A Divine Pardon Review – Part 4
Transcript of FLOT Line Episode 583 aired on October 30, 2016
Good morning and welcome to The FLOT Line. I’m your host Rick Hughes. Please stay with me
for the next 30 minutes where we’ll have some motivation, inspiration, education, always done
with no manipulation. The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, this is our motto. This
is our job here, not some human speculation, but accurate information from the canon of
Scripture, from the Bible. The FLOT Line is the protective barrier you can have in your soul to
stop the outside sources of adversity before they become the inside source of stress by learning
10 unique problem-solving devices that we teach on this radio show. They are nothing new.
These are nothing that I’ve discovered. They were taught by my pastor many years ago and I’ve
been reteaching them to you with his permission. This is dealing with age-old Biblical doctrines
that we learn and use. We deploy these as a main line of resistance in our soul because we have
the opportunity to live a supernatural life. The Christian life is indeed a supernatural life with
supernatural assets, the asset of God the Holy Spirit that indwells us and seals us, the asset of the
living Word of God, the asset of Christ in us, the hope of glory, the Mystery Doctrine of the
church. We have so many wonderful things available to us and as we learn these things and
utilize these things, we are able to live a supernatural life that our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ
lived and passed on to us. It’s called simply the Christian life. It’s a life where you don’t have to
worry. It’s a life where you don’t have to be afraid. It’s a life where you have instantaneous extra-
terrestrial communication with God the Father called prayer.
You can pray anytime, anywhere,
any day, and you can get answers to your prayers. As a Christian you can talk directly to
God.
These are unbelievable assets that we have. We have the confidence that we know He
would never throw us under the bus. He said,
“I will not leave you or forsake you”
(Hebrews
13:5). He said,
“I give unto them eternal life and they will never perish”
(John 10:28). 1 John
5:13 says,
“These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, so that
you may know that you have eternal life”
(1 John 5:13).
We have the opportunity to become a
brand-new person in Christ.
2 Corinthians 5:17 says,
“If any man is in Christ, he is a new
creation. Old things are passed away and all things become new.”
It is amazing, our new life in
Christ. As we learn these problem-solving devices that God gives us such as rebound, how to
solve the problem of sin and the filling of the Holy Spirit, how to solve the problem of our sin
nature controlling us, the faith-rest drill, how to get victory over fear and anxiety in our life,
grace orientation, doctrinal orientation, having a personal sense of destiny, having personal love
for God the Father, impersonal love for other people, having the happiness of Christ, and being
occupied with Christ, these are all tremendous problem-solving devices. We have all of these
listed in a small booklet we’ll send to you if you’d like to have it, no charge ever. Just let us
know, we’ll get it right in the mail to you. We have been going through a study related to a book
I’ve written called
A Divine Pardon.
This book has been used by God in a lot of different ways
including being used by a lot of people that are incarcerated and have need for a pardon. We’ve
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been talking about the divine pardon that God gives us when we put our faith in Jesus Christ, His
anointed Son. I want to describe the opposing attitudes of arrogance and humility for you
because when we wrapped up our last radio show, we talked about how arrogance always rejects
authority.
Arrogance can’t handle authority, especially if authority makes an unfair
decision.
You have to remember something. The only perfect person is God. The police officer,
the principal of the school, even your parents, all are capable of making a wrong decision. Just
because they made a mistake doesn’t mean you can reject their decision. I use an illustration that
I heard years ago about a football coach who whipped the wrong kid for something that he didn’t
do. The kid never complained, never told anybody until years later when another student actually
fessed up to the coach at a reunion that he had whipped the wrong one. The coach sought out the
kid that he actually did whip and apologized to him and and asked him, “Why didn’t you tell me
I was wrong? I was so angry, I could have sworn that was you I heard cursing that teacher.” The
student said, “Coach, it’s okay. I just kept my mouth shut and took it.” This is a humility attitude.
A person with arrogance will accuse you of disrespecting them. They get all angry, get all
haughty, and threaten to sue. “I’m going to get my parents and they’ll come up here and they’ll
sue.” Yada, yada, yada. You know how this goes. Arrogant people cannot handle unfair authority.
We all have to learn how to handle this and sooner or later you’re going to be tested in this area.
The dictionary defines arrogance as a feeling of superiority manifested in an overbearing manner.
I took this out of
Miriam Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary
. On the other hand, humility is defined
as the quality or the state of being humble.
This is a distinction that is very important in the
Christian’s life, humility versus arrogance, respond versus react. The attitude of Jesus
Christ was always one of humility.
If there was ever a person who was treated unfairly, it’s
Him. There were several unfair trials the night before He was crucified, trying Him in an unfair
way, even lying witnesses and assaulting Jesus Christ before they ever put Him on the cross. He
handled it, He didn’t get angry. There’s a song that someone sang one time that said, “He could
have called 10,000 angels to destroy the world and set Him free, but He died alone for you and
me.” Whenever you’re treated unfairly, if you get angry, if you get bitter, if you lash out, this is a
sign of your arrogance. Our Lord Jesus Christ did not have a sin nature, He did not sin. He didn’t
get into arrogance. I hope you will learn what arrogance is. It’s a false pride, it’s a sin, and it
motivates us to commit many more sins.
Arrogance is a mental attitude sin and is a corrupter
of everything you do and everything you say. It’s a guaranteed sure sign that your sin
nature is in control of your life.
Uncontrolled arrogance can distract you and destroy you. If
you’re a believer in Jesus Christ, it can divorce you from reality and destroy any capacity that
you might have for some type of love or happiness in this world. Arrogant people can’t handle
authority. Arrogance motivates all sorts of emotional sins, hatred, anger, self-pity, jealousy,
violence, even murder. I realize there are occasionally reasons why we must defend ourselves
and sometimes we have to do things we don’t want to do but this is not related to an arrogant
attitude. When a person is infected with unrestrained anger, they’re not able to think, they’re not
able to control their decisions, and more than likely they are going to harm themselves or harm
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someone else. For example, Cain murdered Abel his brother. Genesis 4:1-10 says,
“Adam knew
Eve his wife and she conceived and bore Cain and she said ‘I have acquired a man from the
Lord.’ Then she bore again, this time his brother Abel. Abel was a keeper of sheep and Cain was
a tiller of the ground. And in the process of time it came to pass that Cain brought an offering of
the fruit of the ground to the Lord
[and he was very proud of his offering]
and Abel
[who was
very humble]
also brought of the firstborn of his flock of their fat. And the Lord respected Abel
and his offering but He did not respect Cain and his offering and Cain was very angry and his
countenance fell.
[this means he got ticked off]
So the Lord said to Cain, ‘Why are you angry
and why has your countenance fallen?
[why are you so angry?]
If you do well will you not be
accepted? And if you do not do well, sin lies at the door and its desire is for you, but you should
rule over that sin.’ Cain talked with Abel his brother and it came to pass within the field that
Cain rose up and killed Abel and then the Lord said to Cain, ‘Where is Abel your brother?’ He
said, ‘I do not know where my brother is. Am I my brother’s keeper?’ God said, ‘What did you
do? The voice of your brother’s blood cries out to Me from the ground.’”
Read this for yourself
and you can see how Cain murdered his brother Abel because he was jealous of Abel and jealous
of the attention that God showed him. Cain reacted, this is what arrogance does, reacted to God’s
rejection of his own offering and took out his bitterness and his jealousy on his brother. Do you
want to know why God accepted the offering of Abel? Because it was a lamb, a picture of Jesus,
the Lamb of God without spot and without blemish. The other was a picture of works, “Look
what I did, I worked hard, I produced this and now I’m giving it to You and I want You to accept
it, it’s my works.”
Titus 3:5 says,
“He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in
righteousness”
no.
“For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves,
it is the gift of God, not as a result of works, so that no one may boast.”
(Ephesians 2:8-9).
Right here in Genesis 4 you have the difference between works, trying to get to heaven by
impressing God because of something you did and grace salvation, going to heaven and being
accepted by God because of something the Lamb did.
Arrogance has to be controlled.
Do you
know why? Because if you don’t, it will motivate revenge and revenge can cause you to do some
pretty dumb, stupid things. The Bible talks about sins and there are the big ones listed for
example in Proverbs 6:16-19,
“There are six sins the Lord hates, even seven that are disgusting
to Him. Arrogant eyes, a lying tongue, hands that kill innocent people, a mind that devises
wicked plans, feet that are quick to do wrong, a dishonest witness spitting out lies, and a person
who spreads conflict among relatives.”
Now listen to Proverbs 11:2-3.
“When arrogance comes,
then comes shame but wisdom remains with humble people
[did you hear that? That’s a humility
profile].
Integrity guides decent people but hypocrisy leads treacherous people to destroy
themselves.”
Then in Proverbs 12:15-16,
“The way of a fool is right in his own eyes, but a wise
man is he who listens to counsel. A fool’s anger is known at once, but a prudent man conceals
dishonor”
(Proverbs 12:15-16).
Arrogant people like to believe they’re justified in everything
they do.
They overlook their own failures. They have the idea that the rules are for others and
not for them. It is sort of a self-justification attitude that they make excuses for themselves and
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they often blame their situation on someone else. This is the very first stage of arrogance. It’s
called self-deception which keeps them from seeing life with any objectivity. Finally arrogant
people get into some sort of self-absorption. So we have self-justification, self-deception, and
self-absorption. When you lose all standards, you know you would be willing to do anything to
ease your unhappiness. Arrogant people have complete disregard for anyone but themselves.
Arrogant people usually have a very unrealistic self-image of themselves because they don’t
see themselves as God sees them.
Do you know what the most arrogant thing in the world is?
It’s religion. There is no bigger turnoff to me and maybe to you than an arrogant person who is
also religious. He never sees his own flaws. He never sees his own failures, but he’s really good
at seeing yours. For example, the religious man may think he’s gaining God’s favor because he
doesn’t drink and he doesn’t smoke and he’ll look down his nose at anyone that does. If you put
him out in the public he presents some squeaky clean image but he doesn’t fool God I assure you.
Proverbs 23:7 tells us,
“As a man thinks in his heart, so he is,”
that’s the real man. Arrogance is a
subject seldom discussed in the church and for good reason I promise you because the concept of
organized religion is very arrogant unlike Christianity.
Christianity is a relationship between
God and man through man’s faith in the saving work of Christ. But religion, this is like
Cain. Religion is man’s attempt to gain approval from God by what he does.
It’s the height
of arrogance to think that you, like Cain thought, can earn your way into heaven by being good
or by following some religious code. Matthew 7:22-23 says,
“Many will say to Me on that day,
‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your
name perform many miracles?’ And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you’”
(Matthew
7:22-23).
God is not impressed by religious activity.
He’s not impressed by church
membership. Sure, Christians need to go to church but this is not how you get saved. This is
what you do because you’re saved. A self-inflated attitude of self-righteousness or putting the big
bucks in the offering plate, this doesn’t get you saved. Salvation does not come through some sort
of works or false goodness like obeying the Golden Rule. You may say, “I do unto others and
don’t do unto others.” This is not it. These qualify as works and totally contradict the grace
principle of God, the principle I’ve explained to you so many times before. I told you, did you
hear me?
We are all sinners. There is nothing we can do to gain God’s approval by our own
efforts, by our own means. We don’t earn, we don’t deserve an eternal relationship with
God
. It is simply God and His gracious attitude toward us.
He provides everything we need, all
we have to do is accept it.
Anything other than this neutralizes your faith. How do I know this?
“God so loved the world
[put your name there, God so loved you]
that He gave His uniquely
born Son, that whoever believes in Him will not perish but have everlasting life”
(John 3:16).
What motivated God to send His Son, our Lord Jesus Christ into the world? His love for you, His
love for me. If we accept this, if we accept the gift that God gives us, the gift of forgiveness, we
don’t earn it, we don’t buy it, we don’t purchase it, we just do what Romans 10:13 says,
“
Whoever
will call on the name of the Lord will be saved.”
This is something the religious leaders of the
Old Testament like the Pharisees did not understand. Those Pharisees, Sadducees, and all the
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members of the Sanhedrin, they saw Jesus Christ, the Son of God, as an irreverent lawbreaker.
Do you know why? Because He socialized with prostitutes and tax collectors. Both of these
types were hated in Biblical times. When Christ made it clear that He was the Son of God, the
Pharisees became indignant. They went ballistic and they began to plot His death. He told the
disciples this was going on. He told the disciples He was going to be killed, and He told them
three days later He would walk out of the grave. Surely, these religious Pharisees and Sadducees
did not think that the true Son of God would ever associate with such unrighteous sinners, at
least this is what they thought. In reality not only did He befriend these people, He guaranteed
their eternal life. You know why? Because they knew what they needed. They knew the depth of
their depravity. They knew their sin-infected lives and were not happy with themselves, but the
Pharisees, the Sadducees, the Sanhedrin, they didn’t know anything. They thought they were
perfect. They thought they were related to Abraham, they were going to get in on their
relationship to being a Jew. “We observe the law of Moses and we’re in to the Kingdom,” wrong.
Jesus Christ guarantees for all of us eternal life by means of the act of grace that He provided.
What He provided flew in the face of those religious leaders because they thought they could
work their way into heaven and you can’t. Again,
“For by grace are you saved through faith and
it is not the result of works. It is a gift from God lest any man would brag about it.”
The
Pharisees and the religious leaders in the times of Christ our Lord were so struck by their own
self-righteousness that they were offended by this principle of grace. It upset them that their good
works were not good enough to measure up to God’s absolute perfection and righteousness.
Thus, they determined to kill Jesus Christ, an innocent man. John 11:53, listen to the words,
“Then from that day forth they took counsel together to put Him to death.”
Things are really no
different today are they?
Even today many religious people in their arrogance cannot and
will not ever accept the fact that God’s gift of salvation is available to all people.
Regardless
of whatever sin they may have committed, it’s available to all people and this angers people. See,
they are the goody two shoes. They never did anything like you did. “How could you go to
heaven?” You talk about self-righteousness and bitterness. They look at their life and they say,
“I’m a good person, I’ve never done anything wrong. Why would God not save me? But look at
you, look what you’ve done. God can’t save you.” The answer is, yes He can and yes He probably
has, if you let Him. They can’t stand the fact that God is impartial. It drives them nuts that we are
imperfect and that our eternal life is 100% guaranteed by God because of who and what He is,
not because of them and what they are. This is why people reject Christ, for this very reason, and
they lose out on the opportunity to be delivered from the Lake of Fire in eternity. This is the
worst mistake anybody can make. Humility is unbelievable. In sharp contrast to self-inflated
attitudes of religion, humility starts with the Lord Jesus Christ.
“Let this mind be in you that was
also in Christ Jesus”
(Philippians 2:5).
He
humbled Himself. We see this in the way He handled
the unfair treatment He received while He was on the earth. Philippians 2:6-8 says,
“He made
Himself of no reputation, took upon Himself the form of a bond-servant, became in the likeness
of men, and being found in appearance as a man, humbled Himself, and became obedient even to
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the point of death on the cross.”
What is humility? Does it mean you’ve got to walk around all
day with your shoulders slumped over and your eyes on the ground? No. Does it mean you’ve
got to act like some wimpy person, never able to hurt a fly? No. Humility refers to your respect
for authority whether it’s fair or unfair, because God is always in charge.
When someone in
charge of you makes a decision that you deem unfair and you don’t like it, you’ve got to
make one of two decisions. You can react with bitterness or you can respond with humility
and forgiveness.
Arrogant people can’t handle unfair treatment. They can’t forgive anybody.
They get angry, they blow up, they run their mouth, and make all sorts of threats. People with
humility, they know they’re getting a bad deal. They keep their mouth shut and they handle the
situation by forgiving the person that did it. We can only manage to do this when we learn to
think like Christ thought, when we achieve through the renovation of our thinking His attitude,
His thoughts.
“Let this mind be in you that was also in Christ Jesus.”
How do I get it? The Bible
is the mind of Christ per Corinthians 2:16. I am to renovate my thinking.
“Stop thinking of
yourself in terms of arrogance but think in terms of humility as God has assigned to each one of
us a standard of thinking from His Word”
(Romans 12:3).
As you learn God’s Word, as you
apply God’s Word into your life, as you grow in grace and knowledge, you develop a FLOT
line in your soul and you renovate your thinking.
You begin to think in a different way. You
don’t think the way you use to think, in revenge motivation and inordinate competition.
You
think in terms of humility, forgiveness, respect, honor, and integrity. What a great way to
live!
To be able to lay down at night and close your eyes and not be angry at yourself because of
some stupid thing you did, but to enjoy the power of God the Holy Spirit in your life as it
controls your sin nature and enjoy the promises of the Word of God that you’ve learned, you’ve
tapped into, and you’re counting on to deliver you. God is perfectly fair, perfectly just, and He
knew in eternity past where you were and what you would be facing. He will not throw you
under the bus. He said,
“I will never leave you. I will never forsake you.”
Remember these
things. Remember the difference between arrogance and humility and remember the divine
pardon God offers each one of us through Jesus Christ our Lord. Come back next week, same
time, same place. Until then this is your host Rick Hughes saying thank you for listening to The
FLOT Line.