serve the Lord or you start learning like, you know, four guitar chords and you think you're the bomb, like whatever it may be, everything in church started turning into pride and pride.

And sometimes you learn theology and then you, you know, go pick a fight with your pastor. I did all of that, you know? And I remember just thinking, like, some people are just humble and some people are not. I was in the category of pride. That's how I thought, just being honest with you, right?

But truthfully speaking, that is not the way the Scriptures speak to us. The Scripture is challenging us with the simple truth that us as followers of Christ all need to hold ourselves. And it is an imperative that we need to do. It is a, what I like to call, the reflexive verb where you humble yourself, right?

You put yourself under the mighty hand of God. You put yourself willingly under other people and you teach yourself. You have to wrestle with yourself. And I just want to, you know, as I was thinking about this passage, I was sitting here thinking, "Oh my goodness, you know, like, oh my goodness, you know, like, this is the beauty of the Scripture where, like, part of me didn't want to teach this because, yeah, I'm being, talking about humility for a guy who struggles so much with a perception of self.

Like, how do people see me wanting to succeed, afraid of failure, all that kind of stuff. There's so much pride in me. And then to teach on this subject, I didn't know how to think of it, you know? And there's a question that I was asking as I was preparing this, like, how do I take this simple truth where you need to be humble and not allow it to just simply skim at the surface and just say, "Okay, we get that, right?

We're all going to be, you know, trying to be humble, okay?" And just let it go. And so what I'm going to do right now is do two part. One, let's really think deeply about what humility is by also being convicted about the various ways we actually are prideful.

But what's more, what always is going to cause us to see that sin of arrogance and pride in its right perspective, and we're talking about perspective today, is when we realize how God sees that pride in us. Another way to put that is how much is pride despicable in the eyes of our God?

So at this time, I'm going to put up some verses on here on the PowerPoint for us, just so that we can get through a good amount of passages and talk about this question. We want to be convicted that surely we want to be people marked by an attitude of humility.

Then in terms of the opposite, the pride in us, what is it? Okay? First, pride seeks self-satisfaction. Pride seeks self-satisfaction. There's a passage from Hosea chapter 4 verse 9. Oh nice, thank you. Okay. And I'm going to read Hosea chapter 13 verse 4 through 9. And it says, "But I am the Lord your God from the land of Egypt.

You know no God but me, and besides me there is no Savior. It was I who knew you in the wilderness and the land of the drowned. But when you had grazed, they became full, and they were filled, and their hearts were lifted up. Therefore they forgot me. So I am to them like a lion, like a leopard will lurk beside the way.

I will fall upon them like a bear robbed of her cubs to tear open their breasts. And there I will devour them like a lion as a wild beast would rip them open." Quite scary, is it not? When there is this arrogance in us that says, "I had my fill, now I don't need you, so forget you." He says, "I will be to you like a huge bear, mother bear who's just been robbed of her cubs." That's incredibly like, you know, vivid, you know?

I'm not sure if you guys have seen that gruesome movie, Revenant or whatever, Revenant, I forgot how to pronounce it. It's a gruesome sight, right? So you ask that question, when it comes to how much God detests an arrogance. An arrogance where you say, "Because I have enough, I don't need you, I don't need him, I don't need them." And I don't know if you guys have ever interacted with people like that.

It will boil you inside. People who use people, people who just simply are dismissive because, "Hey, if you're not for me, if you're not held to me, then I don't need you in my life." God describes it in very vivid terms. Here's another passage. The point here is, pride believes in self-sufficiency.

Pride believes in self-sufficiency. Let's turn our Bibles to Deuteronomy, chapter 8. And I'm going to read from verse 15 through 18. Okay, Deuteronomy, chapter 8, verse 15 through 18. Remember, the nation, after they've been traveling through the wilderness, sorry, in front of the plains of Moab, getting ready to go over into the land of Canaan, and Moses is saying, "You guys need to listen up.

Because so far, it's just been sin, sin, sin, and I need to reiterate God's law to you so that we can have success when we go in." Well, as he's talking about that, look at the convicting words that he says, starting from verse 15. "Who led you," or he's going to describe to them how they have houses and all this kind of stuff, they've multiplied and everything, but God's the one who's doing this, but they're forgetting God.

God's the one who led you through the great and terrifying wilderness with its fiery serpents and scorpions and thirsty ground where there was no water, who brought you water out of the flinty rock, who fed you and the wilderness with manna that your fathers did not know, that He might humble you and test you to do you good in the end.

Beware, lest you say in your heart," what do they say? "My power and the might of my hand have gotten me this wealth." So he says, "You shall remember the Lord your God, for it was He who gives you power to get wealth." Right? The heart of the arrogant, the heart of those who are prideful constantly think, "I am capable.

I can do this." Right? It's the mantra of, "If I just believe hard enough, if I just try hard enough, I probably can." Not only that, but just thinking, "I am sufficient in myself." What's more? Pride puts self above instruction. Okay? Pride puts self above instruction. What do we mean by this?

Well, when you take a look at Jeremiah chapter 13, verses 8 through 10, okay? Jeremiah chapter 13, verses 8 through 10. I'm going to take a moment to turn there real fast. He says this, "Then the word of the Lord came to me. Thus says the Lord, 'Even so, I will spoil the pride of Judah and the great pride of Jerusalem.

This evil people who refuse to hear my words, who stubbornly follow their heart and have gone after other gods to serve them and worship them, shall be like this loincloth which is good for nothing.'" Right? When you think about that again, you hear the frustration in God as He speaks to the prophet to the nation.

You asked for prophets. You asked for prophecies. You know the people were always in custom of going to the prophets any time they went into battle, any time they had a change in leadership, any time they did anything profound, they would ask God for counsel and blessing. But in the end, they just do whatever they want.

Right? In the end, they just continue to do whatever they think is best. Typically, those who are arrogant continue to put themselves above instruction. They're insubordinate. They think they know. Right? And there are sometimes people who I find even in modern day, they'll come to me for counsel. They'll come to Pastor Peter for counsel.

And they'll come to an older brother for counsel. Then they'll come to an elder for counsel. And in the end, they'll just do whatever they want. And I'm sitting there like, "Oh, my goodness. Why? Why did you even ask everybody?" A lot of times what they were doing was they were trying to wait to find or ask around to find someone who would say what they wanted to hear.

The fact of the matter is, what that reveals is, they're still wanting to do whatever they want. What's more, pride takes the glory. Okay? Pride takes the glory. You guys remember the story of Daniel and King Nebuchadnezzar? King Nebuchadnezzar essentially was a madman in many ways because he set up like a huge statue of himself and he expected everybody to worship.

And in the end, as King Nebuchadnezzar continued to have his kingdom grow, he was standing upon his palace looking out and all of a sudden he had a moment of glory. And this is what it says. Verse 29, "At the end of the 12 months, he was walking on the rooftop of the royal palace of Babylon.

And the king answered and said, 'Is not this great Babylon which I have built by my mighty power as a royal residence and for the glory of my majesty?'" And then it says, "While the word was still in the king's mouth, there fell a voice from heaven, 'O King of Nebuchadnezzar, to you it is spoken, the kingdom has departed from you.'" And God literally puts his face on the ground and makes him graze on the grass and makes him into like a beast.

And then later on the king realizes like, "What in the world was I thinking?" And once he comes to his senses, if you scroll down to verse 37, this is what, or 36 and 37, this is what King Nebuchadnezzar says. 36, "At the same time, my reason returned to me and for the glory of my kingdom, my majesty and splendor returned to me.

My counselors and my Lord sought me and I was established in my kingdom and still more greatness was added to me. But now I, Nebuchadnezzar, praise and extol and honor the King of heaven for all his works are right and his ways are just and those who walk in pride, he is able to humble." Okay?

He is able to humble. We ask that question again of just how detestable is pride in the eyes of God? And scripture teaches us repeatedly that God will not stand for that. As a matter of fact, even in the passage that we're looking at, it says very specifically and he quotes verbatim the Old Testament saying, "God is opposed to those who are arrogant and prideful." What's more, Jesus himself taught against haughty eyes and pride that seeks the praise of men.

So the next point is pride seeks the praise of men. Jesus said in Matthew 23 verses 6 through 12, okay? Matthew chapter 23 verses 6 through 12, "And they," that is the Pharisees, "love the place of honor." They love the places of honor at the feasts, the best seats in the synagogues, and greetings in the marketplaces, and being called rabbi by others.

"But you are not to be called rabbi, for you have one teacher and all are brothers. And call no man your father on earth, for you have one Father who is in heaven. Neither be called instructors, for you have one instructor, the Christ. The greatest among you shall be your servant.

Whoever exalts himself will be humbled and whoever humbles himself will be exalted." Man, and then you actually, if you look at the rest of that chapter, he goes off and he says, "Woe to you hypocrites. You look so great on the outside. You clean everything so that everybody can see, but you're just filled with wickedness and vile things." Right?

Those were Christ's harsh words to those who had this desire for the praise of men. So we ask the question of, man, how, again, I'm just kind of being repetitive here, but I want to add the weight of how much Scripture talks about this. In terms of asking how God is angered and frustrated, not frustrated as in like, "Oh man, he's threatened by our pride and what we can accomplish." In many ways, there's indignation of God toward those who are prideful.

And there was a clear example of this in the book of Acts chapter 12 verses 20 through 23. Okay? Basically, King Herod, who was frustrated because Apostle Paul and other people were constantly teaching and he felt like he couldn't, he was in a bit losing control. And as he was moving from one city to this area in Tyre, the people regarded him in high honor.

And this is what happens, verse 20. "Now Herod was angry with the people of Tyre and Sidon, and they came to him with one accord. And having persuaded Blastas, the king's chamberlain, they asked for peace, because their country depended on the king's country for food. On an appointed day, Herod put out his royal robes, took his seat upon the throne, and delivered an oration to them.

And the people were shouting, 'The voice of God and not a man!'" You know, they're shouting, "Oh, this must be a God!" But then look at this, verse 23, "Immediately an angel of the Lord struck him down, because he did not give God the glory, and he was eaten by worms and breathed his last." Lastly, I want to make this statement.

So far we went down this idea of how selfish pride is, how self-sufficient pride is, right? How insubordinate, unyielding, you know? How just kind of like stubborn and whatnot. But as we go through this, we realize pride continues to compete with God for His glory. Pride continues to compete with God for His agenda and His will.

And if that continues to happen, what will happen is that pride will ultimately oppose the very existence of God. Pride will oppose the very existence of God. In Psalm chapter 10, verse 4 and on, this is what the Scripture says, okay? "In the pride of His face, the wicked does not seek Him.

All His thoughts are, 'There is no God.'" Did you catch that? For those who are prideful in His thoughts all day is, "There is no God, there is no God." Why? They can't be! If I'm seeking glory of men, if I feel like I deserve worship, then God is a threat to me, right?

God has no place in my perspective. What's wrong with the heart of pride is there is then no room for the majesty of God. There is no room for the will of the Father. And so pride stands very opposed to God's presence Himself. And the only final solution to that is, "I need to get rid of God." You can say that many people cried out for the crucifixion of Jesus because they were selfish.

They wanted a Savior who was going to give them power, right? But if you look at the heart of the Pharisees, they got rid of Jesus because they were jealous of His power. They were jealous of His glory. There was no room in their religion for the Christ. Because Christ had to become greater and everybody else had to become less.

And so likewise, if we allow arrogance and pride to reside in our life, you will, you will by nature of your pride, push God out. You will by the nature of your pride continue to minimize His power, continue to minimize His will, and everything in terms of perspective will cater to your glory.

And so that's why the passage says, "You need to humble yourself, for God opposes the problem, gives grace to the humble. And if not, you make yourself as one who stands, stands, challenging the God Almighty." Now that first section then, I hope that I wanted to give just an encouraging and also a convicting challenge.

There are times when we repent of certain sins because we see it as heinous. If any of you have felt the conviction in your heart after maybe you said a lie, if any of you have ever felt a conviction in your heart after you did something hurtful and your brother or sister in church or your family member or somebody was in tears because of your sin.

If ever you had felt a sense of brokenness because maybe of sexual sin or whatever and you felt like, "Oh, that was dirty." Let me ask you a question. Have you ever felt a sense of brokenness where the same kind of weight, same kind of remorse hits you because of words of arrogance that came out of your mouth?

Because you realize the kind of arrogance that's in your heart really stands opposed to God Almighty and in terms of the things that He hates, pride stands of one of the top things that He absolutely abhors? Do we have a perspective like that? Not only are the sins that are heinous the ones that cause the greatest amount of pain to me and my friends, but the sins that are actually truly heinous are the ones that really challenge God, right?

And where we think the next best runner up for God is ourselves. When was the last time you were broken over arrogance? You were broken over your pride? I want to make a transition into the next section. You will notice that as He talks about the arrogance and as He talks about the humility that we need to have, the challenge for us to clothe ourselves and humble ourselves under the mighty hand of God, there's also this concept that runs so closely into it.

He says that He may exalt you in the proper time and what's more, He says casting all your anxiety on Him because He cares for you, right? Because He cares for you. And earlier when I asked that question, what were the motivations that you observed in this passage that taught us to be humble, that those motivations all pointed to our trust in the Father?

Whether it be our trust in the might of His hand, but also our trust in the care of His hand. And so what you see is that the attitude Apostle Peter wants us to have is an attitude of trust in verse 6 and 7. But I ask this question.

This is super important for us to understand. As we think about the challenge for us to be humble in our hearts and also as we think about this challenge where He says in verse 7, "Cast all your anxiety upon Him," right? How do the two intersect? Meaning what's the relationship between our humility and our ability to trust in God, right?

Our ability to trust in God. Because the passage and even in its own grammar joins the two like it's supposed to be attached. What do I mean by that? Well in some versions of the Bible, those of verse 6 and verse 7 will be separated. But that verse actually is one long sentence and the thought continues on.

Well the way I want to ask is this. We obviously know that, you know, just from the grammar and all that kind of stuff and just intuitionally, yeah, if I don't believe that God is mighty, then I'm not going to you know like trust Him. We instinctually know if I don't believe that God is caring, then of course I'm not going to trust Him, you know?

But my question is not so much, okay, you have to have that humility to trust or whatever, or sorry, sorry, not so much that you believe in His might or whatever, but there is this question where the challenge for you to humble yourself underneath that is tied in with your ability to trust.

What am I saying here? There's a sense in which talking in a counseling manner, talking in the respective of our own lives, there are times where we have anxieties, there are times when we have fears. Could it be that in those moments it's not just a simple issue of, "Well I just need to trust." Could it be that there are deeper issues and the deeper issues that I'm talking about are issues of pride, right?

That moments when we're not enjoying the peace of God, moments when we're not enjoying that kind of confidence in our Father, the thing that's keeping us away from that could be because there's an arrogance with us. There's maybe not so much like a bombastic, "Hey, look at me," kind of arrogance, but maybe there's a resilient pride.

Maybe there are things that are causing us to not be able to overcome that hurdle towards having confidence and trust in God. So again, asking the question, and I want you guys to just think about this. Why does trust in God equate with our humility? Or another way to put it is, why is humility a prerequisite, required for us to exercise trust in God?

Well here are two points underneath that question. The first, for us to actually have trust in our Father, we have to accept a lowly reality of ourselves. When we are exercising trust in our Heavenly Father, there is an acceptance of the reality, "I do not have X, Y, and Z, or I cannot do X, Y, and Z.

In the position that I'm in, I admit and confess, I am in need. I am vulnerable. I require help." This is a humble admission that we need to understand, and that is why Jesus, when He talks about those who are blessed, He will say, "Blessed are those who are meek.

Blessed are those who are poor." Because they understand reality. They understand how things actually are. And the lie that we often believe is, "No, you don't need. I don't need Him. I don't need Her. And definitely, I don't need God." Right? That's the kind of lies that sometimes we're attacked by.

But secondly, our ability to trust comes with the high reality of God. Right? The high reality of God. Only in humility can you understand in faith the supreme power of God. Only in humility can you just acquiesce and then give that and relinquish that kind of authority, that kind of credence to God Almighty.

And that's what we're talking about right now. And right here, at this point, is where our enemy seeks to devour. At this point is where our enemy works his most, you know, devious schemes. Is through lies. Lies about yourself. Lies about God so that you cannot trust. Every time I counsel an individual, whether it be through the struggles of life, of anxieties, again, my honest belief is every single one of us, because we're struggling with the flesh, we are afraid.

Right? Even those individuals who come off like they're the man, you know, they have fears. Every man struggles with the fear of failure, you know, just going to confess that. When it comes to their work, their labor, the greatest fear is like the fear of having their work not amount to anything.

Fear of feeling like they're not being productive. Fear of not being able to provide, not being able to produce, you know what I mean? There's fear of being disrespected because of all that kind of stuff. We have fears and anxieties over the things that we don't know. We have fears and anxieties over the future.

We have fears and anxieties over rejections. And people are so afraid of stuff like that, that that's why people have things, silly things like fear of, you know, stage, being on the stage, fear of sharing and speaking, you know? And that kind of stuff really, really grips us. We struggle with that.

Right? But as we think about that, every time we try to tackle one of those fears, we realize those are the moments. And our enemy latches on and tries to give us lies, especially about the reality of how we view in a grand scale ourself and God. So for example, the fear of future, you're never going to get a job.

You're never going to amount to anything, you know? And people exaggerate that kind of stuff all the time. I'll ask people who are very, very like in a moment of despair, like I haven't found a job. And they'll say stuff without even knowing, like I'm never going to find a job.

What does that do to your hope? What does that do to your psyche? Satan's over there saying, "That's right, give up, you know? That's right, just throw in the towel. It's pointless anyway." This is the moment Satan desires to devour you. What else? Lies. Lies. Lies about God. God doesn't care.

God doesn't care. I don't know how many people, this simple verse in 1 Peter I had to use and then talk to people and say, "This passage is so powerful for you." Because whether you're willing to admit it or not, by the way you talk, the little subtle things you say, you have believed a huge, huge lie.

Great deception of Satan. Convincing you God doesn't see you. God totally missed you. God doesn't care about you. He doesn't want to use you. He doesn't have a purpose for you. He just doesn't care about you. What a lie. What a lie. But often times it's through struggle and hardship where Satan will use that and say, "See, I told you.

Nobody cares." You know? And then people will actually come to me. They'll come to me and say, "Pastor, I'm thinking about leaving this church." "Why?" "Because nobody cares." "Nobody cares? Really? Like I don't care. I'm someone in the church. You think I don't care?" You know? And they're like, "Not you, but nobody else cares." You know?

"But that's what you said. Did you hear yourself?" "Let me ask you a question. Did you go around serving everybody? Can I just ask you a question today? Do you care?" You know? But no, what has Satan done? He lied to you. This is how, I ask you this question for homework.

How does Satan in real life try to devour you? He devours you with deception. He devours you with lies. And this is where we need to fight. Right here in the moment of faith. And that's why he'll even talk about that in his passes, does he not? Because he's a liar.

He's a liar. He's a liar. He's a liar. And I want to tell you something. I want to tell you something. I want to tell you something. He devours you with lies. And I want to tell you something. He devours you with deception. He devours you with lies. And I want to tell you something.

He devours you with deception. He devours you with lies. And I want to tell you something. He devours you with deception. He devours you with lies. And I want to tell you something. He devours you with deception. He devours you with deception. He devours you with lies. And I want to tell you something.

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He devours you with deception. He devours you with deception. He devours you with deception. He devours you with deception. He devours you with deception. He devours you with deception. He devours you with deception. He devours you with deception. He devours you with deception. He devours you with deception. He devours you with deception.

He devours you with deception. He devours you with deception. He devours you with deception. He devours you with deception. He devours you with deception. He devours you with deception. He devours you with deception. He devours you with deception. In the scriptures, in Isaiah chapter 51 verse 12, and I would like you to turn to this passage because it's very important.

God is going to combine this idea of humility and trust and commend us as you're going through the hardest times of your life, as you're going through great difficulty. You need to have both these attitudes. And this is what God says. So Isaiah chapter 51 starting from verse 12.

He says, "I, I'm he who comforts you. Who are you that you are afraid of man who dies? Of the son of man who is made like grass and have forgotten the Lord your maker who stretched out the heavens and laid the foundations of the earth and you fear continually all day because of the wrath of the oppressors when he sets himself to destroy?

And where is the wrath of the oppressors?" This is a really interesting passage, but essentially what is happening is the people have failed to trust God and they are living in fear, running away from their enemies. And God doesn't say, "Oh, you poor thing." He rebukes them. And what does he say?

He rebukes them and says, "How prideful you are. Who do you think you are?" That's the question God asks. Who are you? Who are you that you're afraid of man? Now we asked the question, why is God asking that question? Because when you do not trust, you indirectly accuse God.

When you do not have this confidence, you indirectly doubt. You accuse God. Are you really mighty? Are you really in control? You accuse God. Do you really care? Our inability to have confidence in God is arrogant. It is. I mean, imagine regular people talking to each other that way.

As a matter of fact, there was this one time I went to an interesting retreat with an interesting group of people. And it wasn't the recent one. It was a long time ago. And there was this young lady who I started doing small talk with. And for some reason, I felt like I couldn't get beyond the small talk.

Well, by the last night, I went by and I was like, "Oh, you know, it's the last night. How are you doing?" You know, she was like, "I'm good." And I was like, "Cool." And I started trying to do this more small talk. So I said, "You learning this stuff?" And she was kind of like, "I don't know what to say." So I was like, "Oh, maybe it sounds like you're not doing that well." She was like, "I'm just tired of the small talk." I was like, "Okay.

Why?" You know, "I'm just trying here." And she was like, "It's so fake." I was like, "Dang." And I kind of looked at her and I said, "Well, you judged me for being fake. I'm going to judge you for being arrogant." "Man, I don't even know what to say to you.

You just judged me for being fake because you didn't believe I actually asked you. Yes, it's small talk, but I actually asked you because I care." Let me ask you a question. Sometimes we treat God like that. Where in our lack of confidence, where God says to the Scriptures, "Believe me, trust me, reside in me, take my comfort, let me heal you." But we let that blow off and we keep seeking to protect ourselves.

We keep seeking to put up our fences, to put up our defenses, to retaliate, whatever it may be, when we don't realize that every single one of those efforts actually is accusing God. You have to trust that you care. But if you talk like that to anybody else at church, then you're just going to blow off everybody.

"You're fake, you're fake, you don't really care. Don't ask me questions." What is that? Isn't that arrogance? And so, we make this challenge and we start to understand, how is our trust in God connected to our humility? When we have pride in our hearts, we neglect ourselves, we void ourselves of the privilege of having that sweet peace and confidence in God.

So that's why God is saying, especially in this moment when you're going through great persecution and suffering and all the pains that you're going through, go through this with humility. And one of the most humble things you can do, believe it or not, is to be carefree with God.

Is to be care resolved. There are things that I'm anxious for, there are things that I'm worried, there are things that I'm fearful, but I have a resolution in the character and the power of God. That's humility expressed. As we believe that God truly is both mighty and that He truly does care for us.

And so by a way of final exhortation, we as Christians are going to wrestle with that all the time. We're going to wrestle with our pride and then we're going to wrestle with our confidence in God. And that's what Paul the Peter is going to say. Be sober, be clear minded, be alert, be ready, so that you would stand firm in the strong belief.

That you would stand firm in the belief that God absolutely cares for you. Even if all of life, everything's going sour and one by one things are starting to collapse and you just feel like, man, I feel like God has it out for me. I feel like I'm the target of God's attack even.

Believe and stand firm. God has chosen you, given you an amazing calling and an incredible purpose to use you. So that as we believe this, as we understand God, we would rid ourselves of all the defenses, all the prideful talk, all the like, you know, stern face, thick skin, and all things would be released so that we would enjoy the fruit of a church that's really humble with God and humble with each other.

Where we're not being defensive with each other, so cautious walking on eggshells. We're actually humble, receiving, open, vulnerable. Enjoy the benefits of not competing with each other, looking out for each other, right? But rather that we're actually in peace with one another. And so I pray that just as Apostle Peter has said, that we would be able to go through every experience and every season of our lives with a great perspective.

God is the one with a mighty hand and a careful hand in which we can entrust ourselves. Amen? Let's take a moment to pray. Heavenly Father, we want to thank you so much, God. Just to think that you are so relentless to teach those who often are stubborn. We confess, God, that sometimes we can be slow to change.

We can be slow to come around. But I ask that we would be ever growing and trying to understand truly how powerful you are and truly how loving you are. And that, God, we would continue just to be forgetful of ourselves because we trust you so much. That, God, we don't sit here wringing our hands about what we're going to do, what's going to come of us, and what's going to happen to us because we absolutely trust you.

I pray, Father God, that you would grant to us great faith so that we can continue to withstand the attacks of our enemy who continues to seek to put into our hearts filth, filth of arrogance, filth of thinking way too highly of ourselves. I pray, Father God, that more and more rather than making much of our own lives, Lord, we would make much of your great love.

Father, we thank you so much and pray again that through the week you would grant to us just a constant steady trust in you. We thank you in Christ's name. Amen.