Stop Being So Stubborn

STOP BEING SO STUBBORN!

Prov 16:18-19(NIV)

18 Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall.

19 Better to be lowly in spirit and among the oppressed than to share plunder with the proud.

1 Sam 15:23(KJV)

23 For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry. Because thou hast rejected the word of the LORD, he hath also rejected thee from being king.

I. A PICTURE OF STUBBORNNESS

Deut 21:18(KJV)

18 If a man have a stubborn and rebellious son, which will not obey the voice of his father, or the voice of his mother, and that, when they have chastened him, will not hearken unto them:

A. A rebellious child

B. Stiffnecked

Exodus 32:7-14 PP6

He gives this people their true character: "It is a stiff-necked people, unapt to come under the yoke of the divine law, and governed as it were by a spirit of contradiction, averse to all good and prone to evil, obstinate against the methods employed for their cure." Note, The righteous God sees, not only what we do, but what we are, not only the actions of our lives, but the dispositions of our spirits, and has an eye to them in all his proceedings.

(from Matthew Henry's Commentary)

II. THE SIN OF STUBBORNNESS

1 Sam 15:23(KJV)

23 For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry. Because thou hast rejected the word of the LORD, he hath also rejected thee from being king.

A. INIQUITY (INBRED & UNBRIDLED SIN)

Eph 2:1-3(KJV)

1 And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins;

2 Wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience:

3 Among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind; and were by nature the children of wrath(unbridled passions), even as others.

1. The original sin nature that influences me to endulge and imbelish myself in sin and follow a path different from God’s ordained plan.

B. IDOLATRY (PRIDE - PUTTING OURSELVES BEFORE GOD)

1. Putting myself in a position of authority over God. (Knowing more, etc.)

III. THE REALITY OF STUBBORNNESS

A. WHO’S GUILTY OF STUBBORNNESS?

Isa 53:6(KJV)

6 All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all.

B. WE HAVE ALL BEEN GUILTY OF THE SIN OF STUBBORNNESS

1. Turning away from the Lord.

2. Going our own way.

IV. THE CONSEQUENCES OF STUBBORNNESS

Heb 3:7-15(KJV)

7 Wherefore (as the Holy Ghost saith, To day if ye will hear his voice,

8 Harden not your hearts, as in the provocation, in the day of temptation in the wilderness:

9 When your fathers tempted me, proved me, and saw my works forty years.

10 Wherefore I was grieved with that generation, and said, They do alway err in their heart; and they have not known my ways.

11 So I sware in my wrath, They shall not enter into my rest.)

12 Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God.

13 But exhort one another daily, while it is called To day; lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin.

14 For we are made partakers of Christ, if we hold the beginning of our confidence stedfast unto the end;

15 While it is said, To day if ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts, as in the provocation.

A. STUBBORNNESS PREVENTED AN ENTIRE GENERATION FROM BEING FULFILLED IN THE PLAN OF GOD FOR THEIR LIVES

1. Missed the land of promise.

2. Not only did they die for their stubbornness, their lives were miserable.

3. Our stubbornness can not only prevent us from getting where God wants us travel, but it can also destroy any possibility for a happy and meaningful life.

B. GOD WAS GRIEVED WITH THEM

C. THEIR ABILITY TO HEAR GOD IS HINDERED

D. THEY WERE HARD/MEAN PEOPLE – VS. 13,15

E. THEY WERE OUT OF FELLOWSHIP WITH GOD

F. THEY DIDN’T HAVE ANY PEACE “REST” - VS. 11

V. HOW TO PREVENT STUBBORNNESS IN YOUR LIFE

A. SUBMIT THE LEADERSHIP OF THE HOLY SPIRIT

B. CONNECT WITH OTHER BELIEVER “EXHORT ONE ANOTHER”

C. LET THE WORD OF CHRIST GET INTO YOUR HEART

1 Pet 1:22(KJV)APPLICATION/DEVOTIONAL LIFE

22 Seeing ye have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit unto unfeigned love of the brethren, see that ye love one another with a pure heart fervently: