Creflo Dollar - The Origin of Self-Deception
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You have your Bibles, go with me this morning to the book of James chapter 4, and verse 17. Last week we started a new series dealing with self deception. If there’s one thing that is abundant in the world today, it’s this issue of self deception because the problem with self deception is you don’t know you’re deceived. And so, I thought it’s really time to really dig into this thing. And last week we talked about defining self deception so we’ll know what it’s all about. But this morning, I wanna start teaching on the origin of self deception. Not only the origin of self deception, but what are some of the areas that self deception comes from.
And I’m telling you, Taffi and I had a great talk yesterday and one of the things we realized is that a lot of self deception was coming from the pulpits of America, coming from the pulpits of the world. And, you know, there’s some deception that comes from social media, comes from everywhere. Everybody in here, including myself, we’ve all been in situations where we were deceived. And the prayer is, «Lord, help me not to be deceived, or at least Lord, help me to see when I am being deceived».
You don’t realize the progress you make when you realize, «Whoa, I’m deceived». But what happens when people don’t realize the importance of getting free from self deception? I mean, it’s a playground for the enemy and he just plays with you and with confidence you carry your life on in self deception and can’t nobody tell you nothing because you, you know, that’s what deception means is you think you’re right but you’re wrong, but you think you’re right and you can’t see that self deception. Then you get older and then you get old and now you’re the new old people and you didn’t realize you spent 30 years of your life in self deception.
So, let’s begin in James chapter 4, and verse 17 and pray that a strong teaching anointing will come on me. I wanna sow this on the inside of you. And those of you who are at home and you didn’t make it this morning, move all the distractions out of the way so you can hear this because all of us know when we listen to the Word at home there are a whole bunch of distractions, the phone, you know, the kids. Get yourself in a place to hear this because this is gonna be a blessing to your life. James chapter 4, and verse 17. I’m gonna read it in the King James and NLT. He says, «Therefore to him that knoweth to do good, and then he doeth it not,» he said, «to him it’s sin,» because he knows to do good but he didn’t do it. Look at this in the NLT. And in the NLT he says, «Remember, it is sin to know what you ought to do,» you know what you ought to do, «and then you don’t do it».
I know what’s good for me to do, but I don’t do it. Now I want to start off with this illustration and see if I can paint this picture. Think of the last time you felt it was right to do something and you refused to do it. The last time you thought it was right to do something, but you refused to do it. And I mean it could be something like read a bedtime story to my five year old or visit someone in the hospital or showing up at a wedding or a funeral. You felt like that was something right for you to do, but you didn’t do it.
Now, let me say this, we are free moral agents, which means we have a right to decide to do whatever we’re gonna decide to do. And as a free moral agent, you are capable of living true or false to your sense of what is right. So, you have a sense of what is right, but you’re a free moral agent. And you have the right to choose whether you’re gonna be true to what you believe is right or whether you’re gonna be false to what you believe is right. So, if you are true to what you believe is right, then you do these things without a second thought.
There’s no explanation, there’s no second thought. I mean, you go in there, you read the baby the story. There’s nothing behind that. There’s no story. You do it. You show up at the wedding, you do what you believe is right because you’re true to what you believe is right. Everybody on the bus? However, if we do not do these good things that we think are right, or we do them resentfully, now, there’s a story to tell. There wasn’t a story to tell when we were true to what was right, but now, when we didn’t do it, there’s a story to tell. There’s a story to tell. All of a sudden, you know, we decided not to go to the funeral and we came up with all the reasons why or we decided not to read the five year old the story because I mean, after all, you know, I got extra work to do, you know, I didn’t sleep well last night and we come up with all of these things and you’re not being true to what you believe is right.
Now you’re having a lot of rationalizing and a lot of excuses. There’s a story you have to tell and an explanation that you have to say because you decided not to do what you felt was right. And so now, there’s a story. So, the heart of the story is in our refusal to do as we believe. Had we been true to our sense of what was right, it would not occur to us to have to explain ourselves because we were just true to what we thought was right to do and we did it. But when we are false to our beliefs, there’s a whole lot of things to explain. When we’re false to our belief of what is right, then my excuses become an attempt to make the wrong we are doing appear to be right, or at least make the wrong that we’re doing, try to make it seem like it’s not wrong. Everybody follow me?
So, now here’s the problem here. The excuses become the evidence of more than mere ignorance and more than being blind by the demands or the pressures of life. The excuses become a sign of self deception. The small foxes spoil the vine. Those excuses, all of the rationalizing that you’re doing, becomes a sign of self deception. You’re having to convince yourself through the story you tell yourself that all of these reasons are why I couldn’t be true to what I thought was right. But we don’t see that. And it’s okay because it’s built in to the norms and values of the world. I used to have this saying as a young minister, holding down the position of CEO and minister, «Why is irrelevant». You remember that?
And I would challenge all my leaders, «Why is irrelevant». Why you didn’t do something is irrelevant. The fact of the matter is the window of opportunity has passed and it didn’t happen. And so, you spend time trying to tell yourself why it’s okay that it didn’t happen because of boom, boom, boom, boom. Those are signals that self deception is working its way into our lives. Now notice again in James chapter 4, and verse 17. Remember, he said it is sin to know what you ought to do and then not do it.
There’s something that happens, there’s a disturbance that goes on when you know what you ought to do, but don’t do it. But we can’t take pieces of our lives and say, «Well, it’s all right for me to do this here, but not all right for me to do this there,» because all the enemy is looking for is an open door opportunity to come in and to increase that self deception. Self deception, let’s look at it again by definition. It’s more than a term that describes someone who does not see the truth. It is a concept that accounts for how it is possible to be blind to the truth.
How is it possible to be blind to the truth? To be self-deceived is to participate in an act that produces a false view of your circumstances. To be self-deceived is to be blind to the truth of a situation. I’m self-deceived and I’m blind to the truth of the situation. Whether it’s the truth of the situation in your marriage, or truth in the situation on your job. You know, I honestly used to think and remember praying this way, «Lord, the reason why we’re having problems is because of Taffi». And the Holy Ghost said, «No, I’m all right with her, it’s you». Let me tell you something, we’ve got to understand what this deception is all about. The blindness includes two features.
Let me show you the two players that are in this blind act. Number one, seeing the truth falsely or seeing the truth as untruth. And so, in self deception, you see the truth as untruth. And so, that’s why you gotta make up this thing that says, «Well, I got my truth». No, no, no, no, you’re seeing the truth as falsely, you’re seeing it as untruth. And along with that, number two, being blind to the fact that your own actions, your own wrong that you’re doing has produced this false view. It’s what you’re doing that’s produced this false view. In other words, if you’re doing something and then you come to a teaching like this and you hear it, then you’re gonna do everything you can to protect what you’re doing. And there’s a reason why you have this false view because you’re doing opposite of it.
«Well, I don’t think lying to profit is wrong». No, lying wrong, period. But whatever you’re doing, maybe it had a lot to produce the false view that you have. What are you doing? And how are you viewing what you’re doing? Because the norms and values of this whole world, they’re feeding you with the deception of what you’re doing is okay, forget the truth. What she’s doing is fine, forget the truth. And now, your view of the truth has been messed up because you’ve been trying to support what you’re doing. Might have quieted the church this morning.
So, given this kind of blindness, and this is just an introduction. Given this kind of blindness, it seems that if I am self-deceived, I cannot access the knowledge that would set me free so I can escape because I’m self-deceived. So, I can’t escape it because I’m self-deceived. And because you can’t escape it because you’re self-deceived, now you decide this is just how it is and it’s okay because this is what some people have to have. Also, since I don’t know I’m deceived and I don’t know that I have produced the deception, I don’t know, I’m deceived. I just said something. I need to say that again. I don’t know I’m deceived and I don’t know I produced the deception.
Wow. We all have to understand, we produce the deception. I’m deceived, I produced the deception, I can’t escape. And so, what happens is, I’m gonna reject the attempt for somebody to come and enlighten me. I’ll reject the attempt for someone who knows the truth. I’ll reject that and I’ll just, I’ll term it as you just been meddling, you’re just meddling, you’re just messy because you can’t see. So, I’m rejecting what’s true because I’m deceived and I produced the deception. And the deception is protecting that deception that I’m walking in. So, to take the idea of self deception seriously, it might seem impossible to the person that’s deceived. A person that’s deceived is not going to take seriously what I’m teaching. The person that’s deceived is not gonna take anything serious about them being deceived.
And here’s what they’ll do, «That might have been the way y’all did it in your day, but in our day, this is okay». And that’s one thing about truth, it doesn’t change from generation to generation. It doesn’t. What was true in our day is still gonna be the truth in your day and in your children’s day and in your grandchildren’s day. It’s still gonna be the same. Now, let’s look at James chapter 1, and 8. I’ll get real practical with you for a moment, but I wanna give you something to meditate on. I want you to get this series and I want you to listen to it over and over and over again until something clicks. Now there are two guys that really knew about self deception. James is one of them and John was the other. And so, we’ll be studying out of their book to see what they had to say about self deception.
In James chapter 1, verse 8, he says, «A double minded man is unstable in two of his ways only». A double minded man is unstable in what? Everything he does. Everything he does is going to be impacted by his double-mindedness, by his self deception. There’s gonna be instability in his life. And that instability, according to James, it comes from the double-minded and the willful refusal to live that which you know to be true. Wow. But we don’t wanna live, nobody is doing something crazy without first of all knowing it’s crazy. You know it was crazy when you started. What happened is if you just keep doing it long enough, you become calloused or hardened to it and you’ve convinced yourself this is okay. That is okay for me to go and see different women and I’m married.
As long as we ain’t in the bed, but Jesus knows that whatever is in your heart eventually is gonna flow out, and you’re gonna go to bed. But you gotta go and convince yourself that it’s all right for me to go see different women so that once you get into bed, that’ll be fine too. And you’ll wake up one day and realize, «I have been so deceived». Taffi is working on a series where she’s talking about showing us the deception in the church. Lots of different deceptions that are going on in the church. You know this deception where, you know, if you don’t treat me right as the man of God, then you can’t get my blessing. Well, under the New Testament, it ain’t about my blessing, it’s Jesus’s blessing. You’re blessed because of Jesus. «I’ll tell you what, if you don’t do this for me, then you’re not gonna get my blessing».
I don’t want your blessing. I want Jesus’s blessing. There’s a lot of deception that’s coming from the pulpit. A lot of deception is coming from the pulpit. Deception is about… what do they call those roles? Taffi, help me with that. What roles or gender roles. That’s a worldly thing. That came from the world. Jesus was very clear on how we treat one another and it’s amazing to me how I see people who talk about marriage and they’re saying stuff that’s not located nowhere in the Bible. And we get used to that. We slide stuff in that ain’t even in the Bible.
This is what the man is supposed to do and this is what the woman is supposed to do and we’re not paying attention to what Jesus said. We have bought on to, you know, let’s assign something to the marriage that’s gonna make me feel better about what I do. And not biblical equality. You ain’t looking for no biblical equality. You’re looking for this is what the man is supposed to do, this is what the woman is supposed to do. I ain’t talking about no biblical equality.
And so, what happened is inequality in the gender roles that you assign. And all of a sudden, the man looked like he got the best part of everything. Woman is supposed to cook, she’s supposed to clean, and she’s supposed to work to help you pay the bills. Boy, please. If you was a woman, would you do that? I wouldn’t. I’m like, person, please. And somewhere you know it is right to have equality in a marriage. You know it’s right that everything shouldn’t fall on one person. You know it’s right that that corporation that you formed at the altar that there will be, there should be some equality in that corporation. While you do respect the anointing areas where you’re anointed and that person, there’s an equality that’s there. Jesus came so that there can be equality in marriage. But we go talking about, «Well, you know, the Bible say that the man ought to be the one dominating».
See, this is another problem. Another problem is you don’t know how to rightly divide the Bible. The New Testament is a new contract, which means you don’t consider the Old Testament, which is the old contract. The old contract was a shadow of the new that was to come. For example, in the book, in the old covenant, it talks about the Sabbath being a day, but in the New Testament, it talks about Jesus is our Sabbath. So, the Old Testament gives you a glimpse and a shadow of what is to come, but it hadn’t came yet. And so, when he delivered you from the old covenant of the law and into the new covenant of grace, you still, when you see something in the new covenant you don’t like, then you wanna go and steal something from the old covenant to make it all right and use it as an excuse to form self deception.
Here’s an example. Here’s an example. Male dominating females is a result of the curse. You remember in Genesis when Adam and Eve did their thing and he was announcing, «So here’s what happens. Since you guys got so deceived in the garden, here’s what’s going on, dude. There’s gonna be male domination over females». That was true under that situation where male dominance was a part of the curse. There’s nothing blessed by a marriage that’s being dominated by a man who is now automatically bringing a curse of that marriage by pure fact that he’s trying to dominate his wife. Jesus came and he showed up to end the curse of the law, which would include male domination.