Overconfidence can lead to disaster because it can lead you to walk into a trap.
Sometimes you have an weird feeling about a situation, but you don’t always heed your conscience when it tells you something is wrong.
When you feel your conscience telling you something isn’t right, do the following if you are a believer in Christ:
Stop what you are doing
Pray about the situation
Ask the Holy Spirit to show you the truth
Open your mind, ears, and heart to really hear the truth, instead of trying to justify your actions.
I am reminded of a particular part in the movie Passion of the Christ. The Pharisees had a lot of power and were well respected among the Jewish people.
But they were extremely threatened by the words and actions of Jesus.
The people were burdened down with a huge amount of laws they were expected to keep each day.
The teachings of Jesus were like a breath of fresh air. He showed them a new and better way to live, and many of them latched onto it as a drowning person would latch onto a life jacket.
Since the Jewish hierarchy didn’t want to lose their influence among the people, they felt they had no other choice but to get rid of Jesus permanently.
They brought Him before the court. But the Romans could find Him guilty of nothing that broke any Roman law. So they shuffled Him back and forth, not wanting to get involved in a religious battle.
Jesus finally ended up in the court of Pilate, who detested being at this Jewish post. Pilate didn’t want to cause any problems that might draw attention to his leadership position. He had hopes that he could eventually advance to a bigger and better post.
But Pilate was in a dilemma as to how to handle this tense situation. Even though Jesus hadn’t done anything wrong, the Pharisees demanded He be crucified like a common criminal.
The night before Pilate was to make his decision, his wife had a dream. She dreamed that Jesus was the real Savior the Jews had been seeking and that Pilate should not deal with Him harshly.
She told her husband about the dream, and tried to get him to do the right thing. But he was a politician, and knew it might kill his political chances for advancement if he took her advice.
When his wife saw he would not choose to hear the truth, she said these words to him in the movie:
“If you will not hear the truth, you will never know it.”
I have thought about this phrase many times over the years. You must make the choice to open your mind and hear something. Otherwise you will never have understanding about it.
From now on when the Holy Spirit pricks your conscience to let you know that something is not right, stop what you are doing. Then find out what your next step needs to be.
Don’t let overconfidence lead you to disaster by allowing it to make you walk into a trap the enemy has set.
