Dear Christian friends,

In our text Jesus warns us about pride. Not all pride is bad. Some pride is good pride. We should feel proud of our flag, our nation. We should feel proud of honest and good work that we do. We should feel pride about our God and His Church. But here in the text Jesus warns us about sinful pride. Sinful pride can do much harm to ourselves and to others. So we need to

I. Sinful pride shows itself in various ways.

I. Sometimes church members show sinful pride. We call that spiritual pride. We think our church is better than other churches. We think we are better than other Christians. We perhaps think that God loves only our church and not other churches.

1. Here in our text we read how Jesus' disciples showed that bad spirit or or pride. (v. 38) Another man who did not belong to their group was commanding out evil spirits out of people in Jesus' name. The disciples told him to stop his ministry because he did not belong to their group. When Jesus heard about that He corrected His disciples and told them to let that man continue his ministry. Jesus told the 12 disciples that that man was not their enemy, but their friend and helper. (vv. 39-40)

2. Sometimes we are jealous of other Christian churches. Perhaps they are growing faster than our church or perhaps they seem to have a better program than our church. We should not feel jealous of these other Christian churches and we should not bother their ministry. Instead we should be glad that they, too, are doing the Lord's work. They are not our enemy. They are our Christian brothers and sisters. We should humbly pray for them that God will bless their work, too.

3. It is true that these other Christian churches often compete with us, and sometimes they "steal" a member or two, but competition between churches is not always bad. Perhaps we need some competition to make us wake up and work harder and improve our own ministry. Jesus does not want our church to become like a social club where we can enjoy one another's fellowship and forget about the other sinners still lost out there. Jesus wants His people, you and me, to awake and work hard to invite the lost deaf sheep. There are plenty of lost deaf sheep out there, more than enough to fill all the deaf churches in Los Angeles. Competition may be Jesus' way of challenging us to do His work better. Beware of spiritual pride! Don't be jealous of other churches or of other Christians!

B. Another way in which Sinful pride shows itself is when we cause children or other weak Christians to sin by our bad example. In our text Jesus warns us about that, too. Jesus warns about the terrible punishment to those adults or senior citizens who give a bad example and lead children and young people into sin. (v. 42) Jesus says such a person will get worse punishment than drowning in the ocean. Parents and grandparents should always show love, patience, and kindness to children and young people and give a good example for the children and young people to copy. If parents and grandparents do wrong and sin what can you expect of the children and young people? We parents and grandparents should live right, holy lives, and give good example and influence to the children and youth.

C. Sinful pride also shows itself when we Christians fail to control the lusts (bad desires) of our mind and body. (vv. 43-47) Jesus warns about our hand, foot and eye leading us into sin: "If your hand makes you sin, cut it off. It is better to live with one hand and go to heaven, than to die with two hands and go to hell. In hell worms that eat you never die and fires that burn you never stop." (vv. 43-44) And Jesus says the same about the foot and eye. What does Jesus mean? Does He really mean that we should cut off our hand? No! He means that we should give-up all things that lead us to sin or make us fail to do, our duty. These things perhaps are very dear to us and give us much pleasure and excitement. It perhaps is a friend who does not believe in Jesus. Jesus means that it is better to go to heaven without that dear friend than to go to hell with that friend. If you don't give up that that friend he may cause you to lose your faith in Jesus.

Sinful pride can lead us away from God and finally to hell. In hell people are without God, no mercy, no forgiveness, no merit of Christ to put on, only guilt and remorse! People there will say, "Why was I such a fool? Why did I not listen to God's warning?" The terrible guilt and remorse will not stop. That's what Jesus means when He says, “In hell, worms that eat you never die, and fires that burn you never stop." (v. 48)

II. What is the medicine for sinful pride? In our text Jesus explains about the medicine. He calls it "Salt". (vv. 48-50) When Jesus lived on earth they didn't have refrigerators or freezers. People used salt to purify and cleanse the food from germs for preserving it. So Jesus uses "salt" to mean something that cleanses and purifies our proud, sinful hearts. What is that? That is God's Word! On the evening before He was crucified Jesus prayed to the Father for His disciples. He prayed: "Sanctify them through Thy truth (make holy); Thy word is truth." (John 17:17) Think much about the Ten Commandments. They show us what is right and wrong and how we should love God and our neighbor. They also help you to see and know your sin or law-breaking, which helps to keep you humble and makes you aware that you are sinner like everyone else. Then after you have thought about the Ten Commandments hurry to the Gospel, the good news that God loves sinners and shows mercy to those who confess their sins. The Gospel shows that God has already forgiven all sins, through His Son Jesus. We hear the good news of God's love and mercy in Jesus: Love God and get true spirit,life and pride. John says, "See how much our heavenly Father loves us; because He calls us His children...and everyone who really believes this will try to stay pure as Christ is pure." (1 John 3:1-4) And St. Paul admonishes us: "Don't spend your time in wild parties or in getting drunk or in adultery and lust, or in fighting and quarreling, or jealousy. But ask the Lord Jesus Christ to help you live as you should, and don't make plans to enjoy evil." (Romans 13:13-14)

God's Word is the "salt" or medicine we use to put away our sinful pride and control it.

Amen

Additional Notes: Salt - The "salt" is the Gospel of Jesus Christ, Jesus, God's Son became joined with us. He was born under the Law. He accepted our sins and suffered the punishment of our sins, whole world. Then he arose from death. In Jesus I was crucified, I was punished! I paid for my sins. In Jesus I arise from sin and spiritual death to live a new and holy life. Sinful pride is gone! Humility, praise and thanks I give to God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

"It is not what Christ did that believers must do, but what was done to Christ is what believers must learn to recognize as being done to them as well." Martin Luther L.W. Vol. 1 p. 62 This is what God sees happening to us in baptism. It takes most Christians all their life to realize this.