self righteousness on Marriage Counseling

I once asked a psychologist who had been in practice for over forty years what is the most common regret his clients felt. Without hesitation, he said, “Selfishness.” Why was I not the spouse or paren...

Call to Confession: The prophet asks the Lord’s people, “But who can endure the day of his coming, and who can stand when he appears? For he is like a refiner's fire and like fullers' soap.” ...

Moralistic behavior change done for one's self simply manipulates and leverages radical selfishness without challenging it.

Preaching Commentary Context Assyria the Destroyer of the Northern Kingdom It is important to remember that in addition to there being seventeen books of prophecy in the Old Testament, each one of...

Behavior modification that’s not empowered by God’s heart-changing grace is self-righteousness, as repugnant to God as the worst sins people gossip about.

The Golden Result is a corollary to the Golden Rule, which calls us to do to others as we would have them do to us. The Golden Result says that people will usually treat us as we treat them. If we bla...

Loving and gracious God, we know we do not always live the life to which we are called: We turn away from You, and from our true selves. You command us to shine Your light, but we often hide it instea...

This is one of Jesus’ most vivid parables. He paints a dramatic picture of two figures, with a twist to upend his hearer’s expectations. While the context of this passage involves the dynamics of an a...

Stop being so sure that you are always right, and others wrong. Don't trust your own opinion, when you find it contrary to that of older men, and especially to that of your own parents. Age gives ...

Jesus insists on this willingness to change, because he knows that self-righteousness will separate us from God forever. We’re all at high risk of becoming sick with self-righteousness, and if we don’...

It is easier to cry against one-thousand sins of others than to kill one of your own.

Pop psychology is wrong when it tells you to look inside yourself and find your value. The magazines are wrong when they suggest you are only as good as you are thin, muscular, pimple-free, or perfume...

O my Lord, I discern in my anger a sense of self-righteousness, which is much too close to pleasure. And I think of you, Lord. You were never angry in your own defense, and you took no pleasure in ang...

Dear Lord, I am filled with anger born of frustration. I confess I know not whether my anger is of you. I just know I am filled with hope, which makes me angry that others are not so filled. Take away...

When a person has lost Christ, he must fall into the confidence of his own works…. Take great care that no one goes to mass trusting in confession, or prayer, or self-preparation; but lacking confiden...

Context Assyria the Destroyer of the Northern Kingdom It is important to remember that in addition to there being seventeen books of prophecy in the Old Testament, each one of these books takes thei...

This is one of Jesus’ most vivid parables. He paints a dramatic picture of two figures, with a twist to upend his hearer’s expectations. While the context of this passage involves the dynamics of an a...

Why is it so fun to be right? As pleasures go, it is, after all, a second-order one at best. Unlike many of life’s other delights—chocolate, surfing, kissing—it does not enjoy any mainline access to o...

Prostitutes are in no danger of finding their present life so satisfactory that they cannot turn to God: the proud, the avaricious, the self-righteous, are in that danger.

If you believe what you like in the Gospel, and reject what you don't like, it is not the Gospel you believe, but yourself.

At the core of every project of self-salvation is the staunch unwillingness to believe that God’s love and forgiveness can be unmerited. Those who would try and save themselves prefer work to rest, ef...

God has nothing to say to the self-righteous.

Most of us use ‘I’m waiting for God to reveal His calling on my life’ as a means of avoiding action. Did you hear God calling you to sit in front of the television yesterday? Or to go on your last vac...

Jesus warns us against our self-righteousness in the most dire terms. (He uses the word hell a lot more often than most of us are comfortable with.) He’s quite aware that while we humans have seemingl...

God will not go forth with that man who marches in his own strength.

God of lasting forgiveness, You are not surprised to find us standing before Your throne once again, asking for Your forgiveness. It’s true, Father: we have sinned again. In our thinking, in our doing...

The devil may also make use of morality.

Written almost a hundred years ago, this excerpt from the Reverend John W. Rilling points out one of the main reasons we continue to observe Lent, a period of repentance and discipline for many who ca...

Many have passed the rocks of gross sins - who have suffered shipwreck upon the sands of self-righteousness.

In spinning a robe of your own righteousness, before the sun goes down you will find it all unraveled.