“How you are fallen from heaven, O shining star, son of the morning! You have been thrown down to the earth, you who destroyed the nations of the world. For you said to yourself, ‘I will ascend to heaven and set my throne above God’s stars. I will preside on the mountain of the gods far away in the north. I will climb to the highest heavens and be like the Most High.’- Isaiah 14;12-14 NLT

Warrior;

This is where it all started, the downward spiral. Many people believe the original sin was in Genesis 3 in the Garden of Eden.  Hear the Word of the Lord, “So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate.” (Genesis 3:6) This was man’s original sin; however, THE ORIGINAL SIN was Satan in the Heavenlies, not man in the garden. So then, what was the original sin?  PRIDE! It is written; I ordained and anointed you as the mighty angelic guardian. You had access to the holy mountain of God and walked among the stones of fire. “You were blameless in all you did from the day you were created until the day evil was found in you. Your rich commerce led you to violence, and you sinned. So I banished you in disgrace from the mountain of God. I expelled you, O mighty guardian, from your place among the stones of fire. Your heart was filled with pride because of all your beauty. Your wisdom was corrupted by your love of splendor. (Ezekiel 28:14-17a)

Leader, PRIDE was the original sin, and it is in full bloom in America, in our government, in our churches, in our ministries and in our hearts. The Bible is clear in the book of wisdom, Proverbs; Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall. (Proverbs 16;18) Human pride will be brought down, and human arrogance will be humbled. Only the LORD will be exalted on that day of judgment. For the LORD of Heaven’s Armies has a day of reckoning. He will punish the proud and mighty and bring down everything that is exalted. (Isaiah 2:11-12) When considering all the great sins in man’s heart; fornication, greed, adultery, promiscuity, hatred, murder, molestation, abuse- PRIDE, doesn’t seem like that bad of a thing- BUT GOD! Pride is so offensive to God because it puts man as HIS OWN GOD! Just like man God was given FREE WILL, and man was made in the “god class”, see Genesis 1:26. Lucifer’s downfall wasn’t a flaw in God’s creation. It was an abuse of free will. He became evil by distorting truth and choosing self over God. Lucifer stopped seeing his brilliance as a gift from God and started seeing it as something he intrinsically owned. Instead of gratitude, his focus shifted to himself. He began to believe that his wisdom and, and beauty were his own, not created and given by God. In a way, he started to rely on himself rather than on God. And with that, a dangerous thought crept in. What if I didn’t need God? And that’s where pride took over. Lucifer wanted to be worshipped rather than worship God, or serve man. He became convinced with his own deception that he could rule better than God. Once he accepted that lie, everything followed, including influencing a third of the angels to rebel with him. Pride has a way of attracting Pride, and it can bring down individuals, organizations, classes, ministries and churches- it can stop movements!

Conduit, I have had Leadership classes almost lost, because of the pride of a couple of the leaders.  Not only does MISERY love company, BUT PRIDE ALSO needs affirmation and validation- it attracts similar spirits. The sins of ‘sex, drugs and rock and roll’, are not unpardonable or rare, unfortunately. However, the seemingly benign sin of PRIDE starts with an offense.  The Spirit of Offense is the “Bait of Satan”, and it sounds something like this; “I am a man he can’t talk to me that way, who does he think he is, does he know who I am…?”. Pride, like so many other sins, starts in the mind. Like all other habits it follows a pattern. First we become SELF-FOCUSED, forgetting that our gifts, talents and treasures are ‘on loan’ from God. Then our thinking becomes distorted- Cognitive Distortions. There is self-exaltation and justifying, and a lack of proper reasoning. The next step is self-deception; we start believing in a lie as if it were true. Lastly, this creates a hardened will where we choose the lie even when confronted with the truth.  Our EGO won’t let us face the truth; we are too insecure. This process is a familiar pattern that happens often daily.  No one suddenly falls into sin. It begins with a shift in focus, a small rationalization, a failure to check our thoughts against God’s truth. PRIDE is illustrated in v 17: “Your heart was filled with pride because of all your beauty. Your wisdom was corrupted by your love of splendor”. Per Bible Study commentary, This phrase addresses the sin of pride, which is a recurring theme in Scripture. The context of Ezekiel 28 is a lamentation over the King of Tyre, but it is often interpreted as a dual reference to both the earthly king and a symbolic representation of Satan. The beauty mentioned here can be seen as both literal, in terms of the wealth and splendor of Tyre, and metaphorical, representing the original perfection of Lucifer before his fall. Pride is a sin that leads to downfall, as seen in the King of Tyre, man, and Satan. Believers are called to humility, recognizing that all beauty and wisdom come from God. Wisdom can be corrupted by self-exaltation. True wisdom is rooted in the fear of the Lord and humility. God is just and sovereign, and He will humble those who exalt themselves. This serves as a reminder to live in submission to His will. The downfall of the proud serves as a spectacle and a lesson to others. Our lives should reflect God’s glory, not our own. Our beauty and talents should point others to God, not lead us to self-glorification. Rule #1 about being a Warrior for God, ‘it aint about you’!  Get off yourself soldier, get your focus on God!  All Glory and honor to God the Father and His Son Jesus the Christ! No shared GLORY!