Shane Idleman emphasizes the profound humility of Jesus, tracing it from His birth in a manger to His sacrificial death on the cross. He highlights that true greatness in God's kingdom comes through servanthood and humility, contrasting it with the pride and ambition often seen in society. Idleman encourages believers to examine their hearts, confess their pride, and embrace humility as a pathway to hope and spiritual fulfillment. He reminds the congregation that humility is essential not only in their relationship with God but also within their families and communities. Ultimately, he calls for a genuine relationship with Christ, urging everyone to be ready for His return.

I'm going to read from Matthew 20, I'm reading from the New King James, Matthew chapter 20. We left off at verse 17 where Jesus predicts his death and resurrection, but I'm actually going to pick up at verse 20, Matthew 20 verse 20, and it's a pretty lengthy text but I want to read it and I want to just get the impact and the context of the message. So let me start with Matthew 20 verse 20. Then the mother of Zebedee's sons came to Jesus and said, she actually was kneeling down, asking something from him and he said to her, what do you wish? She said to him, grant that these two sons of mine may sit, one on your right hand and the other on the left, in your kingdom. But Jesus answered and said, you do not know what you ask. Are you able to drink the cup that I'm about to drink and be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with? They said to him, we are able. Basically Jesus is saying, are you ready to go through hell on earth to follow me? And they don't really know what they're saying, but they're like, sure, yes, we'll do that, we're willing, we're ready. And Jesus is saying, yeah, you're going to definitely go through that. Verse 23, so he said to them, you will indeed drink my cup and be baptized with the baptism that I'm baptized with. But to sit on my right hand and on my left hand, it's not mine to give, but it's for those whom it is prepared by the Father. And when the ten heard it, they were greatly displeased with the two brothers. And Jesus called them to himself and said, you know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and those who are great exercise authority over them. Yet it shall not be so among you, but whoever desires to become great among you, let him be your servant. And whoever desires first, whoever desires to be first among you, let him be your slave. Just as the son of man did not come to be served, but to serve and to give his life a ransom for many. I'm going to talk to you tonight about a very important topic that I talk about often. I actually mentioned the word often, but I don't do a study on it. And that word is humility. The title of the message is humility from the manger to the cross. And we see, we see the humility in Christ from the manger to the cross and what he endured, what he went through. And I know many of you came expecting to hear a little story about baby born in a manger and go to Luke and talk about that. But I actually want to talk about something a little bit different on this topic of humility. And before we define humility, actually, before we define humility, but we don't have to define humility because we just have to look at the character of Jesus. Anytime you want to know the definition of humility, look at Christ. I mean, Webster's has a wonderful dictionary and not thinking so highly of yourself and different things, but really to get the definition of humility, we need to look at the character of Jesus. Jesus humbled himself as a child. That's Christmas, right? That's what we celebrate. He humbled himself as a servant. That's our example. And he humbled himself as a savior. That's resurrection day Easter. So we see this humility of humbling yourself, himself as a child, humbling himself as a servant, as a carpenter, hardworking carpenter. And then he humbled himself as a savior. And it's interesting that the cure for envy and jealousy, as we see what happened here, the disciples became envious and jealous and became very upset. The cure for that is also humility. That's just an extra negative truth I'm throwing in there. If you struggle with envy and jealousy, if that kind of comes up and you're envious and you're jealous, humble yourself. Humble yourself under the mighty hand of God. In due time, he will exalt you. And something that's interesting about God's kingdom, in order to go up, you must go down. The only way to go up in God's kingdom is to first go down into humility. So let me just talk about three points. They're very brief points, but they're important. Humility started at his birth. Humility started at Jesus' birth. Name one king who humbled himself. Just one king throughout history that humbled himself for his people. Now this is the king of the universe. This is the universe where we're spinning 330 miles per second. He keeps all that together. So if you don't like the rides at the fair like I don't that spin, just don't think about that. You are spinning 330 miles per second. The earth is rotation. He keeps all that together. They estimate over 100 billion galaxies. Now that one still, even now, I just can't even comprehend it. You see the Milky Way galaxy, a picture of you like, that's enormous. That must be our whole universe. Nope, that's just one in billions. That's the king we serve. That's the God who created the universe. And sometimes I think it's important to look back and look at exactly who he is. And for him to humble himself and become obedient to the point of death, even death on the cross, should cause all of us to take retrospect and look at our hearts and examine our hearts and truly look at are we walking in humility. Colossians 2.9 says that the entire fullness of God's nature dwells bodily in Jesus Christ. Now this is something you're not going to comprehend. It's just something in the Bible we have to believe. It is the full deity of God rested in Jesus Christ. The full Godhead dwelt bodily in Jesus Christ. He was not half man and half God. He was fully God and fully man. And theologians call this the hypostatic union. It was in I think 450 AD a council got together and they said this isn't half God and half man. It is fully God yet fully man. Jesus was tempted. He felt pain. He was fully man yet fully God. And it's very hard to understand in our finite mind, but it's a truth that all of those who adhere to biblical Christianity agree with. The next point is hope and humility. Hope and humility. And I think the world and even Christians right now, we're looking for hope. And there is tremendous hope and humility. When you humble yourself, hope is a byproduct because we're filled with the Spirit of God. What humility is as well is you empty yourself to become filled. So as you empty yourself of self, you begin to be filled with the Spirit of God. So being filled with the Spirit is a byproduct of humility. And we just read this, and whoever desires to be first among you, let him be your slave. Just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve and to give his life a ransom for many. And it's interesting, that word slave there, it's actually a lot of modern translations will remove it and put servant in. And the Geneva Bible, the pilgrims brought over, a lot of older translations define this word doulos correctly, it's a slave. We are slaves of Christ, but because that word has so much negativity tied to it, rightly so, they begin to change that word slave with servant. And it's interesting, a servant can serve two masters, but a slave can't. Then you can better understand Jesus' word, that a slave cannot serve two masters. And that word slave is, God controls everything. I'm not just a servant, nine to five, come and do, I'm a slave, I was bought at a price. And that's what Jesus said, whoever wants to be first among you, let him be your slave, doulos. Just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve and to give his life a ransom for many. Anytime we humble ourselves, we are empty to be filled. And I like what A. W. Tozer said, it's doubtful whether God can bless a man greatly until he has hurt him deeply. I'm going to read that again, it's doubtful whether God can bless a man greatly until he has hurt him deeply. And that's an interesting concept there, the more you humble yourself, you feel that pain and you feel that brokenness before God, now God says, now I can use you. Because when we're in our prideful state, we're thinking, well, I can do this for God and I can do this for God. And God says, no, I've got to break you first, I've got to humble you, and then I can use you. And he's absolutely right, it's doubtful whether God can bless a man greatly until he has hurt him deeply. Look at Paul being hurt deeply, look at Peter being hurt deeply, look at the prophets, Isaiah and Jeremiah being hurt deeply, being broken before God, being humbled before God, because the beautiful thing about humility is now you minister in God's power, not yours. When you humble yourself, you empty yourself, and then you're able to walk in God's strength. Philippians 2, Paul said, fulfill my joy by being like-minded. Now listen to this verse, this verse would end half of all arguments in the church. We could get rid of all, I'm talking to the church nationally, right? We could get rid of all of our petty debates, all of our arguing, all of our bickering and complaining with this right here. Fulfill my joy by being like-minded, having the same love, being of one accord and of one mind. Let nothing, nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit, but in lowliness of mind let each esteem others better than himself. Wow! I'd love to just preach a sermon on that. Having the same love, being of one accord, that tells me that I'm not by nature going to do this. I've got to put on these things, I've got to go against the flesh, I've got to stop gossiping, stop slandering, stop putting down, stop being in discord, disharmony. If I were to go over and hit that piano key, oh that sounds terrible, right, that's not in harmony. Me playing it compared to Brant is a big difference. You would not want to hear it. Why? There's no harmony there and that's what he's saying here. There's a discord. You're not of one accord. And when a church is of one mind, you remove all the little stuff and you just say, what does God want? Lord, what do you want? What is your will for this church? What is your will for my life? And this word here, let nothing be done through selfish ambition. That means I'm going to stop jockeying for position. I don't want my name on the PowerPoint. I don't want to be put in a position of leadership. I don't want to put myself, I want God to put me. I'm going to humble myself and let God direct me. And as we humble ourselves, we put others first. We praise others instead of ourselves. Watch yourself sometime how subtle it is that we begin to talk about me. We begin to exalt ourselves, well I do this and I've done this. And we begin to, instead of building up others, and I often tell people if we want to end a lot of the challenges in the church, let's begin to build people up instead of put them down and critique. Where's this coming together in the unity in the body of Christ? That's why he said here, let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit, pride, arrogance, but in lowliness of mind, let each esteem others better than himself. Let each of you look out not only for his own interest, which is good to look out for your, I mean you've got to use wisdom and you've got to be careful, but also, but also for the interest of others. And most are not led by the Spirit because they lack humility. The humble he teaches his way, Psalm 25, the humble God teaches his way. There's something beautiful about humility. You're not only filled with the Spirit, but then God teaches you his way. He directs you, almost like a car that you just give up control and you say, here Lord, you steer it. You guide it, you direct it because the humble is flexible. The humble is moldable, they're shapeable. The humble he teaches, it's almost like this impression here, this word teaches, it's almost like a direction. He teaches you, he'll shape you, he'll form you if you're humble and you submit to that. And that's what Jesus did, he submitted to the will of the Father. Power and humility. Jesus even humbled himself as a carpenter. Hard work, a lowly position, of all things he could have been, a carpenter. So when they nailed those hands to the cross, they saw hands that were scarred, they were withered because of the weather, they were just working with your hands. I mean, now we have Home Depot and tools and gloves and all these great things, but back then it was, you worked with your hands. You could tell that somebody was a hard worker and there's nothing wrong with that. He humbled himself to that lowly position. And I also, I don't know if this is just a side note, but humility in the home is also vitally important. The more I pastor, the more I see the necessity of being humble in our homes. Because we put on what I call the church face. Do you know you have a church face and you have a home face? Because how we act at church, oh brother, praise the Lord, good to see you, and then how we act at home, rarr, rarr, rarr, rarr. Right? It's different people, it shouldn't be that way. Humility is vitally important at the home. Husbands, humble yourself. Wives, humble yourself. And we serve our family. As difficult as that is, that's the way that God designed it. And I came across something this week, I wanted to read to you, it's called The Last Wish. And it's written by a death row inmate awaiting execution. He asked for a pencil and a paper and after writing for several minutes, he gave the letter to a guard to give to his biological mother. The letter said, mother, if there were more justice in this world, we would both be executed, not just me. You're as guilty as I am for the life I led. Remind yourself that when I stole the bicycle that you helped me hide it. Do you remember the time I stole money from the neighbor's wallet? You went with me to the mall to spend it. Do you remember when I stole the final results of the test scores and was expelled and you did nothing? Mom, I was just a child. Shortly after, I became a troubled teenager and now I'm a warped and distorted man. Now, we obviously can't blame parents. I mean, he's off mark here a little bit by blaming. Oh, mom, you should be, you know, it's pretty strong words. But the principle is true. What he's saying is true. How we humble ourselves and teach at home and direct our at home will have ramifications outside of the home. I mean, you can look at their studies on the most of the people incarcerated come from fatherless homes. And let me remind every man in this room that you don't have to leave home to be absent. You can be absent spiritually, emotionally, not just physically. And on that note, two husbands, I can look at the face of your wife. You could probably look at the face of my wife as well. And we can see if humility is truly happening in our home. When we look at her, do we see somebody who's beams and is happy and joyful? Or do we see somebody who's been through challenges and they're about ready on the brink of having a nervous breakdown? They're about ready to break down because there's no humility on the home. Humility in the home is absolutely important. And I can't just preach about humility in the church and neglect humility in the home. And I know people say, but Shane, encouragement is a great motivator. I need encouragement. Yeah, but you know what? So is reality. Encouragement is a great motivator, but so is reality. And the reality is that we are not succeeding in this area. We are not humbling ourself. Look at everything on Facebook. It goes against humility. Look at the media. It goes against humility. Look at the commercials. They go against everything. Everything goes against humility. Your best life now, you just, with Nike slogan, just do it. And all these things, it's just a lack of humility and it's destroying us. And actually this sermon is of no use unless we see our need. Do you realize that this whole sermon is pointless unless a person sees their need? This isn't coming up here and getting graded on a test. This is coming from the heart of God to where it changes our hearts. As I often say, it breaks my heart before it breaks yours. It stirs me before it stirs you. It convicts me before it convicts you. And that's the point of God's word. And sometimes we need a reality check. We don't get that enough. And then the third thing, hope from the manger to the cross. Philippians 2.5 where I left off, let this mind be in you. Now keep in mind, anytime the Bible says let this mind be in you, it means you can do this. Because I talk to people a lot and they're like, I just can't do that. I know the Bible says that, but I'm raised this way or I'm stuck in this, or I'm just this, or I'm this, or I'm OCD, or I'm mental. Whatever it is. So they ignore all these scriptures. But the Bible says let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus. That tells me also my mind's not going to like what I'm about ready to read. Because my mind doesn't like to be in a position of humility. The carnal mind is at enmity with God. It's at war with God. Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus. Who being in the form of God, did not consider robbery to be equal with God. It means he wasn't offended by humbling himself. But he made himself of no reputation taking on the form of a bondservant and coming in the likeness of men. And being found in the appearances as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death. Even death on a cross. And one of the wonderful things about meditating on scriptures, if you just sit and meditate on this, I don't know of too many people who wouldn't, there wouldn't be tears starting to form after 30 minutes. Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus. Who being in the form of God, he did not consider robbery to be equal with God. But he made himself of no reputation, stepping down from heaven, taking on sinful flesh. It's a sickening analogy, but it's exactly like jumping into a septic tank or a cesspool and then coming out all that filth, all that stuff and saying, now let me minister. That's the imagery there. Who would do that? And that doesn't even compare to what he did. The God of the universe who created, who could wipe out and start over a speck of dust, just one word and a legion of angels could destroy whatever. He wiped out an Assyrian army of 185,000 with one angel. This God of the universe steps down from that, humbles himself, becomes obedient, takes on sinful flesh, becomes a carpenter, probably spit upon, probably hit, probably cussed. And like the song says, Oh Mary, did you know the son that you delivered would soon deliver you? That's why he came. And if you, if you, the humility that blows my mind, who would do that? Humble themselves, take on human flesh, and then allow the same creation to put the creator on the cross. He humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death. See, it's one thing to die nobly, but it's another thing to be hung on a cross. It's the worst thing. It's the worst thing. In this society, whoever is hung on a tree is cursed. There's nothing, there's nothing worse than what he went through. Allowed to be beaten, allowed to be scourged, allowed to be his flesh ripped off, allowed the crown of thorns, thick nail-like things placed on his skull, all this enduring, enduring, they call it the passion of Christ, the passion for his people. He humbled himself, carrying his own cross, the old rugged cross, you know, all these. See, once you can meditate on scripture, once this penetrates your heart, you have to become a devoted follower. You have to tell people about Jesus. I just heard something somewhere, I have to check it out, but 95% of Christians don't tell anybody about Jesus. And I thought about it, it's probably true. They'll tell everybody about Star Wars. The reason is, is because they don't know him in a powerful way. He's not changed their life. He's not, he's not, now I'm not, I'm going to be careful here, he's saved them, but they have not felt the salvation. He's delivered them, but they have not experienced it, because they're living a carnal life. There's no, they're not on fire for God, because when you're on fire for God, and you're filled with the Holy Spirit, you'll talk to the cashier at Trader Joe's, you'll ask people in the mall if they need prayer. If you're at the gym, you'll send somebody who's in pain, you'll send, I heard somebody's at the batting cages the other day, and this lady was screaming at her boyfriend, all kinds of four-letter words coming out, and just, I'm breaking up with you, bam, slams her phone down, and I couldn't get to her there, but my wife, I mean, was there too, we could have, they're everywhere. It's everywhere. Ministry's everywhere. And if 95% of the people don't tell anybody about Jesus, it's because they themselves probably have not experienced that power themselves. I would say in a large majority of people, number one, it's because they don't truly know the shepherd. They have religion and not a relationship. So of course they're not going to say anything, because they don't have that relationship. I'd say a lot of people also aren't filled with the Spirit of God. They're filled with Facebook and the media and the news and the party lifestyle and this and everything in the world. They're filled with everything but God. So of course they're not going to tell people about God because it's not changing their life. They're actually convicted. So when somebody's filled with the Spirit of God, comes in their life, they say, I don't want to be around that person. Aren't you a Christian too? Yeah, but they're no fun. Right. Because they're going this way, you're going this way. So that's why I think, and that's my heart and one of the principles of this church, is to get people on fire for God, to be desperate for more of God, to be desperate for holiness, to be desperate for prayer, to be desperate for more of Christ. Where's that desperation? Where's that holiness? I mean, where are people when they come in, they look forward to worship. They look forward to more time in God's Word. Where is that? Where did it go? Because I remember when the church started with just 120 people in an upper room for days. They prayed and fire fell. I remember when the Word of God came alive. You can see clips of Chinese believers in the underground church literally weeping over their Bibles. They can't believe they have the Word of God and they won't get through this in a year. Never try two months. Where's that come from? Because it's a genuine relationship on fire for God. That's where that comes from. And because Jesus humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death on a cross, therefore God has what? God has highly exalted Him and given Him a name which is above every name, that the name of Jesus Christ, here's the famous verse, every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. And the worst thing you want to do is be on the other side of eternity and say I wish I would have done it because every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that Christ is Lord. So you either do it on this side of the cross and thank God you did or you did it on that or do it on that side and you regret. Regret that you allowed pride. Message on humility, that you allowed pride to stop you from that full surrender. Here's what, in this area, here's what confession brings and what I mean by confession is I would like to see people tonight during worship is to confess Lord I haven't been humble. I'll be the first to start. There I can give you many times last month I have not been humble. I have not humbled myself to my wife. I have not humbled myself to kids. I have not humbled myself to others. And I want to let this mind be in you. I want that mind of Christ through humility. And the interesting about confession is it purifies the soul. It restores and it renews. When you confess, when you humble yourself, it purifies, it restores, it renews. There's like this times of refreshing come in from the presence of the Lord and it fills us up. And the reason you become uplifted is because you've unloaded. Watch a semi-truck sometimes that's really full. Watch it unload. And you watch how much the bed increases. That's why you see a lot of trucks, their beds are like this. It's so they can hold the weight of what's being put. And as the weight is unloaded, uplifted, it's unloaded. Same thing happens with us. So many people carrying around stress and anxiety and all these things they weren't designed to carry. They're carrying this load and Christianity seems like this load and this oh I can't do it and this whole bunch of do's and don'ts and how do people get through life and this is difficult. That's not Christianity. Christianity is resting in God's sovereignty and resting in who he is and humbling yourself and admitting and confessing and allowing him to take this load. And I hear mainly a lot of times young adults or guys I guess my age say oh man how do you do that? A whole bunch of rules and this and that. Well it's the same way I drive on the freeway and stay in the lane. See those lines aren't there to protect me from having fun. They're there to protect me and let me get home and enjoy life and not end up in a coroner's van. That's what God's principles are. They're guidelines through the canyons of life. That's why I love Psalm 30. I just meditated on this week and I wanted to share it with you. The psalmist writes oh Lord my God I cried out to you and you healed me. He said oh Lord my God I humbled myself I cried out to you and you healed me. My soul was heading to the pit. My soul was heading to the grave and you held me back. Lord I will worship you. I will sing praises to you. You are powerful. You are mighty. You healed me. You delivered me. Though your anger is but for a moment your favor is for a lifetime. Though weeping may endure tonight joy cometh in the morning. From what? From confession. From humility. David said I pray that the joy of my salvation would return. But what did David have to do first? He had to humble himself. He had to humble himself and repent and get back on track. Many of you know I like to research some of the hymns and I want to give a background of a famous hymn that many of you have sung All Hail the Power of Jesus' Name. If you remember that one. It was written by Reverend E. P. Scott. He was a missionary living in India during the 1800s. At the prompting of the Holy Spirit but against the advice of his fellow missionaries Scott set out alone to visit a remote village. He was determined to share the gospel with a dangerous savage tribe. Several days into the journey Scott was met by a large group of warriors who quickly surrounded him. Each one pointing his spear towards his heart. Expecting to die Scott made a decision to use his last few breaths to glorify God and to hopefully stir something within the hearts of his captors. He took out his violin which he always carried on him, closed his eyes and began to play and sing All Hail the Power of Jesus' Name in the native language of these warriors. After singing the first verse, the second, the third and the fourth he realized he was still standing and that all around him there was peace and quiet. Opening his eyes he saw every spear lowered. There stood those mighty warriors with tears in their eyes. Then he wrote All Hail the Power of Jesus' Name. Let angels prostrate fall. Bring forth the royal diadem and crown him Lord of all. Oh that you yonder sacred throng we at his feet may fall. We'll join the everlasting song and crown him Lord of all. And that sums up so well that what we do in humility. See I think and I know it's difficult but I think we should be the most humble gracious people on the planet. God you died for me what can I do for you? Instead everybody's jockeying for position, everybody's offended, everybody's upset. It's like walking on eggshells in the church. Do you walk on eggshells in the church? I don't want to say it, I don't want to say it. It's like it shouldn't be that way. Of one mind, of one accord, Lord what do you want me to do? You died for me, I'm your slave, I'm your doulos. John MacArthur wrote a great book on that entitled Slave and he did the history of this word. I encourage you to do that. And once you read that book you'll have a new understanding of what this term means. Dying to self has a whole new, everything. Lord these are your finances. And the hard part for me, one of the hardest parts for me was saying Lord these are your kids. Because they're my kids. But Lord these are your kids, whatever you have for them. Because we want college education, we want this, we want to live vicariously through the lives of our children. We want them to be pro-baseball players. Lord whatever you want them to do. And then the thought comes, what about if I take one at a young age? Oh God, not that. Not that. But it's understanding that Lord you're sovereign, you're in control, I give you everything. My finances, this church is yours. My gifting, whether you're worship or whether you're in administration or teaching or preaching, whatever that gifting is, you do it all to the glory of God. You say Lord, here I am, use me. I mean John Scotland would cry give me Scotland for the cause of Christ or I shall die. George Whitefield, John Wesley would cry give me more souls or I die. I mean it's this passion that comes from a heart that surrenders to God. Let me close with this another brief story. I heard D. James Kennedy, I don't know if many of you remember him. He read this on the TV one time. Listen to this for just a minute. There was a man with the job of raising and lowering a drawbridge so passenger trains could cross over a deep canyon. This man had one child, a son who he loved very much. But one day the little boy wandered down the bridge without his father noticing. Soon the father heard a train whistle. As he started to pull the lever to lower the bridge he looked and out the window to his whore he saw his son had crawled down into the big heavy gears. If he pulled the lever his son would be crushed. There were only seconds to decide. Hundreds of people would die if he didn't lower the drawbridge. They are all sons and daughters loved by someone. He took a deep breath and his heart screaming with pain he pulled the lever. The brief father stood helplessly at the window beating on it with both fists and screaming out in anguish as the train zipped by. The passengers saw him and they thought he was simply waving so they waved back not realizing the price the father had just paid for them. And if that's not a perfect picture of what God did for us I don't know what is. And I was reflecting earlier this week on reading ahead of Matthew Jesus says but as in the days of Noah so will the coming of the Son of Man be. Basically saying are you ready? Are you ready? As were in the days of Noah it was wickedness. What is going on Lord? Well as in the days of Noah so is the coming of the Son of Man going to be. And I thought also if this is the most important message on the planet why aren't we hearing more about it? Are you ready? That should be the most. I mean if the Bible is true if it's not forget it. Go have dinner. But if it's true if it's true and Jesus says are you ready? Don't let that day come upon you unexpectedly. Are you ready? Are you ready for Christ's return? Are you right with God? So when somebody like me comes out and says this people say oh that guy he's just he's out there he's mean he's narrow minded he's full of hate. No we're full of love because we want to share the truth and ask are you ready? Are you ready? And people say you're scaring me Shane. I say no I'm preparing you. There's a difference between scaring and preparing. And sometimes scaring isn't wrong. I've told my kids does this sound familiar? Hey don't go in the street. Whoa whoa whoa get out of there there's a car coming. Oh you're scaring me dad. Yeah you bet I am. I hope I scare the hell out of you so you don't ever touch that asphalt again. What about what about my son likes to go in the desert and put his hand down this hole. No no no you see those little tracks right there in the dirt? There's something in that hole. Don't dad you're scaring me. Yes I'm scaring you because that rattlesnake is going to put you in the hospital and possibly kill you. What about somebody you hit a telephone pole and you see this big wire fall down from the sky. My son wants to go climb up the wire. Say no don't you dare touch that wire dad you're scaring me. Yes twelve thousand volts of electricity will kill you. Jesus said don't fear him who can just kill your body. That's a wonderful scripture for today's terrorism. More people are more scared of ISIS than Christ. Tozer said I love him because my savior but I fear him because he's my judge. That's a healthy balance. Jesus said don't fear him who can kill your body but fear him who can cast both body and soul in hell. So is Jesus narrow minded? Jesus mean? Is Jesus full of hate? No he's full of truth and the only way you can express the truth is by telling it. Now I'm not one of those guys on the street corner repent you're going to burn. You know bull horns. I'm not sure that approach is you know well let me not go there because I'll get emails on that too. But the approach is the angry prophet of God is not a good approach. The loving prophet of God like Jesus was is the good approach. If everything is underscored with love and humility there's power in it. But remove the love and humility and you just become a modern day pharisee. I mean that's why we can yell the truth at people and they won't hear. But if you love the truth. I mean everything I'm saying to you I tell to people in private. The volumes turned way down and the words are chosen a little bit more carefully. You don't have private conversations the same way you preach. I hope you know that. There's different dynamics there. But you still tell people the truth. I would tell a young man caught in homosexuality I met with eight months ago I tell him the same thing I would tell a husband who's getting ready to walk out on his wife. Same thing. Same truth. If they're not right with God they need to turn and get right with God. Humble themselves. Oh back to humility. See here's the interesting Jesus humbled himself and became obedient to the death on the cross provided the way bridge the gap known as the cross of Christ. Calvary doesn't look that pretty either. It's not tarnished. I mean if you saw the real cross and the blood still on it and what it was made of and just the wood. They didn't care what it looked like. Give me two stubs of let me put this in the ground and let me just get somebody on it. It was ugly. He humbled himself and then he asked us to humble ourselves and admit that we need him. Anytime a person truly comes to the Lord it's through humility. I've never seen a prideful person at the altar. You know where they're usually at? In the back row like this. Geez always lead to God. You know what? Always do lead to God. Now before you get up and leave I didn't say always lead to heaven. Always lead to God. It's known as the judgment seat of God. Every path every religion will lead to the judgment seat of God. When he says depart from me I don't know you. So anytime somebody says always lead to God yeah that's true. They don't lead to heaven but everybody will stand before God and give an account for their life and give an account for their. Here's the interesting thing to me it all boils down to humility. Those who humble themselves and say I'm not God you are. I mean I just had another conversation this week and I don't know how these people can think there's no God. We came from this ooze and a protein formed and then did a liver form and a kidney and the heartbeat and the central nervous system and the oxygen level and the nitrogen and like who just put all I mean who how that's impossible. And in every single case it's because of pride. I don't want there to be a God. Many of you follow Ravi Zacharias he's one of the leading apologists in our nation today. Wonderful speaker and teacher. He said something along the lines of the denial of Christ in our culture has less to do with facts and more to do with what a person is prejudiced to conclude. In other words it has nothing to do with facts. They just don't want there to be a God. Because the prideful human heart does not want to be does not want there to be a God. They are God. And until they're on their death bed they really don't realize it. So I just encourage you I don't know a group this size and I would ask you are you ready? Are you ready? I don't mean to scare but I do mean to prepare. You have to you know Shane I'm not ready. I'm not ready. And I've met people who've been in church 20 years. They've been serving they've been in different roles 20 years and they've never bowed their knee to Christ. They've been raised in a Christian home. They go to a church because of their pride and arrogance they think by their own merit they're going to walk in through the pearly gates. But really it's humility. Humbling ourselves before God. So if you've never done that I would encourage you just humble yourself and say God I've never confessed to you as Savior and Lord. I've never repented of my sin. I've never turned my life over to you. I'm doing that tonight. And then as Christians we can get off the humility track and get right on the pride track real quick. Well Shane how do I know if I'm on the pride track? Here's a quick test. Are you filled with love and joy and peace and contentment along suffering and gentleness and goodness and kindness and grace just flow out? Or are you rigid and angry and mad and upset and uptight and easily offended? That's not the filling of the spirit. That's the filling of the flesh. It's a byproduct of pride. You know why I know so well? That's me too. I'm a prideful man working on humility on a daily basis. And when those things are creeping up I know pride is there. And that's humility. That's why I don't know how people get through life without prayer in a time of devotion and worship with the Lord. Without that pride will hold you captive. Pride will hold you captive. And you can't just say well I read the Bible a long time ago. I listened to Erwin. That's not going to cut it. So did the Pharisees. The Pharisees read the word of God and they went to temple. And they stood in the front row and they wore these gorgeous gowns and look at me. People are looking at me. So see humility is what the heart is doing before God. And we have to be broken before the Lord. And if you haven't done that before I would encourage you to do that tonight.