We have been looking at pride and how religion can be man-centered without people even recognizing it. God can be thought of as man-centered and men can think of all that religion entails as centered upon them. There is virtually nothing in Christianity as far as its teaching or its practices that proud men cannot focus on themselves and turn it into man-centered religion. In man-centered religion God becomes one that is bought and manipulated by men depending on what they can believe and do. Once one begins to see how the depraved hearts of human beings take things that are centered upon God and center them upon themselves, the teaching of the Bible on the depravity of man becomes even more obvious. The proud hearts of human beings are so blinded by the love of self that they can intellectually adopt orthodox creeds while their hearts are far from the living God.
“In theocentric religion, on the other hand, God is the sovereign and unquestionable Lord of man’s existence. He confronts man with compelling authority; and in His presence there is no place left for egoism in any form. He cannot be regarded here as the One from whom I expect either the fulfilment of my desires or the reward of my deserts. The question of my relationship to Him is not even in the remotest sense optional, dependent on my wishes or sense of need. It is a matter of urgent and imperious necessity.” (Let God Be God! An Interpretation of the Theology of Martin Luther)
Man can even call God sovereign and yet think of this from a man-centered perspective. This is to say that the proud hearts of human beings will use words and phrases that sound God-centered but they will have twisted the meaning in their hearts to where man retains some control. We can think of God as sovereign but want Him to control others for our own purposes. We want Him to be sovereign over all things, but we stop His sovereignty at the door of our own hearts. There seems to be a type of Reformed thinking today that uses the historic language of the sovereignty of God and yet does not want God to be sovereign over the heart. It is able to retain the language and appearances of the sovereignty of God, but in shutting the door at the level of my own heart it remains a man-centered view of God. It is okay to a proud heart like that to think of God as sovereign over creation and over other people, but we retain a freedom for ourselves which is to say we still think we control God to some degree.
The proud heart of man retains lordship over himself (at least in the deep recesses of the thoughts of the heart) and thinks that he can obey God or not at his own will. He simply has not realized the depths of the Lordship of Jesus Christ. Apart from Him we can do nothing (John 15:4-5). The heart that has not dealt with its own pride and the glory of God will even accept those verses intellectually, but it will not accept those practically. Jesus Christ is absolute Lord over all hearts and the entire spiritual realm. We can do absolutely nothing in the spiritual realm apart from the inner work of Christ in our soul. That is humbling at the least, yet a man-centered approach to that denies this teaching in a practical way. The proud heart refuses to give up its pride. Pride and self will not die to pride and self unless Christ puts them to death. This is so hard for the proud and man-centered heart to give up. It will believe anything in order to keep from dying to self so that Christ will be absolute Lord of that heart. It will do anything in order to keep from dying to self so that Christ will be absolute Lord of that heart.
As the quote above says, “in His presence there is no place left for egoism in any form.” Here is a statement of magnificent proportions. If this statement could only be understood within Christendom it would be like a massive earthquake hitting an area with primitive buildings. The forms of Christianity that are so prevalent today are man-centered in theology and in methodology. If Christendom came to more than just an intellectual understanding of the extent of the sovereignty of God much of its man-centeredness would fall to the ground and be despised. It would be something like Job 42: “I have heard of You by the hearing of the ear; But now my eye sees You;
6 Therefore I retract, And I repent in dust and ashes” (vv. 5-6). Theology and creeds can simply be something like hearing of God by the ear. But when we come into His presence we retract (literally, loathe myself) and repent in dust and ashes. There is no room for pride and self in any form in the presence of the living and sovereign God.
Isaiah 6 also shows us how man responds when he sees God as He is in His sovereignty and holiness: “Then I said, “Woe is me, for I am ruined! Because I am a man of unclean lips, And I live among a people of unclean lips; For my eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts” (v. 5). Isaiah had no place left for his pride or self. He had no place left for a religion that depended on him and his works and merits. Isaiah had no room for anything or anyone but the glory of this great God. He was utterly undone and had nothing but grace to look to. What happened to pride and self in Isaiah? In the presence of God there was no room left for those things. He was emptied of self.
God Loves... Himself 
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