Pride before the Fall

Hi, my name is John Humenik. Welcome to my channel. Today we're going to be talking about pride that goes before the fall. I want to tackle this subject because I do think that the truth that needs to be known for all people to understand how dangerous this sin is, and that no matter what, it cannot be celebrated in any context because of the weight and problems and ultimate destruction that follows through with this. So if you're new to my channel, I want you to watch this entire video because this video is going to blow your mind and truly expose the truth behind pride, the fact that it is one of the grievous, most grievous sins that you can possibly commit and ultimately destroys everything that you would hold dear. So let's hop into the scriptures for the very first verse on pride. It starts with Proverbs chapter 16, verse 18. It says, pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall. One of the things I want to talk to you about is haughtiness is a word that a lot of people don't recognize is really another form of pride. Because what you're doing is, is you're seeing yourself from a glamorous posture that you have superiority over others, that you disregard them, and you ultimately have contempt. When you do a deeper study on the word, it even shows the greater effect because it becomes the definition that includes arrogance, majesty, and ultimately a swelling. It comes from the root word that means to rise up highly exalted and grow. These all are actually aspects of pride. These terms clearly show that prideful people try to position themselves ultimately as their own gods, and they do about it in a way that's very destructive because pride becomes The very thing that ultimately God will allow you get to before you will ultimately trip up. And when you see here is pride doesn't talk about going before the fall, it talks about going to destruction. And that's the essence of what pride brings. The world, whenever they talk about pride, whenever they talk about these things, they want to put it and spin it in a way that's loving and caring and open. You're born this way. You're doing all the things that you were naturally inclined to do. But the reality is those are all lies. They don't really care about you. They don't really understand what it means to do those things. And if they do it, they're doing it intentionally because ultimately it's all about destruction. God does not look at people that carry pride in any way, shape, or form in a way with love. It's— he looks at them and he truly despises them. And it really becomes a position to understand that how God truly dislikes it to the point where even in the Bible God talks about this, is it is one of the few sins that God truly, truly hates. Now obviously God hates all sin, but what he calls out pride very specifically in Proverbs chapter 8, verse 13, it says, to fear the Lord is to hate evil. He says, I hate pride and arrogance, evil behavior and perverse speech. There's not a lot of things that God lists in the Bible that he hates, but this one of them. And this is the thing that what God does is he's trying to understand, is to teach you the depth of despair that you actually put yourself in when you're in a prideful state. Again, it doesn't matter how you articulate it, whether you're proud or these other things. At the end of the day, it is all about God and what he wants for his people and how he sees them. And he knows that when you start to position yourself in all forms of pride, whether you attach that to love or you attach that to your orientation, it doesn't matter. God does not want that in your life, but the evil one does, because he knows that the moment you embrace it, that what it'll do is it'll open you up to God's wrath and allow you to feel the punishment that will come with that sin. And the devil knows that. The devil's kingdom knows that. Everyone that's working with the devil knows that. They know that because they want you to fall. They want you to suffer. You may be thinking this is the best thing, and they'll Always put it in a really cool word. They're the best spin doctors in the world. They could be the best marketers practically in the world. But the reality is that God is stronger and God loves you. God cares for you. I love you. I care for you. This is why this livestream is here to teach you on this very topic, because when you understand the nuance that comes with it, that you— that when you step into the world of pride, what you're doing is you're moving away yourself from God, that you're no longer fearing God, that you truly are embracing arrogance. You're embracing evil behavior and perverse attitudes and ways in which God had never intended things to operate, especially from a posture of a heart, because your heart is where everything is sourced. And if pride settles into your heart, what it does is it becomes like a corruption that will then come in and just rip out everything. It just basically— it's like an acid. It'll just burn out all the goodness, all the holiness out of you, because it becomes A root that becomes nearly outside of God's strength, impossible to rip out. And it just becomes something that just replaces all that's good in your life and just turns it sour. And that's the essence of how it'd be. Now you might be asking, well, how do you know that it can turn yourself sour? How do you know that this is really the root and result of that choice? Well, look at— let's look at what happened to Satan, Lucifer. Isaiah 14. Verse 12 through 15, it says, how you've fallen from heaven, morning star, son of the dawn! You have been cast down to earth, you who once laid low the nations. You said in your heart, I'll ascend to the heavens, I'll raise my throne above the stars of God. I will sit enthroned on the mount of assembly, on the utmost heights of Mount Zaphon. I will ascend above the tops of the clouds, I'll make myself like the Most High. But you're brought down to the realm of the dead, to the depths of the pit. Who better to talk about pride than the one who started it all? And that's Satan. This is one of the most amazing and powerful verses in the entire Bible when it comes to talking about Satan and the true destruction that follows when you fall into the pit of pride. One of the things that we know when Satan operated in heaven— what people don't recognize is that Satan was created Perfect. He was blameless in all his ways. He was talked about as the anointed cherub who walked on the mountain of God. Now, you have to understand that those who operate closer to God generally are considered higher ranking in the way the kingdom of God operates. And so Satan had very close proximity to God in his walk with God. He was adorned with jewels. Uh, in some Bible translations, he was the, the angel that was related to worship and that he was in charge of it. And then what you saw is, is that at some point what happens is, is that in his heart he said that I'm going to ascend to the heavens. And what he did is that he basically said is I'm going to be like the Most High God. I'm going to have a throne next to him and be worshiped next to him. He knew he didn't have the authority or the power to overthrow God, otherwise he would have done it already. But what he did is he says I want to be like him and I want to be honored and respected And worshiped like him. And what ended up happening is God looked at him and said, no, worship belongs to me alone, and cast him out of heaven. And we see that fall because he ends up in the Garden of Eden. And then eventually we see the events in Genesis 3 where he then flips Adam and gets Adam and Eve to sin, and therefore exalts himself over them. Satan's plan has always been to exalt himself through pride. And when you operate in pride, in any form of that in your life, regardless of how you wanna word it and how you wanna, you know, reference it, what you're actually doing is, is you're exalting yourself above God. What you're doing is you're saying, I know better for my life. I know what's best for me. I know what matters. And I'm allowed to make my own decisions and not have to deal with the consequences. But God says otherwise, because when you operate with that spirit, what you're doing is, is you're pushing aside God and saying, he's not important to me anymore. I don't really care for him. I have everything that I need in this place, and therefore I'm good. But when you understand what that means is, is then what it does mean is you're separating yourself from God, who is the one who, who provides all these good things for you. Everything good in your life has come from God. Everything that you have enjoyed in any way, shape, or form has not come from Satan, but rather come from God. In fact, if Satan had his way, what you would have really understood is he would have wiped out humanity a long time ago, and you would already no longer be here. There is no love in this space when it comes to pride. There is no respect or humility. It's all about vanity. It's all about arrogance. It's all about puffing yourself up, as we talked about. Look at the definitions again. When we talk about what it means, it means to rise up, become highly exalted. There's an aspect of majesty and arrogance. There's even swelling. Think about it from that perspective, because what you're doing is you're becoming bigger than what you're meant to be. And there— what ultimately happens is God is going to cast you out. And that's what he did with Satan. We know that when God cast Satan out, that was it. He was done. Satan isn't even in a remorseful or even a repentant state because he doesn't care at this point. What he cares about is destruction, and he knows sowing pride in the hearts of people brings destruction because what it does is, is it allows the aspects of what God has already spoken about to come into being. That's the essence of what that sin— why the sin is so great. Because you understand that Satan, in most cases, if you're a Christian, can't touch you. That's the reality, is he has no authority over you. That's why Satan uses Christians to destroy the church because there's no one else that can. He uses Christians to destroy other Christians. But whenever you're not saved, Satan— you, but you're operating whether you like it or not in the kingdom of darkness because you're not in the kingdom of heaven yet. So therefore you're in the kingdom of darkness. There, it's a binary thing. It's, you know, either on or off. And so in that vein, he knows that God hates pride. He knows the scriptures better than all of us, and he knows the very things that will bring your doom, and pride is one of them. And so whenever you put yourself in a place where you're ascending to the tops of the clouds, where you want to make yourself your own god, make your own decisions, choose your own path forward, what's going to happen is, is God eventually is going to humble you in a big way and potentially even bring an end to you. And you can see this further whenever you see these collection of verses from Proverbs. Look at what this talks about. Proverbs 11:2. Talks about when pride comes, then comes disgrace, but with the humble there's wisdom. Think about that. With pride in any form— it doesn't say pride in this space or pride in that space, it talks about pride in any form— always comes with disgrace. That's a terrible place to be. Do you want to be disgraced as a part of your walk with anyone, whether with God or with your family or with your friends or your, your relationships or with your spouse? It's a terrible place to be. Because God says it's the humble have wisdom, and humility allows you to operate under the covering of God. But pride pulls you out and says, let me go my own way. And ultimately, it always leads to some form of disgrace. And there's— and no one wants to be disgraced in any way, shape, or form, because it's a humiliating place to be. Look at Proverbs 29:23. It says, one's pride will bring him low. Not can, it says will. But he who's lowly in spirit will obtain honor. Now, this is really powerful because now I wanna start to contrast the difference between the sin of pride, the actions of pride, and ultimately what the opposite is and what it brings. So what you think about it is, is pride wants to exalt itself in a way that pushes yourself above. That's what it's designed to do. And that it doesn't matter the form, it doesn't matter the context, it doesn't matter the, the situation. It— if you're operating in pride in any part of your life, you're operating in that space, and ultimately the only direction is down. It's— that's the way it is. But what God is saying is those who are lowly in spirit, who are humble, what God will do is they will obtain honor. So the very thing that you're trying to accomplish by being prideful is actually not going to happen, but those who actually are humble, that's the way to go about it. That's what God is saying. That's what he's saying as he's doing these things, is that he will bring honor to those who humble themselves before him, because it's his job to honor people. It's his job to lift them up. It's his job to bring them favor and renown and places of power and authority, put them in positions where they can operate with a kingdom mindset and in freedom. But when you're operating in pride, when you're operating and say, hey, this is what I want to do, it doesn't matter about my body. Or my partner's body. It doesn't matter of their orientation. I don't really care about any of those things. I just want to do what I want to do because I was born that way. Guess what happens? You're ultimately going to be brought low. And that's what God does, is he will bring you low, bring you at the point where you will get to understand that the only way you can get brought up is by to be lowly in spirit. Because once you get down to the valley, there's nowhere else to go but up. But you can't go up unless you operate in a, you know, with humility. And what you start to see in Proverbs 8:13, it continues because it says, the fear of the Lord is hatred of evil. Pride and arrogance and the way of evil are perverted speech I hate. Now think about this again. This is again another contrasting proverb. What you hear— what you see here is very clearly that the fear of the Lord is hatred of evil. Think about that from the perspective. It's not Walking with evil. It's not allowing evil to operate. It's not allowing evil to kind of coexist. No, none of those things. The fear of the Lord is hatred of evil. It means it doesn't want any part of it. It wants it to be destroyed. It needs to be eradicated. That's the essence of what it means, because there's no— because darkness can't coexist with light. That's the essence. This is the thing that a lot of people think about it from the perspective of how The— what we consider the holy people to operate. Because God talks about this, Jesus talks about this in the Sermon on the Mount when he talks about the meek will inherit the earth. Well, the meek are not just a combination of people being humble or lowly or quiet. No, meek in the definition that's in the scriptures, the actual Greek word, what you're seeing is, is that's basically leveraging God's authority and his power with His mercy, but it doesn't mean that you're not wielding it. It means that you just use His mercy. So when you understand that there are certain lines that you have to draw in your life, that you have to be able to say, "That's not acceptable in my life." This is one of them. This is where the fear of the Lord says everything that's sinful, everything that's evil, is ultimately an abomination to God and is abomination to me. I can't have to be any part of it. It's not something that I want to be a part of, and I don't want to be around it because what happens is the moment you step into pride. You're going to step into arrogance. Once you step into arrogance, you possibly can step into pride. So what happens is, is the moment you say you know better than God, you're arrogant. That's the reality. You're taking a prideful approach. You're saying that I'm my own God. And ultimately what you're doing is, is you're walking in the way of evildoers and you have perverted speech. And God hates all of that. And I can assure you, you don't want to be receiving and of anything that God hates. I mean, it's very clear what he's talking about. These aspects that are in these scriptures that we're talking about now and what we will cover are just basically really borderline destruction or destruction, right? Like, that's the essence. There is, you know, when we think about like the other scriptures, we talk about lying and stealing and all these other things, you, you see that there's some form of repentance and reconciliation. but there's no destruction attached to it. There's no end. Yet pride and arrogance have this end that's being talked about, and God hates it, and he wants it destroyed and out of everyone's life. I mean, look at Proverbs 16:5. It says, everyone who's arrogant in heart is an abomination to the Lord. Be assured, he will not go unpunished. Again, think about this. This is— and this again, this applies to both Christians and non-Christians. Alike, because Christians can get caught in the same space. And ultimately, God will reconcile you. He will bring you under an umbrella that will allow you to recognize, hey, this is no longer acceptable. But when you operate with an arrogant heart, what you're doing is you're saying God doesn't know what's best for you. That's what you're saying. You're saying, I know better than God. And what that means is, is that you no longer become dependent on him, and ultimately you You in the God's eyes become an abomination to him, and that's a really strong word. But it's really true because abomination truly means it is like the most disruptible place that you can be in in the entire Bible. Like think about all the different situations that you can operate in, but an abomination is a really bad space. Think about if you would consider what would you consider an abomination to yourself today? You know, to think about the disparity. or the despair, the, the level of sin or the level of evil that what you would have to consider an abomination. And that's how God looks at that. That's how God looks at pride. That's how he looks at arrogance in the heart. Because you want to be able to go about your own life, you want to live your life the way you want because you feel that, hey, this is the way I've been made, this is the way I should act, there's nothing wrong with this, let me make my own choices, let me go with the way I want to choose. But that's not God what says. God doesn't want that. He wants you to operate under his mindset, Because he's the one that created you. He already knows everything about you. He loves you intimately through and through. He knew who you were before you were formed in the womb, and therefore he knows what you need. And therefore you do not have to search or try to justify yourself to anyone, because God is the one you want to justify yourself to, because through Jesus Christ that has already been accomplished. It's amazing. The work at the cross is done to just reconcile us from all of this evil. Proverbs 18:12 continues it: Before destructions a man's heart is haughty, but humility becomes— comes before honor. Think about this from the perspective of humility. Humility comes first, and then you get honor. You're elevated. God puts you up, pulls you up on a pedestal, lets people know. He does it publicly. He will do it, and he'll do it publicly in front of your enemies. Like, that's the essence that God does, is he will exalt those who are— who humble themselves. But what he's saying is those who choose to do it themselves, what happens is it comes to destruction. So your haughtiness in your heart, the things— the pride, the arrogance, the puffing up, the swelling, all the different definitions that I talked about earlier— these things become basically a path to an end. Like, you're, you're coming to an end, and there's always a pit, and there's always some form of destruction at the the end. It's always a downward movement. Like, that's when you look at scripture and you see about things that are holy, things that are just— God's always forward and up. But this is downward. In many cases, you can go backwards. And you start to see this in pride and how it operates in a person's life, because what it does is it replaces everything that God has done, all the good things in their life, with basically, uh, counterfeits and basically second-class citizens And you always are— there's this level of compromise and a cycle of sin and a cycle of pain and a cycle of destruction, possibly a cycle of sickness. Look at the people who enjoy Pride and, and celebrate this month in a way that they do. How many of them are sick across the year? It's unbelievable that the number of people that are sick and struggling, they're always in some form of frailty, weakness. They have issues across the board. They have either mental issues or all forms of gender dysphoria. Like, the list continues to go on and on. And so what you start to see is, is that God will give you over to your debased mind and allow you to, to go that path because ultimately it leads to your destruction. But when you humble yourself and come back into humility— and we're going to talk about some people that did that and, and the transformation in their lives and how they went from literally the point of destruction to back to literally on the throne, you'll start to see the power of God, that in reconciliation you can be restored to your, your former self. So God talks about this in James 4:6. He says he gives more grace. He gives, but more— but he gives more grace. Therefore, he says, God opposes the proud and gives grace to the humble. This is what he is. You don't want to be in a position where you're in opposition to God. I— whether or not you're a Christian or not, I I can just assure you this is not a place to be because you can't win that battle. Think about it from the perspective of Satan. He was so powerful that he walked on the mountain of God. Like, legitimately, he had and still has great power. He walked on a mountain of God. He convinced a third of the angels in heaven to betray God. Think about that. The very angels who served God, who saw God, who saw creation— these are the same angels That saw God create the earth. Because if, if you follow the order of the Bible and you understand how things work, God created the angels first, then he created the earth second. So because they rejoiced— it says that in Job— they rejoiced when he created it. So think about this: you're, you're newly created, and all of a sudden you see— you're fully mature— and you see this Lord who is just doing all these miraculous and wondrous things, next-level stuff. He creates the animals, he creates fish in the sea, the birds in the air. He creates humans. He creates all of the universe. You see this firsthand. You're there. You experience his perfect love. You experience his perfect peace, his perfect joy. Everything's perfect. And then Satan falls, takes a third of heaven with him. Think about that. Think about the convincing capability of Satan to do that. And so what happens is, is God's going to oppose you. God's going to oppose you because he drove all them out. He drove all of them out of the— out of the— out of the kingdom of God onto earth. And Adam was supposed to rule over them. And then obviously he made the— he slipped and fell, and then Jesus humiliated them all on the cross. And so think about that, that God opposes the proud. He, he will not even let it slide. Like, think about it from that perspective. Like, when you understand grace and mercy and how that works, is that there's grace allows you to operate in a space that allows you to be successful in spite of your sins. That's, that's the essence of grace. There's a lot more to it, but that's kind of the core for those who are new to this. Mercy means that you aren't going to receive the punishment that you deserve for the mistakes you've made, but you're going to be able to continue to operate accordingly. Doesn't necessarily mean you have any benefit in that state, but you're just not going to receive the punishment. But God doesn't even do that with the proud. He basically says stop right then and there. So he completely doesn't even allow it to continue. It gets halted in its tracks. And so what he does is he graces those who are humble because he understands. He's like, look, they're trying, they're doing their best, and guess what? I'm still going to bless them. I'm still going to allow them to prosper. But when you're proud, all of that gets ripped out completely from underneath you. It's like the difference between being in a shelter in a storm and not. It's like, hey, I'm just going to sit outside. I'm not even going to build a tent, and I'm going to The wind, the debris, the rain, and everything hit me, be exposed to the elements and the animals and the bugs and the insects, and I'll just take the beating. That's exactly what you're doing when you're operating in pride, where God's saying, no, operate in humility, and that will be a place that allows you to truly understand how you are. But when you start to think about this, it's like you might be asking the question, well, how do I know who's telling the truth and who's not? Well, the answer is really easy because Mark chapter 7 Verses 20 through 23 talk about this. It says, and he said, what comes out of a person is what defiles them. From within, from the heart of a man, comes evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, coveting, wickedness, deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride, foolishness. Think about that. That's a terrible list. All these evil things come from within and they defile a person. Look at what pride is lumped with. Think about this from the perspective of the things that God has put together. The gospel writer Mark puts this in. Think about this. He talks about this list is what comes out of a man's heart and defiles them. Defile is a really strong word. Think about it from the perspective of just like basically gunk or garbage or just all kinds of slime and filth. He's saying— Mark is saying That evil thoughts, sexual immorality— think about this— theft. So this is inside and outside, right? We've got your mind, your body, your actions, right? Theft, murder. He puts pride in the same categories as adultery. He puts it in the same category as murder. He puts it in the same category as coveting— what, you know, you're desiring what other people have. He puts wickedness in the same category. Deceit. which is really intentional lying. Sensuality, which is when you're giving yourself over to all forms of fleshly desires and you're not operating under the kingdom mindset. Envy, right? Slander, pride, foolishness. This is a very, very steep list of things that God hates, and they all come from within. These are all things that functionally defile a person. These are the things that destroy a person. These are the things that destroy relationships. These are the things that destroy, um, you know, basically your business, your work, your school, uh, your marriage, all kinds of stuff. Like, think about this, that there's— there isn't a single thing on this list, there isn't one thing on this list that anyone can go and do and not come away with some form of just basically either self-harm or you're dealing with some form of just consequences Even evil thoughts will manifest itself in all forms of your life. It's a very dark place to be because it really truly puts you in a place of compromise. Like, ultimately that's what it is, is you're compromised in some aspect. So think about it from the perspective of your flesh and how you're operating in your relationships when you have sexual immorality. And we'll talk about that here in a couple weeks about one flesh and the nature of what it means, because one flesh was specifically designed to be between a man and a woman. And when you cross that line, what you're doing is you're actually joining things that weren't meant to be joined and putting yourself in a position where not only you're opening doors into your life, but you're actually trapping yourself in a pit of despair and basically a cycle of pain. And there has— there's deep spiritual ramifications It gets to the point where people don't even realize the negative effect of what you have, because even if you divorce and get remarried and you haven't separated properly spiritually from your spouse, and before you remarry, you're still joined to them. And so all their problems that they carry come back to you, and it becomes an open door. And everyone they're with, guess what happens? They become— those things become your problems. So he's lumping All of that depth and despair and pain and suffering in with pride. Like, that's how dangerous pride really is. And he thinks about that, so he also couples it with all forms of murder and wickedness. I mean, think about that, like wickedness. This wickedness is not like being sinful. This is a lifestyle of destruction and pain and evil and all kinds of things. He adds it with sensuality, which you need freedom where you could say, hey, I can do whatever I want with my body. I can spend time with anyone that I want, and no matter who they are, I can define myself with whatever the way I choose. And none of that's true. You, you don't have the capability of defining yourself because you didn't create yourself. I didn't have any more capability of defining who I was because God did. And when I understand who I was in Christ, it became Uh, of just a revelation of truth. Because at the end of the day, your personality is the mask that we all put on to cover up our true temperament. Our temperament is who we really are. That's who we were built from day one, how God created us and allowed us to be who we are. And you can't hide that. You can cover it up with a mask and put something there, but ultimately that underlying personality that's really truly your temperament exist and you can't transform it. Pride is also lumped in with foolishness. Like, who wants to act like a fool? Who wants to be treated like a fool? Who wants to be, um, you know, looked at and recognized as a fool? There's no— I don't think there's any person, any sane person, that would want to do that. Who wants to deal with envy and slander? Who wants to deal with deceit and coveting and chasing after things that are— whether that is, you know, your, your neighbor or, you know, otherwise people that work with, your, your family and friends— none of those things are, uh, where you want to be and operate. It's like, it's a really bad place to be, and God doesn't want that for you. God doesn't want that. I don't want that for you. This is why we're talking about this. But what you start to see is, if you hop over to James chapter 4, verse 10, you start to see some really important things. Because even in the moment of just despair and maybe a depth of pride where you're like, hey, you know what, I just got humbled by God, I really need to kind of change myself, you really start to recognize that God will respect you and truly exalt you back up because you've humbled yourself. The moment you decide to push away all of the sin and all the things that have happened and say, look, I'm going to listen to my God, I'm going to follow his word, I'm going to trust in his Bible, I'm going to trust in his Son Jesus Christ, I'm going to listen to his Spirit. You're really going to be in a position where he can unravel and undo the mistakes of the past. I mean, this is very clear. You see this, and we'll talk about this here in the, in the next verse. You'll see that God can completely undo the problems of the past, even though you may feel that they're insurmountable. Because this is not necessarily meant to be a condemning livestream, but the, the whole point is, is bring your awareness to the evil that's in front of you, and that the evil only cares about your destruction. That's all it's about. Satan does not care about you in any way, shape, or form. He doesn't care for you. He just wants you destroyed ultimately. And that's why he said— that's why the thief comes to steal, kill, and destroy. It starts by stealing the word of God. When he steals the word of God, you've got no foundation to base your words upon, and so therefore you just choose to do what you want. And then he starts to separate you, and he starts to destroy and undo and ruin these aspects. And then ultimately the destruction comes. And that's, again, that's what God talks about. Pride comes before the fall, and so it comes before destruction. It comes before these things that operate from a position of destruction, and therefore you can't move forward in a way that you want to operate your life. So let's hop over to Daniel chapter 5, verse 20. Let's talk about an example of someone who is truly humbled by God and then how God restored him. It says, but when his heart— and this is talking about King Nebuchadnezzar— was lifted up and his spirit was hardened so that he dealt proudly, he was brought down from his kingly throne and his glory was taken from him. Now again, this is one verse in the context of a larger chapter, in a context of a larger situation. So let's go into this and talk about specifically what happened here. So here we are approximately, uh, about— I think this is, if I remember correctly, around like 600 BC, give or take a little bit. And I could get my dates wrong, but basically what happens is you've got the Babylonian Empire that has come into power, and they're the most powerful nation on Earth, and they're going and they're wrecking everything. They really are. And the guess— and the thing is, is guess what? God's got their back, because God is using them, the King— King Nebuchadnezzar and his army, to destroy everything. He wipes out the Assyrians. He wipes out Aram. He wipes out the Jewish nations, whatever is left of them. He blows up Egypt. I mean, he just there's just no room for anyone. He just wipes everything out, and he drags all the Jews back to Babylon, what's left. And there's really ultimately around just a couple thousand. So here's a nation of millions and millions of people, and they're literally wiped clean short of these thousands. Daniel is. the great prophet at the time. And what he says was, is he's like, look, you know, King Nebuchadnezzar was very, very prideful and thought— even though he knew God was the one that brought him the glory, he was the one that— he was ultimately the person who was backing him— King Nebuchadnezzar still kept taking glory for himself and got to the point where God hardened his heart and basically cast him out. And he became, uh, basically like the beast And what happened was, is then ultimately— and I think it was like a year he operated like that, if I remember the scriptures— and then he comes to his senses and realizes, well, I need to humble myself before this God, this, this God of Israel, because he's the real deal. There are no other gods. He sees Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego get thrown into the furnace, and then the, the Son of Man, or the, the angel walking with them, the 4th person in the furnace, and they come out, they don't even smell like smoke. Like there's no, there's no singe marks, no nothing. He sees these miracles happening. He sees the dream being interpreted by Daniel of the statue with the 4 different materials. He's been a part of this, so he's seen some incredible stuff. And through it all, he, he, he still gets prideful. He still gets humbled by God, and then he rises himself up. The context of this verse is that King Nebuchadnezzar's son is on the throne, and sees all of this stuff. He says, you saw your father go through all of this, and yet you refused to humble yourself. So you became proud on the inside. So guess what happens that night? His son dies, and then his grandson takes over. And so you see that at this point, pride truly comes before the fall. But those who humble themselves beforehand can be exalted, because at that point, the king's son— King Nebuchadnezzar's son could have been in a position where he would have humbled himself and asked for forgiveness, he would have survived. But he never did that. All he did was promote Daniel up and then give him a bunch of things, and then he dies. And so this is the essence of what pride does. But let me go into pride a little bit further, because you start to see from Romans chapter 1, verses 21 through 32, this is the true effect of what pride does. Because ultimately God will give you over to your sin, and it will lead completely to your destruction. It says, for although they knew God— because remember, everyone has eternity put in their heart, so they know God whether they want to admit it or not— they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him. But their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like a mortal human being, birds and animals and reptiles. Therefore God gave them over in their sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity, for the degrading of their bodies with one another. They exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator, who is forever praised. Amen. Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones, in the same way the men abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed shameful acts with other men and received in themselves the due penalty for their error. Therefore, just as they did not think it was worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, so God gave them over to a depraved mind, so they do what ought not to be done. They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed, and depravity. They're full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, and malice. They're gossip slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant, and boastful. They invent ways of doing evil to disobey their parents. They've got no understanding, no fidelity, no love, no mercy, although they know God's righteous decrees that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these things but approve of those who practice them. Now, this is probably one of the most difficult verses in the entire Bible for people to receive who are operating in all forms of pride and all forms of sin, because what happens is, is that what you have to recognize is, is that you do know what you're doing, whether you choose to accept that or not. You have come into agreement with the fact that Those things are sins. And so what happens now is what God is saying is, is that you have chosen— those who operate in pride, you've chosen to operate in pride. You've chosen to operate in sin. You've chosen to exchange the glory of God for the glory of fools. And that— and what happens is, is that you, you've taken what was the Creator and who is supposed to be highly exalted, and you've exchanged it with something else, whether it's yourself or some other things. And it really becomes a place where ultimately you become depraved. And the thing about it is, is what people don't recognize is the moment you start to exchange the truth for God and you, and you just say, hey, I don't want to listen to God anymore, and I want to listen to the lies that the world says who I am and what I should be. Let me be free. I get to choose my own way. What happens is, is ultimately— and God talks about this— is that you end up paying the price. And you pay because it says they pay in themselves. Notice that it's in themselves, the due penalty for their error. Anyone that's operating in pride— and I can assure you, if you see them, just look at them— they're always in a posture of some form of lack, some form of illness, some form of pain, some form of mental anguish. Something is always wrong with their life. It's recurring. It doesn't ever go away. Sometimes it just keeps getting worse and worse. And ultimately what happens is God is saying, hey, you know what, if you want to go that direction, go ahead. You know what, I don't approve of it, but I'm going to allow you to do it. And what happens is, is that it continues to go. When you do a deeper study on Leviticus as a perfect example, or even Exodus, what you see is God talks about the punishment that will come from disobedience to the Israelites. And you can see it's basically a prophecy that then talks about 1 Kings, 2 Kings, and so on. And what you start to see— and obviously the books of Chronicles— so what you see is, is that the further you're willing to go into depravity, the deeper the sin goes, God's just going to let you keep sliding down this path. And what you see is, is that destruction continues to come, and it gets worse and worse and worse. And when you do a study, you start To see, well, wow, it starts with famine, or it starts with some form of disease, or it starts— forms with some form of pain or suffering, and then it continues to multiply and multiply. And you even see it like where people end up, you know, doing horrible things to things that they should have never done, people that they loved, and the things that they should have been cherishing and caring. They become subjects of just scorn, and ultimately they harm them, and they, they use them for their own Their own satisfaction. And what you see is, is that it becomes a cycle of destruction and it continues to go. And ultimately, that's what the devil wants people that operate in pride to be, is he knows that pride is a cycle of destruction. It's not a cycle of just pain and torment. It ultimately leads to destruction. That's why pride is so dangerous. It's so powerful in the sense of it will unravel and ruin your life in a way that very few sins can. And what it does is it becomes a basically a, a springboard to allow all these other horrible things to come to pass, because these sins start to stack on one another. Because God's like, okay, let me separate them from my Spirit, let me separate them from the, the life-giving waters, let me separate them from the joy and the peace that they can have. And what happens is, is that people start to operate and start to look for the things that they want and they need, but they can't find them. The thing is, is that what the devil doesn't want people to realize is God designs them specifically to need him. That's the thing that's really important when you're going through an inner healing process and you're trying to understand who you are. You have to understand that you need God. You need to sit in the presence of Jesus Christ. You need to spend time in the prayer closet. You need to read his word. You need to walk out a righteous, a righteous life. You need to worship him. You need to praise him. You need to thank him. Those are things that are absolute requirements. And when you start to strip those out of your life in any form, what happens then is, is you are opening yourself up to doors and destruction that you were never designed to handle. And once your peace is gone, joy can follow. And you're— then you'll start to search for it. What people realize, and this is why addiction becomes the way it is, is all they are are coverings for the ultimately the bigger problem at hand. The bigger problem at hand is you're separated from God. And you need God to fill you up on the inside in a way that allows you to be whole and to be filled loved and to be filled respected. And to be able to go through and understand, like, wow, there is a person out there that truly knows me for who I am, who sees me for who he created me, and now allows me to operate in the spaces that I need to be in. And pride strips that all away from you. That's the thing, is because you put yourself in front and say, I don't need any of that, I know what's best for me. But no one knows that. In fact, the deeper I realize who I am in Christ, the more I understand who I am, and I start to understand the true temperament that God has put me in, and I look at my personality and try to strip away the personality and understand who I am in Christ, I realized I had no clue who I was. In fact, I still, still try to understand who I am today in Christ. And that's an important thing to realize, is that God's the only one that's going to be able to reveal that to you. He'll reveal it to you in He'll reveal those moments in the quiet place, in study time, through mentors, through other people, and he'll give you the opportunity to receive all of those things bit by bit by bit and fill you up and strengthen you and allow you to prop yourself up with a depth of strength that other things can't do. And that's the essence of what God does. And pride and all the things the world tells you and the things that it wants you to feel good about and allows you to try to do strips all of that away. And when it's stripped away, you're laid bare and you're exposed. And you're now ultimately, you're, you know, you're in a position where you're vulnerable and you can be taken advantage of. And ultimately, what people don't realize is you take advantage of yourself. You never even realize it because you're searching for something that you can't find. You're never going to find satisfaction in the world You're never going to find satisfaction truly in other people. You can only find satisfaction in God and who he defined you to be and how you can operate. But you can't find that without Jesus, and you can't find that without the Holy Spirit. And so for those people who may have never prayed a prayer of salvation, let me go ahead and guide you through one. It comes from Romans 10:9 and how you can get reconciled, because once you're reconciled to God, all of these things start to align itself. The Holy Spirit does his thing because he's the most powerful person in the world anyway. He's the one that can do that, and he's the one that already was a part of the process. He knows you more intimately than yourself and allow you to receive Jesus. So pray this prayer with me. Say, Heavenly Father, I know I'm a sinner. Please forgive me of any and all sins that I have committed against you. Father, I know that I have fallen short, and I've searched For different ways to find satisfaction. I should have found it in you, Father. Forgive me. Allow me to understand and open my heart to Jesus Christ. I want to recognize him as my Lord and Savior. I want to recognize him as the one you raised from the dead. Help me see him that way. Help me understand him. I confess with my mouth. That he's my Lord. I confess with my mouth that you raised him from the dead and seated him in heavenly places. Holy Spirit, come and fill me. Baptize me in your mighty Spirit. Fill me with your fire and allow me to pour forth only you. Let the oil pour forth and never stop. Allow me to be graced and true to you. In Jesus' name. Amen. I pray. Amen. If you prayed that prayer, go ahead and comment, I'm saved. And I just wanted to thank you for watching this entire video. I pray that it allows you to really truly see the depth of God's love and the fact that it's the warnings that he doesn't want you to be in a posture of sin. But again, the world doesn't want you to see these things, and those people who do truly understand the love and power of Jesus Christ. I wanted to thank you for watching this video. And if you have and you feel graced, I'd like for you to prayerfully consider becoming a monthly partner with our ministry. We do a lot of amazing things across social media. We're bringing thousands of people to salvation. Tens of millions of people are seeing the gospel from month to month and year over year, and we continue to expand. We just crossed 600,000 subscribers across social media, and we're continuing to take the gospel to the next level. So if you do feel grace to donate to this ministry, you can make a one-time donation, a single donation to the ministry at humenik.com/partner. It's spelled H-U-M-E-N-I-K.com/partner. There you can also set up a multiple-month partnership where you will experience certain benefits as upon becoming a partner, as well as know that we are going to take all of the income that we receive through donations and put it back into the ministry to do God's work and to spread the gospel throughout all the nations. God bless.