CHAPTER & VERSE
PRIDE GOES BEFORE A FALL
DR. JIM DIXON
2 PETER 5:5-6
JUNE 12, 2011
There is an old story about a small twin engine plane flying on a bitter winter day through a storm. On this plane, there were four people: the pilot, a computer programmer, a pastor, and a Boy Scout. As they flew this bitter winter storm, the right engine went out. The plane began to lose altitude. Ice began to form on the wings. It was a crisis. The pilot came out of the cockpit and said, “This plane is going down and we don’t have much time. We only have three parachutes. I have a wonderful wife and three kids. I shouldn’t do this, but I am taking one of these parachutes and I am leaving.” He opened the door and took the parachute and jumped. The computer programmer said, “I am probably the smartest man in the world, and what I do I do for all mankind.” He reached for another parachute and jumped out of the plane. The pastor turned to the Boy Scout and said, “You know you are young; you have your whole life ahead of you. I am elderly and I have had a long and very blessed life. You take the last parachute; I will go down with the plane.” The Boy Scout said, “Relax, reverend. The world’s smartest man just took my backpack and jumped out of the plane.”
We live in a world where there are a lot of people who put themselves first. In fact, I think, as we go through the days of our lives, most people tend to put themselves first. You see a few people out there who put others first. That is kind of what we are talking about this morning. We are talking about humility. This subject is at the core of scripture. This is one of the great virtues. This is the longing of God for us, that we would develop this quality, this character called humility.
I have three teaching this morning. The first is this: humility is not natural. In this world, it is not natural. Mark mentioned this earlier in the service. The Greek word for humility is the word “tapeinos;” this word “tapeinos” literally means low. Another word for humility in the Bible is “tapeinosthren,” which simply means a mind that is willing to lower itself, willing to lower itself for the sake of another. You see, the Biblical call of humility is not simply to lower yourself; it is the idea of lowering yourself in order to exalt someone else. So, if you are really humble, you are willing to lower yourself for the sake of exalting someone else. This is what God wants us to learn.
In England, centuries ago, the nobility used to love to eat venison. This is one of their favorite foods, their favorite meet and they would go on deer hunts and they would bring venison to their homes. They would eat the best cuts of the venison; they would eat the steaks and the roasts. Then they would take the entrails, the leftovers, the heart the kidney, the liver. They would grind it up and put it into the pie, called humble pie. The humble pie would go to the common people, to the masses. You have heard the expression to eat humble pie. In our first service, I said they took the gizzard from the deer, but deer do not have gizzards. “Boy, there is nothing like deer gizzard.”
Obviously, the poor people ate humble pie. To understand the Biblical concept of humility, you would have to think of it like this. Imagine you had the whole deer in front of you, it was all there, and you could choose whatever cut you wanted. You could choose the steaks, you could choose the roasts, you could choose the best cuts or you could lower yourself and you could choose the entrails in order that you exalt some others and they have the good stuff. Humility is the willingness to take the part of the deer that is less desirable in order to bless someone else, and that is not natural. If you have grown up with siblings in a house, you know it is not natural. You know it is not natural to lower yourself so that someone else might be blessed or exalted. Not in this world.
It is also true that humility is hard to attain. Pride is very subtle. Many of you have heard of Harry Ironsides. Harry Ironsides died in 1951. He was the great leader of Christian Fundamentalism in the United States of America in the first half of the twentieth century. Harry Ironsides rose in the ministry of the YMCA. He became the pastor of the Moody Memorial Church in Chicago, which at the time was considered the greatest church in the United States of America. From 1930 to 1948, for those eighteen years he pastured Moody Memorial. He preached every Sunday in that 4,200-seat auditorium, sanctuary and it was packed, always packed. Harry was prominent. He served on the board of trustees for Bob Jones University, served on the board of trustees for Dallas Theological Seminary, served on the board of trustees for Moody Bible Institute, and served on the board of trustees for Wheaton College. He was called the greatest preacher in the United States of America.
The problem was he kind of believed it. His wife knew this about him and she went up to him one day and said, “Harry, you are very proud and you need to learn humility. You are kind of swollen with conceit, Harry, and I don’t think this pleases Christ. I think you need to experience a little humiliation.” Harry said, “Well, what are you suggesting?” She said, “You know, I have been thinking about it and I think it would be great if you would just spend a day going around downtown Chicago with a sandwich board. Just put that over your head. On the front board put ‘John 3:16,’ and, ‘Jesus Saves.’ On the back board, put, ‘repent.’ I think if you walk around downtown all day like that, I think it would be good for you.” He says, “I can’t do that. I am a respected clergy man.” She said, “I think it would be good for you, Harry.”
So, Harry decided that he would take her up on this. He went around the city of Chicago, the downtown area, all day, morning, noon and all the way into the night with a sandwich board. ‘Jesus Saves’ ‘Repent’ At the end of the day, people made fun of him. All day long they made fun of him, they mocked him, they teased him, and belittled him. He came home at the end of the day and sat down. He was tired and was just kind of quiet. He didn’t say anything. He just put his head down. His wife let him sit there for a while. Finally, she said, “Well, Harry, what are you thinking?” He said, “Well, I was thinking there is probably not another minister in the world that would have been willing to do what I did today.” Pride just has a way of creeping in there, even pride about humility. That is the nature of mankind.
The reason that humility is such a struggle for us, the reason humility is so hard to attain, is because Satan is the archon of this world. The Bible tells us that the devil is the prince of this world. Whether prior to his fall he was given some kind of dominion or assignment here on earth or not, we do not know. We do know that he is called the archon of this world, the prince of this world. The devil and the demonic powers have great influence on this earth and their thinking and their thought infuses everything. So, you look at our culture and it is infused with the thinking of the powers of darkness. What do you think of when you think of culture? You might think of the arts, you might think of theatre, you might think of drama, you might think of painting, sculpture, and literature. Many different images come to mind when we think of the word culture.
The word culture comes from the Latin word “culturo,” and that word means to grow, to change, to transform. We use the word culture in a variety of ways. Today we talk about a Petri dish where bacteria is cultured, where it is changed, where it transforms, where it grows. We think of yogurt. We eat yogurt, where acidophilus and active cultures are changing and transforming. We use the word in so many ways. We grow up in a culture that changes us. We grow up in a culture that grows and transforms us. Understand the imago Dei is in the culture because mankind was created in the image of God, so there is something of God in the culture. Although we are fallen and the image of God is shattered, it is residual in us still.
There is something of God that we see in the arts and in culture, but there is also something of the devil and of the demonic realm because they have infused their thinking into the culture. Even the genetic structures of our bodies, even the genes of our lives, our bodies, are touched by the powers of darkness. Nothing is as it was meant to be. We are born with everything tainted; the Bible makes that clear. Therefore, humility is very, very hard because it is not in the mind of Satan. Satan seeks to exalt himself. He would gladly lower everyone else to exalt himself; he doesn’t lower himself to exalt others. So, that mindset infuses society, the culture, everywhere we go, at home, in our neighborhoods and at work. Therefore, humility is not natural.
There is a second teaching. The second teaching is if we chose humility, if we clothe ourselves with humility… and you remember the words of the Apostle Peter, “Clothe yourselves, all of you, with humility towards one another.” So, we are to put on this garment called humility. It is not part of our birthday suit, it is not natural; you have to choose to put it on, and you have to choose to wear it. If you do that, if you chose to put on the garment of humility God will reward you. That is the second teaching. This passage of scripture is very clear about that. If I choose to wake up each day and say, “You know, I want to exalt God and I want to exalt people and I am even willing to lower myself today in order to do that,” if I choose to wear that garment, God will reward me. God will bless me.
The Bible says in 1 Peter, in our passage of scripture for today, that he opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble. If I chose to put on this garment of humility he will grace me, he will offer some special grace to me. Humble yourselves, therefore, unto the mighty hand of God that in due time he may exalt you. So, he also promises to exalt us. If we choose to put on this garment, he will exalt us.
This doesn’t mean the world will exalt us if we wear this garment. Indeed, the world oftentimes exalts the proud. It doesn’t necessarily exalt the humble. I think the Bible is clear that if we chose to put on this garment, it is dangerous. If you choose to put on this garment of humility the devil will come against you. He seeks the people of God. He delights in attacking those who wear this garment. That is why, in this passage of scripture, Peter moves from a discussion of humility to a subject discussing the attacks of Satan. God opposes the proud, but Satan opposes the humble. He prowls around, our passage of scripture says, like a roaring lion seeking someone to devour.
In the early church, everyone had a picture in their mind of a lion. In the time of David, lions were in Israel; they were indigenous. In the time of Christ, they were rare. Today, they are non¬existent; they are extinct in that part of the world. Everybody in the Roman world had a picture of a lion because they had been to amphitheaters, they had been to hippodromes, like the Circus Maximus in Rome, amphitheaters like the Flavian Amphitheatre, better known as the Colosseum, in Rome. Romans built in every city throughout the Roman Empire amphitheaters and hippodromes, even in Israel. They released lions for the entertainment of other people. The lions attacked other animals, the lions attacked gladiators and, at times in and various places, Christians were persecuted by lions. So, there was this image the average person had of a lion devouring flesh, blood dripping from the mouth and that was their image of a lion. That is the image of the devil here.
Today, we have images of lions and we have this from the movies, from television and television programs. We have all gone to the zoo. Barb and I went to the zoo just last week. We love to go to the zoo from time to time and the whole world of animals. We took our daughter Heather and her husband Chris and we took Abigail and Nina and Dixon, our grandchildren. We had a great day at the zoo. We went to the lion enclosure, which is relatively new. There were two big male lions. We wanted to see them because male lions look majestic and ferocious. But they were just kind of kissing each other, kind of licking tongues. One of the zoo attendants told Heather that these two male lions were actually gay. I don’t know whether that is true or not, but that is what this zoo attendant said. He said, “Normally male lions do not get along because there is competition for the pride, but these two males get along just great.”
I don’t know whether that is true, but I do know this: It doesn’t matter whether a lion is gay or straight, you don’t want to get in the enclosure. To a lion, whether that lion is gay or straight, you are prey. That is what we are to understand of the devil here. He views the people of God as prey. He views people who put on the clothing of humility as prey and the devil wants to devour them. We need the protection of Christ.
There is that beautiful passage in Luke’s Gospel, chapter twenty-two, beginning with verse 31. You see Jesus and Peter and Jesus is about to go to the cross. Peter says, “Lord, everyone else may deny you but I will never deny you. I am ready to lay down my life for you.” Jesus said, “Truly I say to you, before the cock crows you will deny me three times.” Then in that same context Jesus says to Peter, “Simon, Simon, behold, the devil demanded to have you that he might sift you like wheat.” You can’t help but think of the tribulum in the Roman world, which was the equipment that was used to sift wheat. It was a violent procedure. We get the word tribulation from the Latin word tribulum. So, “The devil demanded to have you that he might bring you into tribulation, that he might torture you.”
Now, the “you” in verse 31 is plural. The devil didn’t just desire or demand to have Peter, but all of the disciples. Jesus is saying to Peter, “The devil demanded to have you (plural, all of you),” then in the next verse, the “you” is singular. Jesus said, “I prayed for you, Peter, and you are protected. I have prayed that your faith will be strong, that you might be able to help the others.”
Now, when you look at a passage like that, you will see that key to spiritual warfare is faith in Christ. It is not faithfulness. You might think that the key is your faithfulness and we long for faithfulness, we hunger and thirst for righteousness, but if the key to spiritual warfare was our faithfulness, we would all be in trouble. We are all sinners in desperate need of grace. There is none righteous, no, not one. The key is not our faithfulness but the power of Christ and our faith in that power. In the very context where Jesus tells Peter, “You are going to deny me three times before the cock crows,” He also says, “I prayed for you. The devil wanted you, but I protected you. Your faith is going to be strong and you are going to be able to help others.” As we clothe ourselves with this garment, and we put on humility, the devil will come against us. Our faith in Christ is strong. He is Lord of Lord and King of Kings and has the power to protect his people and to bless them.
The promise is grace. Christ opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble. The Greek word is “charis.” It means unmerited favor. It is used of gifts, when we gift to somebody it is not something that they have earned, it is not something they have deserved, it is just something we choose to give them freely. Unmerited grace. Christ is saying, “If you put on this garment of humility, I will protect you from the evil one and I will grace you. I will show you unmerited favor, I will gift you.” Humble yourself, therefore, unto the mighty hand of God that he may exalt you. The word there is “upso” and “huperupso” (now that is a great-sounding Greek word), and it means to highly exalt. Christ wants to exalt us; he wants to elevate us. We see this principal throughout scripture that God exalts the humble.
In Genesis chapter thirteen you see the story of Abraham and Lot. They have come into the Promised Land and Abraham humbles himself before God and he humbles himself before his nephew Lot. Abraham says, “If you chose the right, I will go to the right. If you chose the left, I will go to the right. You can choose the portion of the Promised Land that you want and I will take what is left over.” Lot is not humble he is not willing to exalt Abraham. He is not willing to lower himself to exalt Abraham. He chooses the best part. He takes the steak, he takes the roast, and he will not eat the humble pie. What Lot does is he takes the Jordan Valley, which is fertile and rich and Abraham takes what is left over.
But God exalts Abraham. God graces Abraham and Lot has all kinds of problems. God opposes the proud, but God gives grace to the humble. We see that principal throughout the Bible. We see it supremely in Christ himself. You come to that incredible passage in Philippians chapter two and the Bible says,
“Have this mind in you which is yours in Christ Jesus, who though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be held onto, to be clutched, but he emptied himself, (‘kenosis’), taking on the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men and having humbled himself he became obedient unto death, even death on a cross. Therefore, God had highly exalted him, (‘upso,’ ‘huperupso’), and bestowed upon him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee shall bow in heaven and on earth and under the earth and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord.”
He has called us to his way. As he entered our world, Lord himself, in order to exalt us, he now calls us to go into other people’s world, lowering ourselves that we might exalt them. The promise of God is that we will be graced, and we ourselves will be exalted. These are the promises of God.
The word exalt, this word “upso” or “huperupso,” is found in the Song of Mary in Luke chapter one. In the Song of Mary this exaltation is food for the hungry, it is clothing for the poor, it is joy for the sorrowful, it is mercy and blessing, all the beautiful exaltation and elevation that God offers his people. His promises are so great if we would choose to put on this garment called humility.
There is one last teaching. The final teaching is this it is that God’s rewards may be delayed. Humility is not natural; we have to choose to put it on. If we put it on, God promises he will reward us, but those rewards may be delayed. The Bible makes it clear; this passage of scripture makes it clear. It says, “In due time he may exalt you.” In due time he will exalt you, “en kairo.” “En kairo” means, “in the providential time, at the appropriate time, at the right time.”
In some of the earliest manuscripts there is also the Greek word “episkeptomai,” and that word means visitation. So, “at the time of visitation he will exalt you,” which would be the second coming of Jesus Christ. That is quite a delay. If you put on this garment, you don’t necessarily want to wait until the second coming of Christ to have grace come your way and to have exaltation come your way. Understand, though, that “episkeptomai” is probably not in the original manuscript so “en kairo” is simply what is there in the Greek and it probably does not mean at the time of visitation, but at the appropriate time, the perfect time for you, at the providential time he will exalt you.
We see in 1 Peter 5:7 that the delay is expected and therefore these words: “Cast all of your anxieties upon him for he cares for you.” So, the assumption is if you put on this garment the evil one is going to come against you and there is going to be a time where it is hard. Cast all of your anxieties upon him because he loves you and he cares greatly about you. When you look at the beginning of the passage in 1 Peter 5, there is this exhortation of the elders. The elders, the shepherds, the pastors of the flock of the churches are called to humility. Tend the flock of God, which is your charge; not by constraint but willingly; not for shameful gain but eagerly; not as domineering over those in your charge but being an example to the flock. When the chief shepherd is manifested, you will receive the unfading crown of glory.
Here the delay is to the second coming, with regard to the promise given to pastors. They are to labor humbly, knowing that at the second coming they will receive a pastor’s reward. Then you look at the end of this chapter and you look at those who have clothed themselves with humility and are being persecuted by the devil and it says, “Resist him, firm in the faith, knowing that the same experience of suffering is required of your brothers and sisters all over the world. And when you have suffered for a little while….” There is this delay in the grace and reward and God wants us to know there will be this delay. “When you have suffered for a little while, then the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ Jesus, will himself restore you, establish you, and strengthen you.”
I don’t know whether you are aware of the greatness and the richness of those promises. The word restore is “katarzine.” “Katarzine” means to set a fracture. So, “When you have suffered for a little while, God will come and restore you, he will set your fractures.” The assumption is there is going to be a few fractures you are going to experience. You are going to have some bones crack—they may be financial, they might be relational, they might have to do with your health, but God is going to come after you have suffered for a little while and set the fracture.
Then he is going to establish you. The Greek word is “sterixei,” which means to make hard as a rock. You may have fractured; he is going to set it and you are not likely to fracture again because he is going to strengthen those bones. He is going to set them and then strengthen them and then infuse you with power. When it says restore, establish, and strengthen, the word for strengthen, which is “sthenosei,” means to infuse with power, to endow with power, to fill with power, even power for ministry. The promise of Christ, the promise of God, is rich. If we put on the garment of humility, yes, the evil one will come against us, but Christ, as we put our faith in him, will protect us. Then after, perhaps, a delay, he will grace us, he will exalt us, and he will restore, establish, and strengthen us.
This past week, on Wednesday night, Barb and I went to an event down at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science. It was sponsored by the Roman Catholic Church. It has to do with an archeological dig that is taking place in Israel on the Sea of Galilee in the village of Magdala, from which Mary Magdalene came. It is considered one of the greatest archeological finds in the last century. I was asked if I would serve on the host committee, which I did. There were Catholics there and there were Protestants there and there were also people from the Jewish community there.
What they found at Magdala on the Sea of Galilee is a first century BC synagogue, a synagogue that has just been unearthed from a century before Christ. This was a synagogue that, no doubt, Christ taught in, a synagogue in which he prayed. The major road from Nazareth to the Sea of Galilee passed right by this synagogue. Jesus would have been there many times, time and time again. The president, the CEO of the Denver Museum of nature and Science said to us that he was a man of faith. He said, “How can anyone unearth the femur of a mastodon and not see God?” I have to admit, that was a thought that never occurred to me. It was kind of a cool event in that it has to do with a synagogue that Christ was in.
There is a synagogue at Capernaum on the Sea of Galilee, but it is third century and there is one at Bethsaida, but again, it was not from the time of Christ. This was from the time of Christ; this is an amazing find. In fact, the Roman Catholic Church owned the land and they were going to build a hotel and an education center and a spiritual retreat there and they were going to put the chapel on the site. As they began to dig down, right underneath it was this synagogue of Jesus’ time with the exact same footprint.
This is a God thing. What an amazing thing! They are going to go ahead and build the hotel and the educational center and the Christian retreat center. It should be a great place for us to go to. As we were going down there in the car, Barb and I were with my brother Greg and his wife, who is also Barb. We were driving downtown and in the lane right next to us we saw AnnaSophia Robb. AnnaSophia Robb is the Hollywood actress who starred in the movie Soul Surfer. She goes to Arapahoe High, she is a wonderful Christian gal, and she loves Jesus Christ. In that movie she played the part of Bethany Hamilton. I had mentioned Bethany Hamilton a month or two ago and I hadn’t seen the movie Soul Surfer yet, and I have seen it now and I love the movie.
Part of what I love about it is it is really about 1 Peter chapter five. This is a Christian gal and a surfer, talented, from a Christian family. She seems to be a very humble person who has chosen to clothe herself with humility. She was attacked by a shark and her arm just chopped off. It was devastating. Everybody thought it was the end of everything for her but in due time, God has come and restored her, God has established her, God has infused her with power. It is power for ministry. She is surfing again and she is still a champion surfer, but God has infused her with power for ministry. It is amazing what God can do, how God can take the events, the hardships and the seeming tragedies of our life and God can do amazing things if we trust him and if we clothe ourselves with his garment called humility. He has called his people to be people of faith. Let’s look to the Lord with a word of prayer.