Egotism

 

 

Egotism is expressed by many associated terms: self-righteousness, self-promotion, narcissism, pride, arrogance, conceit, and even self-deception. In any case, it is about trying to prove ourselves superior, both to ourself and to others. Many studies have clearly pointed out the universality of this tendency. One study found that 98% claimed the they are morally superior to others.

Why are we so egotistical? The Bible reveals that we are subliminally aware that there is something radically wrong with us, which needs to be addressed lest we succumb to crippling feelings of guilt and shame. The accusations from our conscience are so powerful that they continue to accuse us of wrongdoing:

·       Romans 2:15 (NLT) They demonstrate that God’s law is written in their hearts, for their own conscience and thoughts either accuse them or tell them they are doing right.

Since God’s laws are written into our DNA, unless we find His mercy, we will continue to experience inner turmoil. Therefore, we resort to self-justifications:

·       Proverbs 21:2 Every way of a man is right in his own eyes, but the LORD weighs the heart.

We suppress the truth about ourselves and cannot tolerate exposure by the One who judges us:

·       Romans 1:18–20 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse.

After Adam and Eve disobeyed God and eat the forbidden fruit. Once sin entered, it took control. They could no longer tolerate the presence of God and hid from Him. Nor would they confess their sin once God gave them a chance. Instead, they covered their shame with fig leaves, half-truths, and blame-shifting. When God pronounced His verdict upon them and cast them out of the Garden, they seemed relieved. Adam was in denial and named his wife Eve (life), even though their God and Creator had just condemned them to eventual death.

We have been running from God and His terrifying and revealing light ever since, covering ourselves with the fig leaves of money, power, attainments, and sexual conquests, whatever might make us feel self-righteous and entitled, while our conscience has been declaring the opposite. In view of this, Christ pronounced His condemnation upon humanity:

·       John 3:19–20 And this is the judgment: the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil. For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his works should be exposed.

We are condemned by what we love—the darkness of self-deception—and we know it:

·       Romans 1:32 Though they know God’s righteous decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them.

We either try to cover this awareness over with the fig leaves of self-righteousness or shake a defiant fist at heaven. Some will even maim themselves to experience a brief reprieve from the punishment they know they deserve.

The Remedy

We suffer from alienation from the Creator and need to be reconciled with Him. None of us can be good enough to earn anything good from Him but death. Our only hope is in His undeserved mercy. What then does He want from us?

·       1 John 1:8–9 If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

We just need to be real with God and acknowledge our sins, trusting in His mercy through Jesus’ atonement. Solid relationships must all be built on truth:

·       John 8:31–33 So Jesus said to the Jews who had believed him, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” They answered him, “We are offspring of Abraham and have never been enslaved to anyone. How is it that you say, ‘You will become free’?”

The self-righteous Israelite leadership were blinded. Their pride had to be broken for the Lord to begin to let light in through their hard shell. Hence, Jesus’ strong denunciation of the scribes and Pharisees!   He had to also break me so that my eyes would see my horrible bondage. However, I could not have endured without the miraculous assurances of His love.

Every day, I am comforted by these assurances. Only in the light of His love can I face myself and even boast in my failures and weaknesses, as He had revealed to Paul amid his disease and God’s unwillingness to heal Paul:

·       2 Corinthians 12:9–10 But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong.

Consequently, I can now accept my many weaknesses and even laugh at them, because my true identity is in Jesus, where I rest safe and secure.

HOPE THROUGH HUMILIATION

I must confess that I am ashamed of myself. Even though I know that all blessings come from the Lord and that I am helpless without Him, I have been commencing my sermons without prayer. Why? I can only think of one reason. To my shame, I have grown confident in myself.

Jesus' Apostles had also grown confident in themselves. Even after Jesus had warned them that they would all abandon Him, they insisted that they would not! Peter went even further, insisting that he would stand alone for Jesus, even if all the others abandoned Him:

• But Peter answered and said unto him, "If all shall be offended in thee, I will never be offended."

However, Jesus corrected him, saying that Peter would be the worst offender, denying Jesus three times. But Peter corrected Him again:

• "Even if I must die with thee, yet will I not deny thee." Likewise also said all the disciples. (Matthew 26:33, 35 ASV)

However, Peter fell in the most humiliating way. He denied the Lord, just as Jesus had prophesied, and "wept bitterly."

But in spite of his humiliating betrayal, a remarkably encouraging thing took place. The resurrected Jesus came to His Apostles as they were fishing in the Sea of Galilee and designated the disgraced Peter to feed His sheep. 

We tend to rate spiritual qualifications in terms of spiritual habits and behaviors. However, Peter now was qualified by virtue of his brokenness and self-despair - necessary qualifications for service. 

During his discouraging 40 years as a shepherd tending the sheep of his father-in-law in the desert, Moses became the most humble man in all the earth. This became his  all-important quality. He would now be situated to regard God's Word above his own.

To reinforce the lesson Peter's humiliation, Jesus reminded him of his betrayal. Simulating this betrayal, He asked Peter, three times, "Do you love me?" 

I think Peter now understood that he could no longer rely on himself. Christ alone would have to be his strength. Later Peter confessed the all-sufficiently of his Savior:

• Through him [we] are believers in God, that raised him from the dead, and gave him glory; so that your faith and hope might be in God. (1 Peter 1:21)

Our faith and hope must be in God alone. I am ashamed that I often lapse into self-trust. Nevertheless, I am grateful that the Lord hasn't humiliated me in a painful and public way. But I am even more grateful about something else - that He is working all of our failures for good to conform us into the likeness of His blessed Son.

WELCOME WHAT HUMBLES AND HEALS

·       “There was none who sold himself to do what was evil in the sight of the Lord like Ahab, whom Jezebel his wife incited. He acted very abominably in going after idols, as the Amorites had done, whom the Lord cast out before the people of Israel.” (1 Kings 21:25-26; ESV)

However, when King Ahab heard God's judgment against him, he humbled himself, and this made all the difference. Therefore, God informed His prophet Elijah:

·       “'Have you seen how Ahab has humbled himself before me? Because he has humbled himself before me, I will not bring the disaster in his days; but in his son's days I will bring the disaster upon his house.'” (1 Kings 21:29)

Humility is so important before our Lord that He reversed Himself entirely regarding the worst of Israel's kings. It’s also important for us! Even the greatest of God's servants had to endure the severest  humbling experiences. After God had deprived Job of everything, he was angry with God, but even he had to be humbled so that he'd repent of his pride and rash charges against his God:

·       “Behold, I am of small account; what shall I answer you? I lay my hand on my mouth. I have spoken once, and I will not answer; twice, but I will proceed no further.” (Job 40:4-5)

·       “I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees you; therefore I despise myself, and repent in dust and ashes." (Job 42:5-6)

Paul had to be humbled with a "messenger from Satan" to prevent him from becoming proud (2 Cor. 12:7-10). Clearly, "God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble." (1 Peter 5:5)

I, therefore, must welcome and even embrace those things that humble me, however painful and discouraging they may be. Although Satan means them for evil, our Lord uses them to heal and conform us into His image.

And, by the way, don’t be surprised if these humbling experiences don’t make you feel cleansed but filthy and totally unworthy of anyway good from God. That’s what humbling is all about!

SPIRITUAL PRIDE KILLS

Spiritual pride is deadly. One reason for this is that it disguises itself as virtue and deceives and blinds people to themselves and the saving truth about God. This is the judgment that Jesus brought against the religious leadership:

·       “But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you shut the kingdom of heaven in people’s faces. For you neither enter yourselves nor allow those who would enter to go in.” (Matthew 23:13; ESV)

In the Gospel of Luke, Jesus charged:

·       “Woe to you lawyers! For you have taken away the key of knowledge. You did not enter yourselves, and you hindered those who were entering.” (Luke 11:52)

How did they take away this “key of knowledge” that would open the door to God? By giving the people a false portrait of what it means to please God! Most of the people, even Jesus’ disciples, had been convinced that the spiritual pride of the scribes and Pharisees represented the pinnacle of piety. However, Jesus saw through them:

·       “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs, which outwardly appear beautiful, but within are full of dead people’s bones and all uncleanness. So you also outwardly appear righteous to others, but within you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.” (Matthew 23:27-28)

According to Jesus, they were masters at image management, at presenting a false face, but they were no better than whitewashed tombs. However, on the outside, they looked faultless:

·       “They do all their deeds to be seen by others. For they make their phylacteries broad and their fringes long, and they love the place of honor at feasts and the best seats in the synagogues and greetings in the marketplaces and being called rabbi by others.” (Matthew 23:5-7)

Jesus’ condemnation was damning. It was not that they occasionally lapsed into deception. Instead, “all their deeds” are performed to deceive, perhaps even themselves. No wonder Jesus proclaimed:

·       “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you clean the outside of the cup and the plate, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. You blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and the plate, that the outside also may be clean.” (Matthew 23:25-26)

Jesus called them “blind” Pharisees, perhaps because they were barely conscious of their willful self-deception. But what could they do about it? They could submit to the light of the Savior. Therefore, Jesus instructed His disciples to not engage in Pharisaical practices:

·       “But you are not to be called rabbi, for you have one teacher, and you are all brothers. And call no man your father on earth, for you have one Father, who is in heaven. Neither be called instructors, for you have one instructor, the Christ. The greatest among you shall be your servant. Whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted.” (Matthew 23:8-12)

Why these severe restrictions? Because we are all Pharisees! We are all susceptible. We too all want the acclaim, the recognition, the honor, the influence, and the power. That’s why Paul had warned us:

·       Therefore let anyone who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall. (1 Corinthians 10:12; 2 Cor. 3:5; Gal. 6:3)

None of us has what it takes to stand. If we think we do, then we are deluding ourselves. The Apostles all proclaimed that they would never abandon Jesus. However, their spiritual failure proved to be a painful lesson that we all need to learn. Jesus had warned them, “Without Me, you can do nothing” (John 15:5), but we need to experience painful reinforcements of this lesson.

Well, how do Jesus’ teachings against taking honorific titles prevent us from becoming like the Pharisees? These teachings are humbling. We find that it is very hard to resist pursuing the acclaim and honor, and we come to see the Pharisee prowling within. This should humble us and cause us to confess our sins.

Elsewhere, Jesus taught us to seek to serve as He had. In contrast, His disciples had been seeking their own honor. Two of them came to Jesus requesting that, once He had received His kingdom, they would be elevated to reign alongside of Him.

When the others heard about this, they became indignant. Jesus then corrected them all:

·       “But Jesus called them to him and said, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. It shall not be so among you. But whoever would be great among you must be your servant.” (Matthew 20:25-26)

This teaching continues to humble me, showing me how unworthy I am of anything good from the Lord. It continues to put to death the Pharisee within. Yes, this self-realization, that I do not want to be the servant, humbles me, but it also nurtures gratefulness that God loves this unworthy person.

When Jesus’ 72 disciples had returned from their evangelistic outreach, they boasted that the demons were subject to them. However human this celebration over their spiritual accomplishment might have been, they were celebrating the wrong thing. Accomplishments come and go. However, what we have of supreme value is an eternal relationship with our Savior. Therefore, Jesus corrected them:

·       “Nevertheless, do not rejoice in this, that the spirits are subject to you, but rejoice that your names are written in heaven.” (Luke 10:20)

My prayer is that He would always correct me.