What does the Bible say about self-deception?

• Genesis 3:6-7, the tree of good and evil
• Jeremiah 2:34-35, "On your skirts is found the lifeblood of the innocent poor, though you did not catch them breaking in. Yet in spite of all these things you say, 'I am innocent.'"
• Jeremiah 5:30-31, the prophets prophesy falsly
• Psalm 36:1-2, "They flatter themselves in their own eyes that their iniquity cannot be found out and hated"
• Revelation 3:17, "You say, 'I am rich, I have prospered, and I need nothing.' You do not realize that you are wretched, pitiable, poor, blind, and naked"

Warnings

• Matthew 7:21-23, only those who do the will of the Father in heaven will enter the kingdom
• Matthew 23:24-26, "First clean the inside of the cup, so that the outside also may become clean."
• James 1:22-24, they look at themselves in the mirror and immediatly forget what they look like
• 1 John 1:8,"If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us"

Sermon ideas about self-deception

We all know there is such a thing as self-deception because we can spot it in other people. Once in a while, particularly when we have been jolted in some way, we can spot it in ourselves. The lies we tell ourselves are sometimes sad, sometimes funny, and often downright scary.

Self-deception is almost always an ingredient in addiction and hypocrisy.

Why do alcoholics and other drug-abusers typically go through years of denial? Why do some spouses miss all the signs of infidelity in their partner? How do their unfaithful partners manage to sleep at night? How do the men who beat up women get themselves to believe that the women had it coming? Why do some of the women believe it too?

Self-deception is hard to spot in ourselves because it covers its own tracks. As Lewis Smedes put it, "first we deceive ourselves, and then we convince ourselves that we are not deceiving ourselves." (Smedes, Lewis.A Pretty Good Person, Harper & Row 1990, p. 74.) But there are verbal cues. Suppose you've done something that's borderline and find yourself saying things like this: "I'm only human." "Everybody does it." "You have to sell what people are buying." "I did what I had to do" "If I don't do it, somebody else will." "Nobody is hurt by what I do." "I was only following orders." "Nobody's perfect." These expressions are small alarms going off. They tell us it's later than we think. They tell us it's probably time for confession of sin.

The scary thing about self-deception is not just that it warps our thinking and puts the best face on our sins and miseries. The scary thing about self-deception is that it can insulate us against Jesus Christ. When our achievements secure us, when our reputation precedes us, when our pride defends us and pumps us up whenever we lose pressure—that is, when we become our own creators, our own law-givers, our own centers of meaning and power—then the thought that we need a Savior starts to sound quaint. It sounds uninteresting.