Having pride in any area of your life is a sign that you have NOT been fully and completely “burnt” on the altar of our LORD. Thus, a part of you is still fresh and living: You have not died to the “world” completely yet.

As a result, that ‘fresh’, unburnt part of you is beginning to smell. Sacrifice yourself, all of you on the altar of the LORD. Allow yourself to go through God’s refining fire. Remember, the LORD’s fire doesn’t burn to consume and destroy you, but rather, it burns to refine you so that you would become mature and complete in Him lacking nothing [James 1:3-4 NLT].

Our Lord Jesus Christ admonished us that in other for us to be his followers, we have to FORGET SELF, CARRY OUR CROSS, and then FOLLOW HIM [Matthew 16:24 NLT]. Forgetting self implies giving up your own way or one’s will for the Will of God. It is the first requirement for our walk with God. Have you completed this first requirement yet?

If a part of you is still in “remembrance”, and hence hurts, or is in rivalry when offended or ‘touched’, then you have not completely let go, you are not carrying your cross with endurance, hence, you are not following Christ in Humility.

The world may celebrate your pride, and call you big names, but know that you are moving further away from God because you are beginning to stink. Your pride makes you stink.

Amen.

Romans 8:6-9 NLT _”So letting your sinful nature control YOUR MIND leads to death. But letting the Spirit control your mind leads to LIFE AND PEACE. For the sinful nature is always hostile to God. It never did obey God’s law, and it never will. That’s why those who are still under the control of their sinful nature can never please God. But you are NOT controlled by your sinful nature. You are controlled by the Spirit if you have the Spirit of God living in you. (And remember that those who do not have the Spirit of Christ living in them DO NOT belong to him AT ALL.)

1 John 2:15 NLT _“Do NOT love this world nor the things it offers you, for when you love the world, you DO NOT have the Love of the Father in you.”