PROVERBS 16:18

When a person becomes a born again believer by faith in Jesus Christ, he genuinely wants to please God.  The problem is, the success of living on a "spiritual mountain top" has a tendency to be very dangerous to the believer.  It is on those "mountain tops" that we tend to forget how we got there; we forget we are there because the Holy Spirit guided us.  Feeling we "have arrived," pride sets in, and before you know it, we end up in the "valley of despair."  Because of the great joy one experiences when living in the will of God, we often get complacent and let our guard down.  We begin walking "with our heads in the clouds," and before we know it, we have stepped off the ledge blinded by the sin of pride.  We have become more like Satan and less like Christ, who humbled Himself for us (Phil. 2:5-8).      

Satan's fall was due to his pride.  He hadn't killed anyone.  He hadn't tempted anyone.  He hadn't lied to anyone (except perhaps to himself).  He simply rebelled when he recognize that he was a creation and not the Creator!  He could not stand the fact that there was anyone greater than he.

Pastor George F. Parsons created this helpful diagram to show Lucifer’s five haughty "I WILLS":

As believers, we tend to think more highly of ourselves than we ought (Rom. 12:3).  As James put it, we are "...like unto a man beholding his natural face in a glass:  for he beholdeth himself, and goeth his way, and straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was" (Jam. 1:23-24).

So the next time you are "fessed up" (have your sins confessed - 1 Jn. 1:9), and you are walking in the Spirit and not in the flesh (Rom. 8:1-4), remember, the "mountain" you are on has steep cliffs.

The cure for pride is to compare yourself to Jesus!