 Hello, David Diga Hernandez here, and you're watching Spirit Church here on the Encounter TV Network. I'm finishing now my series on religious spirits by talking to you about the spirit of pride. Now, the tricky thing about the religious spirit of pride is that those who struggle with it, and those who are under its influence, never know that they are. So, I want to show you signs that you are under the influence or that someone you know is under the influence of the spirit of pride, and this is one of the most vicious of all the religious spirits. So, it's very important that you hear this message, not only so you can discern the spirit of pride, but so that you can prevent it from gaining influence in your life. But first, Stephen Maktuzuma is here with me. He's going to lead you in some very anointed worship, and then we're going to get right into this message. To finish now, my series on religious spirits here is Stephen Maktuzuma. Just to see to behold you as my King. Gotta be you. Just to see to behold you as my King. I'm going to take you now to John chapter 8 where we're going to read a story about the Pharisees, Jesus, and a woman caught in sin. Now, this story I believe best demonstrates the religious spirit of pride because the Pharisees were so filled with pride that they were willing to take the life of someone just to prove a point. Let's go now to John chapter 8. I'm going to begin reading at verse number 1. The scripture says, Jesus returned to the Mount of Olives, but early the next morning he was back again at the temple. A crowd soon gathered and he sat down and taught them. As he was speaking, the teachers of religious law and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in the act of adultery. They put her in front of the crowd. Teacher, they said to Jesus, this woman was caught in the act of adultery. The law of Moses says to stone her, what do you say? They were trying to trap him into saying something they could use against him, but Jesus stooped down and rode in the dust with his finger. They kept demanding an answer, so he stood up again and said, all right, but let the one who has never sinned throw the first stone. Then he stooped down again and rode in the dust. When the accusers heard this, they slipped away one by one beginning with the oldest until only Jesus was left in the middle of the crowd with the woman. Then Jesus stood up again and said to the woman, where are your accusers? Didn't even one of them condemn you? No, Lord, she said, and Jesus said, neither do I go and sin no more. Now, I have to ask the question here and forgive me if this is too crude, but how exactly did the Pharisees catch the woman in the act of adultery? I suspect that they had set a trap for her and where was the man who was caught in adultery also? I suspect he was a part of setting that trap. These religious people were so fixated on proving a point. They were so jealous of what Jesus was accomplishing. They were so closed-minded to the truth that he was teaching that they were willing to sacrifice the life of a woman in order to prove a religious point. Now, we see that wisdom in Jesus demonstrated. He gives both grace and mercy. He says, neither do I condemn you. That's mercy. Go and sin no more. That's grace. And also, he shows mercy while fulfilling the law. Jesus never said, don't stone her. What Jesus instead said was, let he without sin cast the first stone. In other words, go ahead and fulfill the law, but I want you to take responsibility individually if you believe you are sinless and you're the one who should cast judgment. So, it's perfectly wise what Jesus did in addressing this situation. But when looking at that story, we see a few, I should say, character traits or signs of the religious spirit. Because when you look at the Pharisees, at least the ones who interacted negatively with Jesus, you see the religious spirit of pride. So, having looked at that story and having studied the New Testament interaction between the Pharisees and Jesus, we can see these very clear signs of the religious spirit of pride. And again, it's very important that you be open as you're hearing this because those who battle with this religious spirit, this religious mindset or paradigm, never are aware of the fact that they, in fact, battle with this spirit. So, the signs are, number one, the religious spirit looks for reasons to argue. The religious spirit of pride does. Number two, it looks for reasons to disconnect. Number three, it looks for reasons to condemn. Number four, it looks for reasons to show off knowledge. Number five, it looks for reasons to criticize. So, we see the Pharisees constantly trying to argue with Jesus, trying to disconnect themselves from him even though they had never really landed their ears to hear the truth he was speaking. They looked for reasons to condemn people. They looked for reasons to show off their knowledge, to demonstrate that they, in fact, were the ones with the truth, or so they thought. They looked for reasons to criticize Jesus and criticize people. They put burdens on people that God did not intend for those people to bear. So, looking at each one of those signs now, let's break them down. Number one, the religious spirit of pride looks for reasons to argue. People who are religious and filled with pride care more about making points than they do about people. And this is demonstrated perfectly in the story. They wanted to make a point. They wanted to trap Jesus. And in doing so, they were willing to risk the life of a person. They lacked love and empathy and mercy. Now think about that poor woman who came trembling before Jesus. She must have been terrified. They had no thought of that. All they were concerned about was getting their points across. All they were concerned about was trapping Jesus. Now, of course the word of God is true. Of course we understand that the Bible is clear. We understand that God has spoken a clear message to us. But that doesn't necessarily mean that your interpretation of the word is always accurate. So, in looking to the word, we must recognize that the word of God is infallible, but our interpretation is not. So, we must try to avoid this spirit that causes us to want to argue. We want to be combative. I see it all the time, especially online. People will ask questions. And you can always tell when they're asking a question out of sincerity and when they're trying to ask a question in order to start a dialogue, in order to start an argument where they can just attack the person they're presenting the question to. Now, this is a sign also of immaturity. People who enjoy arguing, people who enjoy quarreling. The Scripture condemns this. This is something that we should, as believers, avoid. And that is a sign of the religious spirit. Number two, the religious spirit of pride looks for reasons to disconnect. I had a woman one time contact our ministry asking about our doctrinal beliefs. She explained that she went through our website and she saw, in her words, You believe in Jesus. You believe he rose from the dead. You believe he was crucified for our sins and so forth. She basically named all of the essentials of the Christian faith. And then she went on to explain that that wasn't enough. She said, I want to make sure that there's nothing with which I disagree. She said, I want to go through all your teachings. I want you to answer all my questions about every little idea, every little doctrine, every little verse that I can think of that's important to me. And I want to see if you disagree with me. And if you disagree with me on any of these issues, I don't want my son watching your YouTube channel. Well, of course, we just sent her the link to our YouTube channel so that she can go and watch the teachings herself. But I thought that was so odd and I think it's interesting because Christians are really the only group of people that will do this. You look at any other group of people. And this is not a compliment, by the way. I can already hear it. Some people will hear what I'm saying. Well, that's right because Christians have the truth and we should be careful. That's not a compliment. Christians are the only ones who will disconnect from people based upon small things that don't matter instead of focusing on the essentials that unite us. So this is a sign of a religious spirit. They look for reasons to disconnect. They demand agreement exactly in every single area or they attack. I've had people go through my stuff and if I'm preaching a sermon on healing, mind you, the topic is healing. They will go and say about that sermon, oh, but the gospel is not about healing and then they'll go on and explain the gospel. And I'm thinking, yes, of course, that's not what the gospel is about. That was a message on healing. And basically they're looking for you to constantly teach 100% what they believe. Otherwise, you're not of God. I disconnect. That is a religious spirit. They disconnect from challengers. They disconnect from people who could otherwise sharpen them because they take disagreement as a threat. And here's the truth. Those who have the truth have nothing to fear. If we have the truth, we should not fear questions because ultimately questions will lead to the same conclusion that we found. And so if someone is afraid of questions, if someone is very divisive to the point that they will disconnect from you because you ask questions about what they believe, that person likely has a religious spirit. They isolate themselves in pride and in anger and they call that sanctification be warned. Isolation is not the same as sanctification. Just because you are isolated doesn't mean you are sanctified. In fact, isolation leads to all sorts of troubles. The scripture talks about accountability being a very important aspect of the Christian life. Just because you are isolated doesn't mean you are sanctified. Just because you are alone in a belief doesn't mean you are right in a belief. So these people leave no room for discussion. They see room for discussion as compromise. They see agreeing on the essentials as a problem or as a compromise, again, on their Christian faith. They don't want to even think about doing anything like that. And that is number two. So number one, it looks for reasons to argue. Number two, it looks for reasons to disconnect. Number three, it looks for reasons to condemn. They condemn their brothers and sisters. They condemn those because they themselves are under condemnation. Remember, religious spirits torment the people under its influence. Those who are of a religious mindset torment themselves. They live under guilt. They live under fear. So people who feel condemned condemn others. On the other extreme, people who feel self-righteous condemn others. But a true believer will never look for a reason to condemn someone, though they will address sin. They will look for ways to show mercy and grace. They will look for ways to give hope in an area where someone is lacking hope. So this religious spirit enjoys that condemnation. Of course, it's okay to talk about hell. You need to talk about hell. You need to talk about judgment and righteousness and holiness. But don't enjoy the fact that people are going to hell. Don't enjoy the fact that people are in sin just because it gives you a pedestal upon which you can stand and condemn them and feel better about yourself. This is demonic in nature. I've seen people condemn others because of the way they do ministry or because they disagree with people on certain doctors. I've had people condemn people that I've interviewed. My goodness. I did an interview with Pastor Benny Hinn. And many of the religious community, they'll say, oh, his nephew did this, an explosive look. I know his nephew. I know Pastor Benny. And I can tell you firsthand account, a lot of that was very inaccurate. And I'm using this just as an example. I'm not here doing apologies for Pastor Benny. But I will say this. The Christians who jumped on that situation, the Christians who looked for a place to disagree, are much like the Pharisees. In other words, he preaches Jesus. He preaches the gospel. He preaches salvation. Oh, but I disagree with him on his doctrines of finance. And therefore, I condemn him. And that right there is a religious spirit. And so they not only condemn people like him, they condemn anybody in the limelight. They condemn any pastor, any leader, any teacher, who speaks in a way that they don't agree with. And it doesn't even have to be unessential. God forbid you should find yourself in a teaching and preaching position. Yes, I understand that there's a greater judgment on those of us who teach. But at the same time, the scripture tells us to not make those jobs more difficult for those who are in those positions. So if you're someone who's just constantly studying, constantly waiting for somebody to say something wrong so that you can be the one to jump in and rescue everyone and present the scripture as you see it, then you are a Pharisee. You are walking in pride and you need to repent and instead walk in humility. Number four, the religious spirit looks for reasons to show off its knowledge. They teach impatiently and become angry if people cannot be persuaded. They will take one or two sentences from myself or people who teach the Word of God and they'll pull it out of context and then they'll show a scripture that seems to condemn that phrase when they didn't give an explanation of either the phrase or the scripture. And so they're just trying to show off their knowledge. They're trying to show everybody how great they are. Look at how well I know the word. Look at how well I've studied. Look at how informed I am. And this is pride. They care more about what they know than how they can serve and they have an unwillingness to learn. In other words, if you tried to help them, if you tried to teach them, if you tried to question them, they come at you with phrases like, well, I know my Bible or I studied the word. I know who I am. Instead of being humble and saying, you know what, I don't know everything and I can always learn when it comes to the Word of God. Number five, the religious spirit looks for reasons to criticize. This is often rooted in jealousy and insecurity. And people will say, well, I'm not jealous. I'm just zealous. No. Jealousy comes from insecurity. In other words, you have this sense of superiority when you can tear others down because of what you perceive as an error. And again, guys, I need to make this very clear. I am all for defending the faith. I am all for speaking out and speaking truth. But the reality is that there are going to be things with which we disagree with other believers all the time. I think about Peter and Paul. They had a disagreement and Paul did confront Peter. But the truth is they were still brothers and they were still both considered believers and they were both still going to heaven and they were both still working together in the gospel. So we have to be careful with how we approach these things. So that jealousy that these Pharisees have and other ministries success. This need to be the hero. This need to be the one seen as the one who knows the word better than everybody else. This is an issue. The religious spirit of pride looks for all the reasons to criticize. I've seen it, for example, people in my circles. Yes, I understand. We don't need fog machines in lighting to reach the world. But if someone wants to use that to decorate their church, why on earth is that such a big issue? We criticize things on fog machines. You have church on a certain day when you should have it on this day or you didn't pronounce God's name the way I pronounce God's name or you're doing the ministry method a little bit differently than I would do. They're very judgmental. They're constantly looking for differences that they can criticize. And this is not godly. This is pride. This is a religious spirit and we must be delivered from it. So if you're someone who's recognizing your traits in here, you need to repent. If you're someone who just recognizes these traits oh my goodness, I've seen people like that. Well, here's how you handle them. You do not respond to pride with pride. The scripture says a soft answer turns away wrath. In other words, you respond to pride with humility. When people criticize me, when people come against me, typically, number one, first of all, I usually just ignore it and let them say what they're going to say. I've had people twist my words. I've had people take what I've said out of context. I've had people take things that I've repented of teaching because we're all still learning and still throw it in my face and say, oh, this is what he taught years ago. Look, that's the devil's work. And these religious people do the devil's work. But I'm saying to you that we must respond with humility and grace and kindness and understanding. And instead of having that immature approach by saying, well, I disagree with you on this specific doctrine or I disagree with you on that doctrine, that we disconnect. That doesn't mean we argue or condemn or criticize or try to show our knowledge to be better than the other person's knowledge. This simply means that we work together through them as brothers and sisters in Christ. So again, I'll show you the signs of religious spirit of pride. Looks for reasons to argue, looks for reasons to disconnect, looks for reasons to condemn, looks for reasons to show off knowledge and looks for reasons to criticize. And that is it for the lesson. I want to pray with you now. I want to pray that God would keep you from falling into this trap, this isolated, angry place of having a religious spirit of pride and coming to the place where you're condemning this brother or that brother because they don't agree with every little bit of doctrine like you do. Let us pray right now that God would keep us humble, that God would keep us teachable, that God would keep us in grace and truth. So Father in Jesus' name I pray for that one receiving this prayer right now and I ask you Lord in the name of Jesus that you would touch and that you would give wisdom to each and every one of us. Well that we're asking you for the wisdom for grace and truth for righteousness and mercy. Help us to find that balance in you Lord and your love in the name of Jesus we pray. I want you to say it because you agree say Amen. Well that is it for the lesson. I want to welcome now the new members of Spirit Church there you are up on the screen. We love you and we are praying for you. I always say that because I always mean it. If you like information on how you can join the Spirit family then simply go to DavidHernandezministries.com slash Spirit Church. Sign up today. So go to that link scroll all the way down to where it says join Spirit Church just fill out that form and then you are a member of the Spirit family. Here's what's going to happen when you sign up. You're going to get an email from me every single week on Sundays well depending upon your time zone but for most of us it's Sunday and in that email I'm going to send you a brand new fresh word from Heaven. Steven Maktezuma is going to send you a brand new fresh worship cover that you can worship along to and the best part you can reply to that email for prayer support from our ministry staff. Did you know the Spirit family is now almost 8,000 members in size? That's incredible. So join the Spirit family today it's 100% free sign up now and we would love you to be a part of that. I want to read now your comments and these comments are from the second part of my series religious spirits guilt and fear. If you would like me to potentially read your comment next week then go ahead and leave a comment in the comment section right now and while you're at it if you're watching us on YouTube be sure to subscribe and click the notification bell so that you can be notified of when we put out new content. Okay I'm going to read your comments now from last week again this is from the teaching religious spirits guilt and fear Kristin Faith writes he is not looking for perfection he is looking for progress that's going to stick with me for a long time thank you. Naylee writes you have helped me view Christianity on another level I thought fear was a normal thing and I've been living with it but from today's sharing there is no fear and love how powerful is that I thank God for your life to be honest you are really helping me to grow glory to God you are greatly blessed well thank you Naylee for writing in I'm very glad to know that the Lord is touching you through this ministry remember I want everyone to know this is the Holy Spirits Network this is the Holy Spirits Channel he can do through our content whatever it is he wants to do so you'll never know what's going to happen Isaac Aguilar writes thank you evangelist David for today's message this was something I really needed to hear praise Jesus for his peace and faithfulness wonderful worship from Stephen too may God continue to bless the ministry in Jesus' name and the final comment to writes God bless you David every time I watch you I'm encouraged in my walk with Jesus you make the Holy Spirit real to me every time I listen to you lots of love from my family well this channel really does this content really does carry the anointing of the Holy Spirit on it people get healed people get set free people can fill the presence of God just from watching this content and that I find amazing now I want to give you a test right now don't tune me out I'm going to test you now this test I'm going to give to you is a test of your love for Jesus this is a test of where your heart is this is a test as to how disciplined you are in the Christian faith we often say things like Lord whatever you ask of me I'll do it Lord however you want me to I'll surrender Lord whatever you want to do through my life do it but then he asks us to do difficult things and we become disconnected from those promises that we made to him only moments earlier so here's a test I want to give you I'm going to show you a verse that talks about how your heart is tested check this out it's in Matthew chapter 6 I'm going to begin reading at verse number 19 don't store up treasures here on earth where moths eat them and rust destroys them and where thieves break in and steal store your treasures in heaven where moths and rust cannot destroy and thieves do not break in and steal wherever your treasure is there the desires of your heart will be given to them now I believe that we must give to the gospel we don't give out of greed we don't give out of guilt we don't give in response to any gimmicks we give so that the gospel can go forward and in doing so we're demonstrating that finances money does not have control over us I'm interested to observe that people often criticize for taking offerings they say oh this is what the preacher is all about this is all he ever wants from you when in fact most of the content that we put out is not about finance at all it's actually the gospel it's teaching that we put out for free but in order to keep all of this running we need resources in order to keep reaching the people we're reaching we need resources and people who love the lord and people who love the gospel don't have an issue with that so I want to challenge you to step out in faith and take this test this is always good to do to put the flesh in check to say to the flesh I'am gonna obey God no matter what fear says I'm gonna obey God no matter what my checkbook says I'm going to obey God no matter what my emotions tell me or what people around me may say I'm going to step out in faith and trust him and if you will focus on the gospel God will focus on your house if you will focus on the gospel God will focus on your needs So, here's my challenge. Help me continue to spread the gospel of Jesus Christ in the power of the Holy Spirit. Make a one-time donation or become a monthly supporter of the ministry today. Don't wait on this. Some of you have been praying on this for a while. Some of you have been thinking about it. You always hear me do this and you're thinking maybe one day, one day, one day. Let that day be today. Become a monthly supporter right now. Give a one-time gift of any amount. We have people who give $5 and we have people who have given the six figures. Them and everybody in between, they are all helping us. So, I also challenge you do monthly. If you will sign up today to become my partner for $30 or more a month, I will send you either carriers of the glory, encountering the Holy Spirit in every book of the Bible, or 25 truths about demons and spiritual warfare. I will sign it. I will send it to you as my thank you, my initiation gift, thanking you for signing up to be my partner. Do that today. Go to davidhernandezministries.com slash donate and sign up for a monthly gift or give a one-time gift today. Well, that is it for this edition of Spirit Church here on the Encounter TV Network. Until next time, remember, nothing is impossible with God. Thank you for watching Encounter TV. Don't forget to subscribe. Also, help me win souls by spreading the gospel through events and media. Make a one-time donation or become a monthly supporter by clicking on the donate link now.