SELF-RIGHTEOUSNESS

 

SELF-RIGHTEOUSNESS

Luke 18:11-12 The proud Pharisee stood by himself and prayed this prayer: ‘I thank you, God, that I am not a sinner like everyone else, especially like that tax collector over there! For I never cheat, I don’t sin, I don’t commit adultery, I fast twice a week, and I give you a tenth of my income.’ ” NLT

Pride in one’s spirituality is an awful thing to have. Pride comes when we play the comparison game. We look around us and find a lot of people who aren’t as good as we are. We see ourselves as having an inside track to God because of what we have learned or what we are doing. We want to lord it over others because our pride convinces us we deserve to do it. We see ourselves as being wise and deserving of praise. Spiritual pride is the enemy of our souls.

I believe that we need to understand where we are at in our journey with Christ. We need to know how far the Lord has brought us. We need to know who we are in Christ. We need to know the trust the Lord has placed in us to do His work. We need to know these things so that our gratitude and devotion to Christ may increase. We need to know how much we owe to Him and be humbled by it. We will never understand what true grace is until we learn to appreciate what has happened in us because of Christ in us.

Be careful of what you think about yourself. You are nothing without Christ. You don’t deserve anything but God’s disdain and wrath. You are who you are because of what Christ has done and not you. You are no better than anyone else, no matter how much you have grown spiritually. You will never outgrow your need for Christ to change you. Pride in who you have become will take you down if you let it rule your heart.

Don’t ever think for a moment that you have not sinned. You have and do, just like everyone else. Thinking of your self-righteousness will destroy your soul. We all need to see ourselves in light of God’s holiness, not our goodness. We need Jesus constantly to work in us to make us more holy before God. We cannot be holy without His constant lordship over our lives.