Enemy Of God - Proud Series

c. Here Jesus gives an example of someone who tries to build a spiritual life on something other than the firm foundation that Jesus came to be for us. He says that anyone who does this is foolish and that all they have built up will be a great disaster and will fall apart.

d. The opposite of wisdom is folly, meaning the short-term self-indulgence which marks out the person who doesn't think about long-term priorities and goals, but lives on a day-to-day basis, asking, "What is the most fun thing to do now?" Wisdom seeks to have a solid relationship with God, while the foolish seek to put it off because they believe they have all the time in the world.

e. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, And the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding. ~Proverbs 9:10

f. So let us build our hopes upon the solid rock of Christ Jesus. Because all other things are sinking sand.

4. Hateful

a. This is the state of not wanting to show or feel love for ourselves and others. In this state we lean not upon God, but to our own selves because of the hate that fills our heart.

b. For we ourselves were also once foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving various lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful and hating one another. ~Titus 3:3

c. I am saddened by this scripture to know that we were at one time so hateful, and that some of us like to remain in this state. Hate is like acid. It can damage the vessel in which it is stored as well as destroy the object on which it is poured.

d. Many Germans who had immigrated to the United States were sitting in a theater when the movie Psyche was shown. The propaganda movie, produced by Hitler’s Third Reich in 1940, followed the invasion and Blitzkrieg through Poland. Whenever a Polish person appeared on the screen, people in the audience would scream, “Kill him! Kill him!” in a frenzied commitment to the destruction of Germany’s enemies.

W. H. Auden, the Pulitzer prize – winning poet, playwright, and literary critic, was so shocked that he walked out of the theater. He later said one question ran through his mind: “What response can my enlightened, humanistic tradition give to this evil, to those who cry out for the blood of innocent victims?” He began to sense that the only answer to evil was not in humanism, but in God and the revelation of God in the Bible.

He was convicted of God’s holiness and his own sinfulness. In 1940 he became a Christian.

e. A man who hates to be slapped on the back packs his coat with TNT and waits for this man who always slaps his back. His idea is when he hits me I will get him, I'll blow him up. Hate kills both the person who you hate, but also yourself as well. Hating people is like burning down your own house to get rid of a rat.

f. But thanks be to Christ Jesus who transformed us into His marvelous light, shining the light upon the darkness of our heart and illuminating the love that God desires us to show.

5. Hypocritical

a. This is the state where we act as a righteous person in church, but having a heart that is far from God.