This summer I read a book called How the Mighty Fall and Why Some Companies Never Give In. The book was written by a man by the name of Jim Collins, who also wrote 2 other great books, Built to Last and Good to Great. In this book Collins talked about how great companies that were once at the top of their game began to lose their market share, not adjusting to what they were losing, ignoring it to some degree, ended up declining many moving into irrelevance, or even to death.

As he evaluated and he examined these companies, he talked about the 5 stages of decline that all of these companies had in common. He said

Stage 1: is what he called Hubris, born out of success. Now hubris is not a familiar term, but basically what the term means is excessive pride. In other words they started with nothing and all of a sudden they went to their success, and they began to develop an excessive pride about it.

And then those companies moved to a second stage: And it is the stage of what is called Undisciplined Pursuit or more. In other words the companies began to make a lot of money, and began to be very prosperous, and they basically just threw out their discipline, and they said, “You know, whatever it takes to keep on, we’re going to ride the waves our way, and we need to do whatever we need to do to make it happen.” So therefore, they had what they needed out of if, and they did what they needed to do, and all of a sudden what happened is they ended up being somewhat fat in their overhead.

And then those companies moved into another degenerated stage, degenerative stage, and that is the denial of risk or peril. In other words, they began to know they were going down, but they denied the risk of which they were. And the way they denied it is that they began to change the rules of the game. They began to explain away. They began to rationalize in their minds the figures, and why they were going down.

And then they moved from there into grasping for salvation, which is the fourth stage, meaning that they were just going to sell-out to hopefully a silver bullet. You know if we’ll do this one thing, we can bring our country, our company back again. If we’ll hire just the right leader, and bring in someone, I mean just, maybe someone from the outside this time with a charismatic ability, and they need to rally this group back. And so they had that silver bullet in their gun, and they hoped they could shoot, and most of them when they shot it, it was not worth receiving.

And then they would end up capitulating to irrelevance or death. In other words, they would finally say, “Well there’s no hope, our company can’t come back,” so they would surrender to their, to their, to their death, or even into their irrelevance.

What he does, he talks about many companies in this book, but he talks about for example Motorola, who years ago owned 50% of the market share in cell phones, but in 1999 it had already gone down all the way to only 17% of the market share.

He talked about how Circuit City one time dominated the electronics market, but Circuit City began to deny that there was a competitor by the name of Best Buy, and they just discarded Best Buy, now Circuit City has declared bankruptcy, and Best Buy is alive and well in the top of their game.

Then he talked about a company by the name of Ames Department Stores that in a 15-year period of time, their stock had grown by 6000%. But they all of a sudden didn’t pay attention to a little a rural company that began to go into rural settings in America, and began to captivate the market share from them, and they woke up one day after not paying any attention to their major competitor, and now that major competitor is the largest company in the world called Wal-Mart, and Ames Department Store is no more.

You see, when I read that there are so many applications about life. In fact, you know what I thought about? I thought about me. That’s the first thing I thought about when I read that book. How many times I’ve seen my own self go into that stage of decline. I thought about our church. I thought about issues. I thought about other companies. I thought about people that I know. But I also thought about the Bible. Because the Bible is full of stories about people who were once on the top of their game, and then all of a sudden, after God had elevated them from their humility, they became so proud about it, that all of a sudden they began into that degenerate decline in their lives.

For the next 3 weeks I’m going to talk about How the Mighty Fall and You Do Not Have to. This morning I want to begin by talking to you about Pride and More Pride.

One of the first way, if not the first way, it doesn’t matter what we have, what we don’t have, how much we have, what we don’t have, every one of us at times can be mighty in our heart, filled with arrogance, filled with pride, filled with all kind of stuff in our lives, and the end result can be one thing, and one thing alone: that we develop a proud, proud heart.

The Bible says in Proverbs chapter 16, verse 25 these words. It says, “There is a way that seems right to a man, but in the end, it is the way of death.” There’s a way that seems right to all of us, but if we go down that way, the end result is death. You see that verse gives to us a great definition of the word pride.

Here’s what pride really is, pride occurs in your life when you go your way, rather than God’s way. Pride occurs when you go your way, rather than God’s way. You see pride steps up in your life and stands up in your heart, and pride says, “I know better than God knows.” Now you’d never say that with your verbs, with your words, your verbiage, your words, but I’m telling you, that’s exactly what happens. Our pride declares, “I know best.” Our pride says, “I’ll do it my way,” ignoring what the Lord may say in His Word. I mean pride stakes its claim in your heart. And pride makes you feel like life is all about you, and everything in life revolves around you.

The great reformer Martin Luther said the following, he said, “Pride is the mother of all sin.” And how true that really is. What he was saying is that out of all sin, all sin, at the core depth of that sin, at the deepest level is pride. I mean think about the Garden of Eden. The Garden of Eden, God said, “Don’t eat of the tree.” And what did they do? Adam and Eve ate of the tree. Why did they eat of the tree? Because he told them, he said, “If you will eat of the tree, you’ll be just like God.” And God had told them, “You don’t eat of the tree.” So they were deceived in their heart. They became proud in their spirits, and it became the literally, the beginning, the birth of original sin in your life and my life.

C.S. Lewis who wrote the book Mere Christianity calls pride the following: He said that “pride is known as the great sin.” He said, “Pride is the utmost evil.” C.S. Lewis said that, “Pride is the anti-God state of mind.” Now I realize that most of us would never say the word, “anti-God,” but the moment we stakes, we stake our claims, and the moment we take our position, we take our posture, and it’s about us, rather than about what the Lord may want, then all of a sudden we become anti-God in our mind.

Then he said that pride is the cause of misery in every nation and every family since the world began. Oh I tell you what a dynamic word that is. Every nation, why do nations fight in war? Because of pride. Why do families end up getting in trouble? Because of pride. You show me any relationship that ends up in any kind of disarray in the family; it’s always because of pride. Somebody is taking their stake, they are naming their stake right there, “This is where I am,” and there is no compromise, there is no happy medium, and there’s just no way that agreement can occur.

Lewis always says that pride is the devil is setting up the dictatorship of pride in your life. You know what? That’s what self is. Every one of us have self. Every one of us have ego. Every one of us have pride. It becomes a dictator in our lives, and what we need today is an overthrow, and the overthrow of that dictator needs to come when we become humble before God, and we get rid of the pride in our lives.

But I really like what he says finally, he says that pride is a spiritual cancer; it eats up every possibility of love, contentment, or even common sense. Oh I tell you what, that’s what, that’s what pride is. You see many times when a person has cancer, they have that cancer for a long period of time, and they never even know they had it, then all of a sudden, they find out, and the tumor is huge, and sometimes it is out of control, and sometimes death is inevitable. That’s exactly what pride can be in the life of a believer, or even an unbeliever. What it does, it eats up the power and possibility of love. Many of us who struggle loving one another is because of pride.

It also eats up that element of contentment; many of us are not content with what we have, where we are, what we’re doing in our life, or our job, or our family, anything, all because of pride. We want more. We want more. We want more! We’re geared, and we live in a country that demands us to want more! And even leads to a lack of common sense. Wow! We’re living in a day where the common sense has gone out the window.

You see one of the mightiest men to have ever lived in the scripture is the man named Solomon. Today we’re going to talk about Solomon. Next week we’re going to talk about David. And the following week we’re going to talk about Saul.

Do you realize that even as mighty as Solomon was, Solomon ended his life writing one thing, he wrote about how empty his life really was. Let me tell you about Solomon today. If you have your Bible, look with me to 1 Kings. 1 Kings is in the left-hand of your Bible. It’s not very much from the beginning. It’s right before 2 Kings if that helps any.

But in 1 Kings, chapter 2, we find out that King David died, and Solomon takes over the reign of his dad, King David. And he was given the reigning power over the people, but also he had to fight to preserve that, and he had to kill even to some degree. In 1 Kings chapter 3, after all that was settled, and the kingship had been determined, in 1 Kings chapter 3, verses 1, 2, and 3, which I will not read, but notice what happens to David’s, or excuse me, Solomon’s heart. Compromise hit his heart.

You know what Savid, excuse me, Solomon did? Solomon married the wrong person. And he began to marry wrong persons, plural. The reason he married wrongly is because he created an alliance with a nation. In other words, he began to marry some of his, some of his enemy nations, women from those enemy nations in order to create an alliance, and what that did is that violated the law of God, because the book of Deuteronomy told him, tells us not to marry those that are outside of the faith.

And so what he began to do: on one hand he would worship God with all of his heart, and the rest of it he would go to the false, to the high places, and he would worship a false god, and he would make sacrifices to a false god. What it all started with was the way he married.

In 1 Kings chapter 3, we see that God extended grace to him. 1 Kings chapter 3, God appears to Solomon and He said, “Solomon, ask anything you wish, and I’ll give it to you.” Solomon asked for one thing, “Lord you placed me in charge of a lot of people, I’ve got a big job here, I need discernment. I need wisdom.” And God made him a wise man; in fact, the scripture says he was the wisest of his day.

And because he did not ask for wealth, and he did not ask for riches, and because he did not ask for power, God not only blessed him with wisdom, but He gave him riches, and power, and wealth! And so all of a sudden he’s the wealthiest, and the richest, and the most powerful, and the most wise man in all of the world in that day and time.

Well, 1 Kings chapter 4 talks about how God’s provision was so bountiful upon his life, again, I just said it: he’s the wisest anywhere. His reputation extended to all of the earth. Listen to what the scripture tells us there. It says in 1 Kings chapter 4, it said, “He wrote 3000 proverbs, and 1005 psalms.”

In 1 Kings chapter 5, verse, excuse me, chapter 5, verse, through chapter 7, Solomon built the temple and the king’s palace. That’s what he did, he built the temple, and the king’s palace in 1 Kings chapter 8, he dedicated it to the Lord, and the glory of God came. You remember that same passage is recorded over in 2 Chronicles chapter 7, which many of us are more familiar with than 1 Kings chapter 8. But it’s the same basic story told in a different way. About how the temple when the dedication of the temple took place after it was built, the glory of God came upon the people of God, and was so powerful, the people could not even go in to the temple to worship. It was that kind of powerful presence upon God, upon the people, and they had to bow their faces to God in order to even worship. I mean it was an incredible moment before the Lord.

Well, in 1 Kings chapter 9, God reminded him of his covenant with David, his father. And He appeared to him a second time, even though Solomon had already messed up, even though Solomon was already on a track that was not positive, that very nature is, is that God is a forgiving God. God is a graceful God, and listen carefully, listen carefully, anytime God gives you a second chance, a third chance, any chance beyond the first chance, it happens because of one thing, grace and forgiveness period. And that’s exactly what He demonstrated with Solomon. And the reason He did it was not the covenant with Solomon, the covenant was not with Solomon, the covenant was with David.

In 1 Kings chapter 10 the Bible says that the Queen of Sheba visits, and he, and she applauds, and she praises Solomon. And what does the Bible say there? The Bible says that his wealth continued to grow exceedingly. He surpassed all the kings with wealth and wisdom. Everyone wanted an audience with this man Solomon. He was so brilliant. He was so wise. But listen carefully, and don’t ever forget this word. This mighty, powerful, wealthy, wise, gifted man fell. This mighty, wise, wealthy, gifted man fell.

Look with me to chapter 11 of 1 Kings, let me read to you the first 10 verses. The Bible says, “King Solomon loved many foreign women,” remember he had violated the law of God by loving those foreign women, and he did it for what reason? To create an alliance so his enemies would not come after him. And he did it, “in addition to Pharaoh’s daughter: Moabite, Ammonite, Edomite, Sidonian, and Hittite women,” and notice verse 2 “from the nations that the LORD had told the Israelites about,” what did He tell them? “Do not intermarry with them, and they must not intermarry with you,” why is that? Because of one thing, “because they will turn you away [from Me] to their gods.” He told them, if you get involved with a woman that does not serve God, and God alone, He said what’s going to happen to you, you’re going to slack away from your love with me, and before you know it, your heart’s no longer going to be tender towards what I’m up to, and what I’m about.

Let me tell you friend, one of the worst mistakes you’ll ever make in your life is when you marry the wrong person. And I want to make it real clear here, intermarriage here is not talking about racial intermarriage, it’s talking about a believer, and an unbeliever coming together. That never is right. Some of you think you’re in the dating missionary game, no you’re not. You’re dating out of the will of God. Teenagers, you listen to me, you are not to date someone who does not know Jesus Christ personally, and they better be as on fire as you are for Him, or you’re dating out of the will of God. [APPLAUSE]

To every one of you single adults, you better hear what your pastor says. All across this auditorium are wrecked families, in other words, they’ve already been through one marriage. You know why they did it? Because it wasn’t the will of God. And they did it, they claimed their own way, they chose their own path, and the result is now a disaster. And now, God’s put their life back together, and hopefully they’ve married right the second time, and hopefully things are much better and they’re under God, and by the will of God.

Well, notice what he says in verse 5, or excuse me, verse number, uh, where are we at? Verse number 3. So, so verse 2, notice what he says, it says that, “Solomon was deeply attached to these women and loved [them].” All right, deeply attached, that’s what happens with a man toward a woman, he gets deeply attached. All right? If it’s the right woman anyway, or just a few of them. He had a few. Notice what he had here. The Bible says, verse 3, “He had 700 wives,” wow! 700 wives! “who were princesses and 300 concubines,” and guess what they did? “and they turned his heart away [from the LORD].”

When I read that this week, I thought you know I’ve got a Godly wife, but I have a hard enough time walking with God being married to one, no wonder he couldn’t walk with God being married to 700, and 300 on the side. I mean there was enough estrogen between those 1000 women he could have blown up the kingdom, and the entire world! [LAUGHTER] I mean think about it, he never had a good day! [LAUGHTER]

“When Solomon was old,” I could say more there, [LAUGHTER] “his wives seduced him,” they lead him away, “[to follow] other gods. His heart was not completely with the LORD his God, as his father David’s heart had been.” Notice what he began to do. “Solomon followed Ashtoreth,” Ashtoreth was the god of love, the god of fertility. That’s the sex god if you may. And then, “the goddess of the Sidonians, and Milcom, the detestable idol of the Ammonites.” Milcom was, was the one who rules the Ammonites believe, and therefore, they would offer their children unto him as a sacrifice. In other words, if you went to Israel with me, I could show you the place where thousands, and thousands of thousands of children were offered, their lives offered in a sacrifice to a Pagan god. Killed. Murdered. Burned, as a sacrifice to a Pagan god. And, “Solomon did what was evil in the LORD’s sight, and unlike his father David, he did not completely follow the LORD. At that time,” in verse 7, “Solomon built a high place for Chemosh,” Chemosh is another one who demanded another god who demanded the sacrifice for children. “the detestable idol of Moab, and for Milcom, the detestable idol of the Ammonites on the hill across from Jerusalem. He did the same for all his foreign wives, who were burning incense,” and notice, “offering sacrifices to their gods.” Wow.

Verse 9, “The LORD was angry with Solomon, because his heart was turned away, or had turned away from the LORD God of Israel, who had appeared to him twice.” Remember? He had appeared to him twice, “Ask what you will and I’ll give it you, and then He appeared to him again in the chapter just mentioned to you a moment ago, reminding him that the covenant was not with him, but with David. “He had commanded him about this, so that he would not follow other gods, but Solomon did not do what the LORD had commanded.”

Well, what happened? Well the next 2 verses talk about it, let me just tell you about it in a story. He told him, he said, “Because you do not follow me completely,” he said, “I will not take away the kingdom from you because I promised David I would not take away the kingdom from you, but once you die, Solomon, listen to what’s going to happen to your son. You’re going to give the throne to Rehoboam, your son, and Jeroboam, another man, an enemy, is going to rip one-half of the kingdom away from your son.”

Listen to me parents, your children, many times, pay the price for your sin. You may think that you’ve got it all under control, and you’ve got your sin managed, and you’ve got your kids fooled, but you listen carefully, many times your children pay for your own sins, just like Solomon, his child paid for his own sin.

In 1 Kings chapter 11, verse 39, the scripture said, “I will humble David’s descendants because of their unfaithfulness, but not forever.” God said, “Because I’ve raised them up, I’ve blessed them, all of a sudden because they’ve gotten proud about it, they’ve gone their own way, they’ve lived their own life by their own pride, I’m going to humble them.” Why? “Because they’ve been unfaithful to Me.”

Listen today, God doesn’t want part of your heart, He wants all of your heart! God is a jealous God, He doesn’t want to share you with anything, don’t want to share you with anyone, including your wife, including your children, including something you love, including your job, including a sport, including any hobby you have, He doesn’t want to share you with anyone! It’s all about Him! All about Him! And He will humble you if you try to share it.

With the people of God, He said I’m going to humble them because of their unfaithfulness, but not forever. In other words, there’s a promise there, there’s a prophetic promise there that one day the children of Israel will rise again. That’s why God’s collecting them, and bringing them from all parts of the earth right now back to Israel, all for the purpose of fulfilling His promise here that He said right here in this verse.

So I want you to get the picture. Here is a Solomon, a man who had attributes of the promised Messiah, but ultimately he failed as a king, and ultimately he failed as a father, all because he had a relationship with God, but yet that relationship with God became distorted, and warped, all because of one sin in his life, and it was the sin of pride. You see his pride left him half-heartedly committed to God. And guess what he became? He became an idolater. He became an adulterer. He became a picture of compromise from A to Z.

My friend, the mighty fall when their heart is filled with pride. And you may never see pride in your life. Pride is blinding. We all have pride in our lives. We all have to deal with pride, and some of us may think, “Well that’s not me.” Well I want to tell you today, every one of us, we deal with pride. We have an ego. We have this ferocious enemy within us called the flesh, and the greatest competition for God in your heart is you, your flesh. You can talk about the devil all day long, and yes, he is your competition, but the greatest competing force in your life, for you’re to give your all to Jesus every day, is your flesh.

This is what I call, “The Slide of Pride,” occurs in the life of Solomon, and it also occurs in our lives. Not long ago, Jeana and I had the grandchildren, we had the grandboys especially, and we took them over to Chick-fil-A. Chick-fil-A is a great place to take your kids cause they have the playground. So what you do is you take them to the playground after you feed them a little bit, and then you say, “Now kids ya’ll go play cause there’s a slide out there.” And they went up, and they went down, and they went up, and they got stuck in it, and everything else. They just went up and down, and I told them, “Just keep on keep on keep on keep on.” Wear them dudes out! [LAUGHTER] But you know what? Just like that slide at Chick-fil-A, great place to eat, that slide at Chick-fil-A starts up here and just goes down, goes down, that’s exactly what happens in your life, and my life when we develop pride in our lives.

You know where it all starts?

1. Deception of the heart. Nothing is more deceiving than the heart. The deception of the heart. The Bible says in Jeremiah, the following words in chapter 17, verse number 9. “The heart is more deceitful than anything else and desperately sick – who can understand it?”

You see somewhere, at some moment in Solomon’s life, he became deceived, and he began to believe a lie from Satan. And while he did not get removed from the throne personally, it was all because of God’s covenant with David that he didn’t, but his deceit led the kingdom to being taken away from his son.

I want to challenge every one of you today, check your heart. Check your heart. You see, here’s the way it works in our lives, most of us begin humbly, most of us begin with nothing, in one way all of us began, begin with nothing. But all of a sudden, God begins to bless us. And as He begins to elevate us, all of a sudden, we look around, and we get real proud about it. And we begin to think about how good we’ve got it, and how great we’ve got it, and how we don’t need this, don’t need this, and all of a sudden we get deceived in our heart! We need to check our heart today! You have what you have in your life today not because of you, but because of God! You live where you live not because of you, but because of God! You, you have a job like you have not because of you, but because of God! It’s because of God! This thing’s about God! It’s not about you! And we are proud people when we claim our own stuff because of us!

You see deception makes you believe you’re better off than you really are. It lies to you, and pride is very blinding, and pride is nothing more than a liar in your heart. The ex-CEO of Fannie Mae, which obviously bellied-up what the government owns, Daniel H. Mudd said the following words. He said, quote “There was a certain amount of arrogance…” In other words, they became arrogant at Fannie Mae. Then he said, “…we were establishing the standards,” regardless of what was best, we began to establish the standards. But look at this last one, what an incredible word, “…success is one of the biggest impediments to growth.”

I tell you what, it doesn’t matter whether it’s a person, doesn’t matter if it’s a company, doesn’t matter if it’s a team, doesn’t matter what it is, success is impediment to growth! Because the moment, because the moment you begin to rise, and you see yourself as successful, and you see yourself, “You know I’ve got this thing under control.” That is the beginning of the end for you if you don’t change your heart! It’s a powerful, powerful thing.

But deception of the heart leads to arrogance, and deception leads you to making your own rules, and eventually it damages your own growth personally. How I wish to God I would have known years ago when I was a young pastor that truth in my life. It had to happen later on for me, but I’m telling you how many times my life got me into situations, got me into trouble because of my pride, my pride. Let me tell you something, God is committed to bringing down the proud. And He will not share His glory with anyone! Anyone!

And when the heart is deceived, all of a sudden there becomes a:

2. Disconnect with God. Somehow Solomon disconnected with God. Probably when he started offering pagan sacrifices to pagan gods. But also he married the wrong people. And he chased after the things of life. But you know what? We have to ask ourselves, why was he continually receive, a recipient of the favor of God? Because the favor or God is given based on the promise given to his dad by the name of David. And God extended to him grace.

You know if you don’t get a hold of anything else today before you leave, would you get a hold of this next statement? Here it is: God is never attracted to a proud heart. God is never attracted to a proud heart. We better understand that when pride walks into our life, God walks out.

Years ago, I said this statement back in 1995, I believe it firmly. When pride walks on the platform of a church, God walks out. When pride walks into any area of your life, God says, “Uh-uh. No. I don’t share it with anybody.” When a person is boasting or bragging about this or that, I’m telling you, they’re deceived. And they can’t see it. But they’re not walking humbly with the Lord.

Therefore they move to another element of decline in status, and that is they:

3. Disregard what God says. Solomon was fully aware of God’s teaching on marriage, and God’s expectation for his life, but what did he do? He disregarded. He acted like it was no big deal. He ignored it! How many times I have seen that as a pastor! I mean I could talk for the next 3 hours with you how foolish of a statement, and story after story, after story I’ve heard people tell me trying to justify what this book says. And they explain it away in their lives, and they can even quote scripture doing it! God help us! We’re deceived! They can talk God, but they can’t live God.

Pride pays little to no attention to what God says, and usually what it does, it tries to reinterpret that which it does acknowledge. When you try to twist God’s truth to accommodate your situation, you’re full of pride. That’s why America is screwed up. When you pay little attention, or do not want to know what God says about your situation, you’re proud.

Notice the slide of pride. It’s very clear. Deception of the heart. And then, this disconnect with God, and then there’s this element of disregarding what God says, ending up into the lowest status, the:

4. Demise of life. The demise of life. Pride always leads to failure in life. The very things you think help you really end up hurting you. Solomon’s life was on the outside, was a picture of success, women, wealth, and no worries. But inwardly, and before God, his life was very much a picture of how a mighty man had fallen! And it was his pride, and more pride, that led him to failure.

I could give you a long list of national, regional, and international personalities that would represent how the mighty have fallen. I could talk about companies. I could talk about churches. I could talk about a lot of things today in illustration, but I cannot do that, and I’ll tell you there’s one reason why I cannot do that today: Because of one verse in the scripture that literally haunts me at night when I go to sleep and I think about it. 1 Corinthians chapter 10, verse 12, “Therefore, whoever thinks he stands must be careful not to fall!”

When you think you’re so strong, you’d better be careful, or you too will fall! Who am I to point my fingers at anyone? Who am I to do that? I must learn from the failures of others, and I must learn from my own failures! The amazing thing is, it is God’s blessing that takes us up, and it’s our pride that brings us down.

The Bible says in Proverbs chapter 11, verse 2, “When pride comes, disgrace follows,” that’s pretty clear, “…but with humility comes wisdom.” When your attitude of arrogance is boiling over, and running over, it will lead you to disgrace and failure. But humility brings forth wisdom from God.

Proverbs 18:12 says, “Before his downfall a man’s heart is proud, but before honor comes humility.” In other words, before collapse occurs, there’s usually exaltation. And before stumbling there, there is a haughty spirit. But before honor, there is humility. In other words, God raises up those who have a commitment to humility.

The Bible says in Proverbs 29:23, “A person’s pride will humble him, but a humble spirit will gain honor.” It is never, it is never, it is never to your advantage to develop any pride whatsoever at all in your life. Oh sure, we can say, “Well you know, that teams got pride. Or boy, that person’s got, got great pride in their company.” I don’t mean pride in that relationship, pride is probably not even the correct word to use there. But I’m talking about that whole element of me, of us. I mean let me tell you, God will insure your humbling if your heart is proud. The greatest thing I want to be in my life is a humble man of God. I want to be a man committed to humility, and committed to servanthood to all people, and how many times, how many times have I been in situations where I have not ever exercised that at all? God help me, and God forgive me. I want to be a humble man of God.

Regionally in NWA, I heard many say over the last 23 years, really over the last 21 and a half, “Oh, we’re recession proof! NWA will never have a recession. Man we just keep going, keep going, keep clicking. I mean we are, we are recession proof!” And I thought to myself, “Dude you don’t have a clue.” I know what it’s like. I walked into a church the first day I went on the job, 5000 people were laid off by a refinery. I know what can happen. And guess what? Today, NWA is not recession proof. NWA is facing the greatest economic trauma it’s faced in my time here, and I promise you in a number of years.

You look at the American system nationally with the economy, and so much more, let me just put it on the table today. There’s one reason why America’s in trouble economically, you want to know what it is? It’s a spiritual problem. It’s a spiritual problem. Now some of you would not agree with that, and that’s okay, you have your right to be wrong, but I’m telling you it’s a spiritual problem. [LAUGHTER] It is a spiritual problem. I can assure you it’s a spiritual problem when you have greediness more than giving, when you’ve got me more than about God, when you see people getting their viability and their substance, and they get their identity from what Wall Street does versus what Jesus did, I’m telling you, you’re going to be in trouble. And America’s in trouble, and the greatest, and the quickest way to recover economically is that America needs to get on its face before God. we need to repent of our sinfulness, and we need to humble ourselves before God, and God if He is merciful, will raise us up again. [APPLAUSE]

But you look at your own life, and you look at the failures of your own life that you’ve experienced, many times they’ve been experienced because of pride in your life. You see here is the bottom line: each one of us can be on top of the world one day, get proud about it, and fall the next day. It takes a long time to get to the pinnacle, but it takes one wrong decision, one wrong attitude of the heart, for you to move from the pinnacle to the pit. And let me just tell you, it’s rapid.

The mighty do fall even when they have pride. Solomon, he started well, but he didn’t live well, but thank God, he finished well. Solomon had all he wanted, and all he needed in life. Towards the end of Solomon’s life he wrote book, the book is called Ecclesiastes. It’s an incredible read. 12 chapters about how he had everything in life. here was a man who was reflecting on his life, and how empty his life was. He talked about his wealth. He talked about all those things that he used to chase. He chased it all from women, to wisdom, to wealth, and he said, “You know what? Nothing of that, or all of that became kebble to me.” That’s what the Hebrew says. What we translate that in the English language is the word vanity, or emptiness. But more correctly translated, it would be translated, he said, “I chased it all, women and work, and myself, and my success, and all of that, and all of that became kebble,” meaning all of that became nothing more than a mist in my life! Nothing more than a vapor in my life. Nothing more than a breath in my life. And Solomon was saying that everything he had done in his life, everything, became a mist to him. It was fleeting, and not lasting. Therefore, he writes, 12 chapters about how he had done that.

But notice this today, in those last 2 verses of Ecclesiastes, what did he say to us? The Bible says it this way, “When all has been heard, the conclusion of the matter is,” are you listening? “Fear God and keep His commands because this for all humanity. For God will bring every act to judgment, including every hidden thing, whether good of evil.” What Solomon said is this, “Don’t chase after all the things like I chased after. I chased after all of it. I had it all. Powerful. Wealthy. Blessed among all. Even had all the wisdom of the world. But I didn’t have the right kind of wisdom. I didn’t have Godly wisdom because I didn’t fear God. Because I didn’t walk with God!” What Solomon was saying is don’t focus on stuff out there in life, focus on your relationship to God!

You see, let me tell you real clear today, one of the reasons the heart of America is so proud, and one of the reasons the heart of our church is so proud, and our lives are so proud, is because we don’t fear God anymore! My friend, there will be a payday someday. You will stand before God, and He will reveal all the hidden things in your life, and all the hidden things in your heart! And judgment will come says the Lord.

So the challenge today is what? Don’t be like Solomon. You live your own life, your own way, no! You be like God! You live your life according to what God wants you to live it! Worship something other than God? NO! You worship God alone. Pride is the idolatry of self-sufficiency. Pride means it’s all about you. Pride is the mother of all sins. It’s the spiritual cancer of your soul! Therefore, it does not matter what you have, or what you don’t have, who you know, or who you don’t know, or how much power you have, or how much power you do not have, none of that has anything to do with this! But if you walk humbly before God, like it all belongs to Him, and you’re sold out to Him, then my friend, God in His unique manner will raise you up to the greatest moment of influence in your life.

The great news today is this, you don’t even have to start well because some of you haven’t. You don’t even have to live well, because some of you are not. But you can finish well. And some of you started well with Jesus, but you’re not living well now. You’ve sold out to everything I’ve talked about. But the key is not where you are, the key is where you want to be. And the great news today is that God looks upon your heart, and my heart, and it’s not about how much we sin, but it’s all about one thing: what is our attitude toward our sin? And attitude needs to be brokenness, humility, and we need God more than ever before in our lives.

I don’t know where you are in your life today, but I want to tell you some great news today, God’s got a better future for you than what you yourself even imagine. And I pray today that you’ll come to your future, and come into your future God’s way, and that’s through humility, through humility.