Tonight, we're going to be in the book of Proverbs in the 16th chapter. Proverbs chapter 16. Very interesting topic for us tonight. One that I know that I've spoken on on several occasions, but none that I think I actually drew the text from, but it's found here in our text.

Every person that's ever been born comes from the womb speaking lies, the scripture says. And what is the lie that we say? that we are our own God. It's all about number one. It's all about me. It's all about self. You never heard a baby ask permission to have something, have you? Not an infant, certainly not. They can't communicate. They come from the womb because they're born their own God. Now they don't sub, they don't consciously know that, but that's the result of sin. That's the result of sin.

The very first sin, if you recall, Satan in heaven said, I will. Anytime we say that, that's usually gonna get us in trouble. because it's the root of the problem. That's what we're gonna talk about tonight. I will ascend above the heavens. I will be as the most high. I'm gonna be God. That's what he said.

What was the second sin? Well, he said, he saw that the fruit was good. It was good to eat. It was pleasant to the eye, to make one wise. She took of it and she ate. That's power, popularity, and pleasure, isn't it? I can be my own God. That was it.

What about the third sin that the Bible records? I'm sure there's many others besides that prior to this sin, but it was Cain and Abel. Abel brought the fruit of the lamb, brought what God required, the blood of the lamb, and God accepted that sacrifice. Instead of the Abel and his sacrifice, the Lord had respect unto it. Cain brought the fruit, the works of his hands, the fruit of his vineyard, the fruit of his, the vegetables and the fruits of his labor. He was a tiller, he was a farmer. Brought the very best he had, but undecane and undecane offering God had no respect.

Now, was that a sin? Well, Lord told him, said, Cain, if you do good, you will be received. You will be. All you have to do is what Abel did. You just look to Christ, look to the blood. And they were talking, Abel and Cain, after the Lord had departed. Figuratively, the Lord never departs. We understand that he's everywhere all the time, but And Cain was wroth with his brother Abel. You know why Cain was wroth with his brother Abel? Because his brother said, just offer a lamb. That's what the Lord wants. I'm good enough on my own. I don't need to do that. What I've made is good enough. Does that sound like anybody you ever heard before? He killed his brother. Why? Because he couldn't kill God. Cain wanted to be his own God. I am good enough. I am good enough. My choice is good enough. The works of my hands are good enough. What I've offered is good enough. That's the third sin.

All of these have a common denominator, an unmistakable root problem. As a matter of fact, all sin, all rebellion, all disobedience, all unbelief, all stem from the same source, and it's pride. Pride. That's the subject tonight. Pride. Every man thinks highly than he ought, the scripture says. Every man thinks more highly of himself than he should.

Let's read our text. Proverbs 16 verse 1 says, and we're going to read through verse 7. I had more verses written down, but I wanted to condense this because there's a lot in this little bit. Verse 1, Proverbs 16, the preparations of the heart and man. And the answer of the tongue is from the Lord, as the ways of man are clean in his own eyes. All the ways of man are clean in his own eyes. Do you see that? All the ways of man are clean in his own eyes, but the Lord weigheth the spirits. Commit thy works unto the Lord, and thy thoughts shall be established. The Lord hath made all things for himself, yea, even the wicked for the day of evil. Everyone that is proud in heart is an abomination to the Lord. Though hand joined in hand, he shall not be unpunished. By mercy and truth, iniquity is purged, and by the fear of the Lord, men depart from evil. When a man's ways please the Lord, he maketh even his enemies to be at peace with him.

Here in our text, we have the root problem. All the ways of man are right in their own eyes. Solomon said this multiple times in different ways, hasn't he? Multiple times in different ways. But that's the root of the problem. Why? Because it's pride. It's pride. It's all about self. Self-value, self-entitlement, self-worth. That's our society, isn't it?

It also gives us the only solution. It says here in verse six, by mercy and truth, iniquity is purged. What's the solution? The mercy and grace of God. That's the solution. It is of the Lord's mercy that we are not consumed, the scripture says, because when we are made to know the truth, we're made to see that we're not getting better and better, we're getting more and more worse. We're getting more and more prideful in this flesh.

I love how the Lord does things on the way to church tonight. I'm driving. Somebody felt like they were about six inches from my bumper, and I knew what I was gonna be preaching on tonight. And she knew what I was gonna be preaching on tonight. And I thought to myself, now what am I gonna do about this? And so I pulled over and let him pass. I got the last laugh because we end up catching up to them, but that's not the point. That's pride, isn't it? That is the point. It's just how we are. It's just how we are. I didn't do anything ugly. I didn't do anything rude. You know, sometimes we may do something. It's the flesh. It just wants to be its own god in every way. So full of pride and so full of self and selfishness. So much entitlement. I deserve this and I deserve that. That's how we come from the womb. We're not made to see that we're getting better and better. We're made to see that we're getting worse and worse.

Paul said, Oh, wretched man, that I am not that I was. No, we don't preach progressive sanctification here. We preach sanctification by the spirit and it's internal. It's not external. We're bad. We're worse. Now we've ever been on the outside, but we're perfectly righteous on the inside by the grace of God, by his blood alone. That's the good news of the gospel.

You ever notice that commercials are even geared towards making people feel empowered? Have it your way. Come shop here, come eat here, have it your way. We'll make it just how you like it. You just let us know, everything that you want. We won't even upcharge you for it. You're entitled, you're empowered. That's just commercials. I mean, and this is part of what I'm talking about tonight, the pride of man, because everybody wants what they want. When it comes to God's salvation, there can be no pride. That's the point. There can be no pride, when it comes to God's salvation. If you approach God with pride, you're gonna end up just like Cain, so will I. If we approach God like, well, try to make fig leaves like Adam did to cover up our sin, God's not gonna accept that. And it was only by God's grace the Lord didn't destroy Adam and start a new man, but it was all his purpose, all his purpose. Fig leaves represent the works of man's hand. It was his pride. I can cover myself up. That's works, isn't it?

Do you know what God's people are made to say? I told Mac tonight, whenever, I'm not singling you out, you don't mind if I say this, I hope. He said, how you doing tonight? I said, better than I deserve. He said, well, if we're doing as good as we deserve, we'd be splat, that's what we deserve. I said, yeah, that sounds about right, Mac, I believe that.

You know what the Lord's people are made to say? Whatever state I find myself therewith to be, Content, content, not content in the circumstance, content in the Christ, the God who sent the circumstance. We're made to say, I deserve a lot worse, far worse than this. And then we have this warfare going on of our flesh that says we deserve this and we deserve this because of this and this and this.

That new man, new man says, no, we don't deserve anything but the pits of hell. That's what it says. Funny part, or most interesting part about it is, is that the old man never owns it's sin, the new man does. There's no sin to be owned by the new man. Isn't that interesting? The Lord's already put it away. It's amazing.

Only the Lord's people are made to say, I deserve, no matter what I get, I deserve far worse. Can we say that, honestly? If we can, it's because the Lord gave us the grace to say that. The grace to say that. That's not of this world. It's only by God's grace, by his given faith, only the elect are made to say this.

Now, look at verse six. By mercy and truth, iniquity is purged, and by the fear of the Lord, men depart from evil. The only way we repent is if God is the doer of it. Interestingly enough, after the Lord came to Cain and said, where is your brother Abel? You talk about arrogant, prideful. Am I my brother's keeper? You can't tell me he wasn't smarting off to God. I mean, that's just what it was. That's really stupid of him to do, but that's exactly what he was doing.

Lord said, well, you're going to be a vagabond. Your brother's blood's crying from the ground vengeance. That's what it was crying. He said, you're going to be a vagabond forced to roam about this world. Nobody's going to know you. You're going to have a target on your head the rest of your life. And you know what he said? He didn't say, woe is me. I'm undone. I'm a man of unclean lips like Isaiah. He didn't say, I'm going to put my hands over my mouth and never speak again. Behold, I am vile. He didn't say that either like Job did.

You know what he said? My punishment is too great. I deserve better. That's what he was saying. I deserve better. Oh, is that not us by nature, brethren? That's just us. The Lord took some of his sentence off, I guess you could say, where men wasn't going to try to kill him after that. He was still a vagabond his entire life. He had to be a nomad. He didn't have anywhere to lay his head.

If God is the doer of it, he'll give us repentance, and if we can, we will. If we can, we will. Repentance is what God gives that changes our mind about who he is, about what we are, about what we deserve.

Once you see him as Isaiah, we'll get to Isaiah in a minute, but once we see him as high and lifted up and seated, sovereign, holy, just, true, and our self as undone, I don't deserve anything. I don't deserve the bed I lay in at night time. I'm a creature of dust. I'm a sinner by nature, a sinner by practice. I find myself sinning. I'm saying, what are you doing, self? All the time, what am I doing? All others will excuse themselves because of pride, but God's people are given repentance over and over and over. The mercies of the Lord are renewed every morning, the scripture says.

Somebody might say to that, regarding repentance, I heard somebody this week say this. Repentance is something we choose to do. And to that I would remind us, Cain did not repent after his punishment was given. If there was repentance capable in a man to do, that would have been it right there. When the Lord cast judgment upon Cain, he would have said, woe is me. Repentance is just like faith, it comes from God, not man-made. Everything God requires, he provides, everything. He provides the repentance necessary for you to repent, causes you to do so, and gives you and I the faith to believe Him and Him alone.

Says that Cain found no place of repentance, though he sought it with tears. That tells me that repentance is not of man. It's not of man. Repentance is a gift of God freely given by grace only to His elect.

Now there's a few individuals in scripture, and I was gonna have his turn, but I chose not to for this is the sake of time, and sometimes I get caught up reading too much, and it's a Wednesday night. Sometimes when you read too much, people get tired, so I chose not to do that.

But a couple of fellas I wanna talk, people I wanna talk to us about tonight that had pride as their issue, and what they all had in common I found very interesting. The first one is Pharaoh. Think about everything that Pharaoh saw with his natural eyes. And you would think if anybody would have repented, everybody would have believed God, Pharaoh would have. He saw the 10 plagues of Egypt. I mean, from the boils to the dying animals, to the hail that fell from the sky that called on fire, to the flies, the locusts. Uh, the frogs, the water turning to the whole now turn to blood, everything, everything that was water turned to blood. Then there was the darkness. It was dark on Egypt, complete blackness, but it was light still on Israel to picture of Christ and his people. And the, uh, the ones that leave the reprobates when God leaves to themselves, but Pharaoh says Pharaoh and Pharaoh hardened his heart and Pharaoh hardened his heart and Pharaoh hardened his heart and God hardened the heart of Pharaoh and God hardened the heart of Pharaoh and Pharaoh hardened his heart. It was. wasn't given repentance.

The only thing that man has to do to find himself under the judgment of God is for the Lord just to leave him to himself. There's enough rope in this book that a man could take it and harm himself. Isn't that true? I mean, it's just true. He would not bow even though everything he saw, even when he was pursuing after Israel and the pillar of fire came down to separate him. I said fire, I know. The pillar of fire came down and separated the children of Israel from the Egyptians. Can you imagine fire that's literally between them? And he's like, I'm just going to wait this one out. I'm going to come get you in just a minute. Think about the arrogance, the pride in this. He tracks them down through the water, he parks the water on either side, tracks them down through there, thinks he's gonna catch up to them, the Lord lets the water recede and they drown in the deep. And the very God that he was trying to defy, he found out, he's God and I'm not.

Now either, brethren, we find out that he is God right now, on this side of eternity, or when we open our eyes in eternity, never to shut him again. we'll find out he's God. Either way, every knee is going to bow and every tongue is going to confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father. That's scripture.

There's so many examples of this, I had to narrow it down. You remember in Exodus also after the children, so shortly after this, the children, it's amazing to me, and it's as us, I can't say that this is amazing, because I know it's us. Moses has left, he's 40 days on the mountain, and what do they do instead of worshiping God and still celebrating that they're free from Egypt's bondage? Hey Aaron, fashion us a calf that we can make us a God so we can worship Him. What is wrong with our idol factories? What is wrong with our pride? No, we want a God that we can liken to, that we can understand, that we can put hands on, that we can control and manipulate. What they're saying is that we want to be God. Something we can control.

Well, Aaron did it. Cast the earrings into the fire, melted it down, made a calf of gold. I find it so funny when Moses came down and said, what is that? Aaron said, the people told me and I threw the earrings in the fire and out popped a calf. He's like, yeah, okay. And that's the lying tongue. He didn't want to get in trouble. That's pride also, is it not? Oh, that's us by nature.

Well, shortly thereafter, you know the, the story on that well. Shortly thereafter, though, Dathan and Korah had had enough of Moses. Scripture says they withstood Moses. I believe this is in James. And they said, we can be priests ourselves. We don't need you to be our priests. We can burn incense ourselves. I can't remember if it was 200 or 400 men. I'm thinking two, but I can't remember. But anyways, here they are. And Moses said, okay, well, let's burn incense. The Lord will, and I'm paraphrasing, but the Lord will reveal what the truth is. The Lord will tell us. The Lord won't not reveal the truth. And sure enough, the Lord answered. He opened up the earth and Dathan and Korah and all the followers of them, they were swallowed up in the pit that very day. Them and all of their family, everything that they had, all of it was gone.

Why? Because they didn't need a high priest. They didn't need a high priest. So Pharaoh wanted to be his own God. Cain wanted to be his own God. Eve wanted to be her own God. And now you have Korah and Dathan wanting to be their high priest. And I would remind us, Christ is prophet, priest, and king. So Christ, that's the point I'm getting to, is Christ, or all these things that these people are rejecting one way or another, it's all about the rejection of Him, which is actually blasphemy of the Holy Spirit. That's what that is, blasphemy of the Holy Spirit. A lot of people don't know what that verse means. That's exactly what it means. It means rejecting either one of Christ's office, prophet, priest, or king, or rejecting Him as Alpha, or rejecting Him as Omega, one of the two. God consumed, Dathan and Korah, and then goes on a little bit later in Leviticus. And you think after everything Aaron's sons would have saw, they'd have known better than this, but Aaron's sons were in charge of keeping the fire lit. The fire at the temple, at the altar, the tabernacle, and they let it go out. What were they doing? I don't know, but it wasn't what they were supposed to be doing. They let it go out.

And what did they do? Did they repent? Did they say, we've disobeyed, have mercy on me, the sinner? No, they said, hey, we can light this thing back. We can get it going again ourselves. And they relit the fire. Scripture calls it wildfire. Scripture calls it strange fire, sorry. Strange fire is the word. And as soon as they did that, God's fire consumed them instantly.

Why? Because that was the fire that represented the consumption of the sacrifice, the lamb. Do we see that? It all has to do with the lamb here. This is what all this is about.

Well in 1 Samuel the two sons of Eli they did something similar, much worse. However you want to look at it, Hophni and Phinehas they wanted to take the best part of the sacrifice. The Lord said, I want you to burn it with fire and I want the fat thereof. And then in the morning you are going to consume what is left of it. You are going to take the remainder. They said, no we want to eat it before it is cooked. We want to eat it raw.

And you know people order different kind of, I used this example before, but different kind of steaks, whether it's rare, medium, or well done, or whatever. They didn't want it well done, they wanted it rare. But no, the lamb represents the Lord Jesus Christ, and he had to be burnt with the fiery wrath of God. order for us to consume him first. You can't just take him the way you want him. That's the whole point there isn't it? He said it's not supposed to be sodden. That means you can't water down the gospel. Don't water down the lamb. It has to be absolutely 100% what it is.

Well, Hophni and Phinehas didn't do any of that. They defiled the Lord's worship insomuch that they were committing fornication on the doorstep of the temple, all kinds of horrible things. And what happened to them? Well, the Lord destroyed them in battle. Lord kill them in a battle that was brought up in the gospel.

Think about those men and women. Well, maybe not women, but men, priests, and probably some guards that came to seek Christ. I'm not mistaken, all four Gospels has this account, at least three. They came to him right after the garden, this is right before he goes to stand trial. And our Lord is standing there with the disciples and these men walk up to him, a great band the scripture says, and it says, the Lord said, whom do you seek? Whom do you seek? And he said, Jesus of Nazareth. And he said, I am. He that you're speaking to, am, I am.

And what happened? They fell over backwards and they got back up and they all ran away, right? They got back up and they repented. Oh, this is God. No, neither. You know what they did with their pride, their foolishness, like we would do without knowing he's God. They said, he said unto them, whom do you seek? And he said, Jesus of Nazareth. They said, no, we're seeking Jesus of Nazareth. And He said, I that speak to you am He. I've already told you I'm Him. Now let these go. The whole point of that was He was showing His power so that the disciples would be set free. But think about the pride that had to be involved with them getting back up and continuing to pursue the Lord of glory rather than repenting, rather than repentances of the Lord, brethren. That's the point here. What about Judas? He saw all the miracles performed. He cast out demons. He performed some of the miracles himself and yet he betrayed Christ. Why did he do it? Pride. Pride.

Now, that's why I said I was going to tell you about them instead of reading them. It's pretty, it had been lengthy. But one example, I want us to look at as Uzzah. And I don't think that's one that I've ever looked at as pastor here. And I hope the Lord will give us insight onto this because I knew the story well. This never was on my heart until tonight, but it's a perfect example of what we're talking about.

So turn with me to 2 Corinthians chapter 26. I'm sorry, 2 Chronicles, 2 Chronicles. I said Corinthians, Chronicles. Not New Testament, Old Testament. Second Chronicles 26. Now here's what's happened. The Lord has placed Uzzah in the position of kingship. And the scripture says at first, Uzzah did that which was right in the sight of the Lord. And a lot of times, That wasn't the case during this time. A lot of times it would say, and the king did not do that which was right in the sight of the Lord. This time, Uzzah, it says the king did that which was right in the sight of the Lord. So the Lord blessed him. And as the Lord's blessing him, he's winning battles, he's having victories and different things like that. And he's getting prideful because the scripture says he had help and it was the Lord that was helping him, but he became strong. And that's where we're gonna pick up, is where he became strong.

Look, chapter 26, verse 19. Oh, I didn't finish what I was gonna say. Oh, no, verse 16, I'm sorry, that was it. But when he was strong, his heart was lifted up to his destruction. What does that mean to you? Pride. His heart was lifted up in pride, wasn't it? For he transgressed against the Lord, his God, and went into the temple of the Lord to burn incense upon it, Now we just got done talking about Korah and Dathan, all them. And Azariah, the priest went in after him and with him fourscore priests of the Lord that were valiant men. And they withstood Uzzah the king and said unto him, it appertaineth unto thee, Uzzah, to burn incense unto the Lord. Don't do it. But to the priests, the sons of Aaron, they're the only ones that are allowed. are consecrated to burnt incense. Go out of the sanctuary, for thou hath trespassed. Neither shall it be for thine honor for the Lord God."

Now get this, then Uzzah was wroth and had a censer in his hand to burn incense. And while he was wroth with the priest, leprosy even rose up in his forehead before the priest in the house of the Lord from beside the incense altar. And Azariah the chief priest and all the priests looked upon him and behold, he was leprous in his forehead. And they thrust him out from thence. Yea, himself hasted also to go out because the Lord had smitten him. And Uzzah the king was a leper until the day of his death and dwell in a several house. being a leper, for he was cut off from the house of the Lord. And Jotham, his son, was over the king's house, judging the people of the land."

He was helped, but then he decided in his strength, he was lifted up in pride that he was going to burn incense before God. And instead of asking a priest to burn incense for him, he says, I have my own priest, I don't need a priest. And he burns incense. And it's a picture of taking the place of the Lord Jesus Christ, just as we talked about before. And what happened? The Lord showed him what he really was, a leper.

Now I find it interesting because it doesn't say that it struck him with leprosy from the top of his head to the bottom of his feet, because then the priest would have declared him clean. No, it's just in his head. just where his pride lied, in the heart and the head. Scripture don't really differentiate from the heart and the head, did you know that? Nothing else is recorded about this man. No space of repentance is recorded. The only other thing that's talked about is when Isaiah says in Isaiah chapter six, in the year that Uzziah king died, I saw the Lord high and lifted up. That's it. That's it. He was seated on the throne. His train filled the temple. But that's all that was mentioned of Uzziah.

Here's the difference, brethren. Seeing God is seeing salvation. Uzzah didn't have any interest in seeing God. Uzzah wanted to be his own God, his own high priest. Isaiah was complaining unto the Lord because of the pride of the people and realized, oh, I am prideful. Oh, I am prideful. I see the Lord high and lifted up.

When the Lord reveals himself to his people, he does it the same way. He shows us that we're sinful, that we're rebels by nature. We're sinful rebels by nature, that we're full of pride. And he abases that pride. He's the only one able to do that. Scripture says, for whomsoever exalteth himself shall be abased, and he that humbleth himself shall be exalted. But make no mistake about it, if you're able to humble yourself, Scripture even says humble yourself under the mighty hand of God. But it also tells us to repent. It tells us to come to Christ. It tells us to confess, we can do none of these things without the gift of God, faith and repentance. It's the Lord that gets all the glory in this, all the glory.

Make no mistake, pride is alive and well in us. So I told you the bad news about what we are by nature, now I'm gonna tell you the good news about what he did, about what he did. Go back to our text in Proverbs chapter 16. Look at verse six. Here's our hope. Now, number two is not our hope. It says all the ways of man are clean in his own eyes. But verse six is our hope. Actually, verse five is also where we're at. Even one that is proud in his heart, everyone that is proud in his heart is abomination to the Lord. But verse six is our hope. By mercy and truth, iniquity is purged. Who is full of truth? Who is full of grace? Who is that? By the fear of the Lord, men depart from evil.

So all I gotta do is fear the Lord? No, it's his fear bestowed. His fear bestowed. Until Isaiah saw the Lord high and lifted up, he didn't see himself as he was. The Lord gave him fear. Verse seven, when a man's ways please the Lord, he maketh even his enemies to be at peace with him. Two things about this that hit me. Number one, how is my ways gonna please the Lord? Well, the second part of that's the answer. because my enemies are at peace with him." Well, what's our enemies? The flesh, the world, and Satan. Now, how can I be at peace with my flesh, the world, and Satan? There's a warfare going on because the Lord Jesus Christ conquered them all. Therefore, therefore, My ways please the Lord because they are in Christ. It's his ways, not mine. Not unto us, O Lord, not unto us, but unto thy name be all glory and honor and praise and dominion forever and ever. God's the doer of it, brethren, salvation of the Lord. If on my deathbed my fist doesn't clench towards the heaven and blaspheme, it's because God has kept me by his power, all by his grace, and you too. And you too, it's him. He gets all the glory in this. We don't get any glory. He won't share his glory with anyone.

But you know what he promised? I'll never leave you. I'll never forsake you. That you are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation, ready to be revealed at the last time. He's going to keep his people from themselves. Does that bring you hope? It brings me hope. Tonight I was driving my truck. He kept me from myself. I didn't do anything stupid. Now I ain't bragging. It was the Lord that kept me, because I felt something inside of me bubbling up. And I thought about the message tonight. I thought, well, I'm already a hypocrite standing up here. You ever stand up here, you feel like the biggest hypocrite ever was. Is that right, Rob? I'd have to add more to it on purpose.

It's a miracle of God's grace that we're kept, brethren. How do I know? There's two comparisons, and I gotta be quick, because I think I've written down too much, but I'm gonna do my best to get through this. I hope this is encouraging to us as it was to me. There's two kings I wanted to mention. Number one is King David and King Saul. They're very similar in a lot of ways, but they're totally different, polar opposites.

Number one, King Saul, what'd he do? He followed himself. He followed after what he wanted to do. He didn't obey the voice of the Lord, the word of the Lord. Samuel told him, wait right here. Wait right here and I will be here and then we'll offer sacrifice unto the Lord. Four days pass by and the war's still raging and Saul's losing his mind because he's afraid that they're going to be overtaken. So what's he do? Does he wait on the Lord? No, he takes matters into his own hands and he offers up sacrifice unto the Lord. Now what is that replacing? It's the Lord Jesus Christ, high priest and sacrifice.

That wasn't bad enough. After Samuel died, he needed to know what the Lord's will was, and rather than waiting on the word of the Lord, he decided to summon up Samuel's, and don't ask me how this works, he went to a soothsayer, a fortune teller, and tried to conjure up Samuel from the dead. And the Lord told him, said, no, I'm telling you, the kingdoms, the king rent from you. You're no longer a king. You're no longer my king. You're gonna die. The Lord pronounced judgment of death upon him for those sins. And he died. He ended up committing suicide. Lord left him to himself. It's perfectly evident.

But what of David? He's a lot better, right? He did so many much better things. He was an adulterer. He was a murderer. He was a liar. He was a thief. What was the difference? Well, Nathan came to him one time by God's divine providence and says unto him, David, there was a man that had many flocks and many herds, a wealthy man and another man that had one ewe lamb. And when the time came for that wealthy man to make a feast, he took the one ewe lamb rather than taking of his flocks and herds, what should be done to the man. And I'm trying to be as brief as I can here, but David said, that man's going to die. Surely that man will surely die. And Nathan said, David, thou art the man. Now all the difference here. in the response of David is of the Lord.

But David said, I have sinned against the Lord. Was he wroth like Uzziah? Was he wroth like Cain? Was he justifying himself like so many others that we've heard about? Pharaoh and Korah and all of them saying, we don't need you, we can do what we wanna do on our own. No, he said, I've sinned against the Lord.

See, the Lord has to draw that confession from us. We'll never admit that in this flesh. I've proven tonight how prideful the flesh is, but that's exactly what he does for his people. He draws that confession.

I was gonna have us turn to Psalm 51, and I'm really thankful that we went ahead and read that for the call to worship for the sake of time, but he says the first part, purge me with hyssop, I shall be clean, wash me, and I shall be made whiter than snow. He said, The bones, he asked the Lord, put the bones back together that thou hast broken. He said, restore unto me the joy of thy salvation. He's acknowledging everything is the Lord's, none is, nothing is his. Have mercy upon me according to thy loving kindness, according to thy tender mercies. Blot out my transgressions.

It's all the Lord that has to do it. I can't accomplish anything in and of myself because I'm full of pride. But oh, the repentance the Lord gives his people and the humility that comes with it. Because the Lord gave it, the Lord's pleased with it.

And the last one I want to look at is this, and I'll say this before, is God's the only difference between Saul and between David. And I'll mention one other real quick, and then I'll tell you the last one.

Judas and Peter, Peter was full of pride, and so was Judas. But the difference was, the Lord told Peter, Because they both did the same thing, just Peter didn't get paid for it. I mean, Peter denied the Lord, and Judas betrayed him with a kiss. It's still denying who he was, same difference. Peter never denied who the Lord was, he just denied affiliation with him. But you understand what I'm saying, they both forsook the Lord.

And Judas did it for money. Peter did it because he was afraid of popularity. What was the difference? The difference was that the Lord looks at Peter and says, I have prayed for you, Peter. Fear not, for I have prayed for you, Peter. Did he pray for Judas? No, that's the difference.

That's the only difference between David and Saul. That's the only difference between Peter and Judas, and that's the only difference between Uzzah and Nebuchadnezzar, the last ones I wanna look at.

So turn with me to Daniel chapter four. Hold your place, because we're gonna finish in Proverbs 16.

Now you remember Uzziah, to recap on him just for a second, Uzziah thought, I'm strong in the flesh, I can offer incense. What did Nebuchadnezzar say? Is this not great Babylon which I have made? Is this not, look what I have done all by myself, is that not prideful? He completely discredited God after everything he had seen.

Do you realize this is the same Nebuchadnezzar that saw Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego get thrown into the fiery furnace and he saw the fourth man which was like unto the Son of God. This is the same Nebuchadnezzar, he saw all that.

Only one between Uzziah and Nebuchadnezzar was smitten with leprosy and the other was humbled and then restored. Look at Daniel chapter four, verse 34 through 37. The Lord had cursed him at this point. And he was, we'll read 33. This is the curse that the Lord gave to him. The same hour was the thing fulfilled upon Nebuchadnezzar and he was driven from men. And he'd eat grass as oxen, and his body was wet with the dew of heaven, till his hairs were grown like eagle's feathers, and his nails were like bird's claws.

And at the end of days, I, Nebuchadnezzar, lifted up mine eyes into heaven, and mine understanding returned unto me, and I blessed the Most High. And I praised and honored him that liveth forever and ever, whose dominion is an everlasting dominion. His kingdom is from generation to generation. All the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing. He doeth according to his will in the army of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth, and none can stay his hand or say unto him, what doest thou?

At the same time, my reason returned unto me. And for the glory of my kingdom, my honor and brightness returned unto me, and my counselors and my Lord sought unto me, and I was established in my kingdom. Excellent majesty was added unto me.

Now I, Nebuchadnezzar, praise and extol and honor the king of heaven, all whose works are truth and his ways judgment, and those that walk in pride, there's the word, he's able to abase. Those that walk in the root problem, he's able. to a base. That's repentance, isn't it, brethren? He drew the same confession out of David as he did Nebuchadnezzar. And he does this out of each of his children. And what is their confession? I want to look at that, go back into Proverbs chapter 16.

They are made to confess, verse six, By mercy and truth, iniquity is purged. By the Lord Jesus Christ, by his finished work on the cross of Calvary for his elect people, by his shed blood alone, is the only remission for their sin, the only forgiveness for their pride, the only abasement for what they are and who they are, and the only exaltion that we have is found in Christ. We're made to realize there's none good but God. There's nothing good in me, that is to say in my flesh, dwells no good thing. That's what we confess. Truth, truth, Lord. Christ is all in salvation, not unto us. No, Lord, you can abase us in our pride. You can put us down. Lord, exalt your son and please cause me to be found in him, not having my own righteousness, which is of the law, but having the righteousness which is found by the faith of the Lord Jesus Christ is faithfulness.

They're made to confess truth, mercy and truth as our only hope by the finished work of the Lord Jesus Christ on the cross because God's given us the fear of the Lord to depart from evil, to depart from the pride when it comes to spiritual things. Our flesh is still going to have things to do pridefully. There's still gonna be ways people rub you wrong, make you frustrated. When it comes to spiritual matters, when it comes to the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ and His finished work, how God truly saved His people from their sin, we have no pride as in we had anything to do with it. No, it's Christ is all, and God is all, and salvation's of the Lord, and Christ is all in salvation. And if you can say that, God's given you the ability to say that, it's because God's given you Repentance and faith.

Therefore, your ways are in the Lord. And it says here, when a man's ways please the Lord, he make it even his enemies to be at peace with him. That's the only way you're gonna have peace. There is no peace outside of being outside of Christ. Christ alone humbled himself. You know why? Because we can't. Can't humble ourself. Christ did. And then he humbles us. He became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross, so that our disobedient pride might be erased. Not just abased, not just squashed down, erased. Never happened in God's eyes.

You have never had pride one Single time if you were an elect child of God because of the blood of Christ, isn't that glorious? You mean all those times I've lost my temper all those times I've did this and that and all those times that yes Gone cast as far as the East is from the West There is no sin that the Lord Jesus Christ did not die for it for his people Every single sin that he died for was for his people and there wasn't one that he missed Sin of pride he died for that one as well

Our sinful pride has been forgotten and forgiven, washed in the blood of the lamb. And I love the fact there's nothing that that blood is incapable of washing away. Oh, it's all freely by his grace. We say with the writer, who is a God likened to thee that pardoneth iniquity? Thank God he got rid of the root problem.

Let's pray. Father, we ask that you would take this and bless it to our understanding for your glory. In Christ's name, amen.