Rick Warren - A Faith That Helps Me See the Truth (03/14/2024)
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Pastor Rick Warren, continuing his series "The Faith That Works When Life Doesn't" from the Book of James, teaches on the pervasive danger of self-deception. Using scriptures like Jeremiah 17:9 and James 1:22, he outlines eight common ways we lie to ourselves, from taking sole credit for success to judging others. He concludes that truth brings freedom and offers a three-step solution: ask God for clarity, seek help from a small group, and ask Jesus to transform you.
Introduction: A Pandemic Update and a Plea
Hi everybody, I'm Rick Warren and yes, I'm wearing a Hawaiian shirt for the first time in about 20 years. But before we look at God's word today, I want to give you an update on our pandemic plans as a church. You know, we were all hoping that this last Tuesday, our local health officials would announce that Orange County would be dropping into a lower level of restrictions. We started in the purple zone with total lockdown, and then we've been in the red zone for months. Officials had announced that we would probably drop into the less restricted orange zone this last Tuesday, but it didn't happen.
Instead, this past week showed us that we're still in the middle of this pandemic and it's not safe. Over half of the states in America—26 of them—reported a spike in infections and in deaths this week. Then Disney announced that they were permanently laying off 28 thousand employees. Almost 800 thousand new people filed for unemployment just this week, and we ended the week with the news that the president and the first lady both have the virus and the president has been checked into a hospital.
Now, you don't have to be a fan, or vote for the president, to pray for his health and the first lady's health, along with everybody else's health who's contracted the Coronavirus this week. Scientists are now calling this the beginning of a fall or winter resurgence, or a second wave of the pandemic. But I just want to say for your benefit and for the benefit of all your family and for everybody else around you: please, please, please wear a mask, all right? It's not a political statement. It's a statement of unselfishness. It's a statement of love. It's a statement of responsibility. It's a statement of good stewardship. It's a statement of loving your neighbor as yourself.
You know, some people complain, "Well, I don't like feeling restricted." Well, a casket is pretty restrictive. Being in intensive care is pretty restrictive, and prolonging this pandemic restricts everybody. So be smart, and more importantly, do the unselfish, loving thing and wear a mask.
The Faith That Works When Life Doesn't
Now, welcome back to our series through the book of James called, "The Faith That Works When Life Doesn't". We've been studying this little, but extremely practical and powerful New Testament book in order to learn the principles for living through a pandemic. As I've mentioned several times, James wrote this little book during a time of great stress in those days—great persecution when Christians were not able to meet publicly for worship. In fact, many of them had lost their homes and their businesses when they were forced to flee the city of Jerusalem.
Today we're in part 27 of this series, and you can download the listening outline for today's message at either saddleback.com or pastorrick.com. These outlines have all of the Bible verses on them that we look at each week; they're written out for you to review, and I highly encourage you to write down things that you want to remember on your outline.
Now, I want to begin today by asking you a question. Have you ever felt the deep feeling that something you were considering doing was the absolute right thing to do? You just felt that in your heart it was the right thing to do. But after you did it, it was obvious in hindsight that it was exactly the wrong thing to do? If you're a normal human being, I'm sure that's happened to you many, many times. Why does that happen?
Why is it when I feel like it's the right thing to do and then I do it, but then it ends up not being the right thing to do? Well, first, you rarely have 100% of the facts and the information you need, and you get in a hurry. Second, because you're not God, you can't always see the unintended consequences of your actions. But there's a third reason: not everything that you think and not everything that you feel is true.
Just because you think it doesn't make it true, and just because you feel something doesn't make it right. Sometimes that leads to disastrous consequences. The Bible in Proverbs 16:25 says this: "People always think they're doing the right thing." Okay, we don't intentionally do the wrong thing. "People always think they're doing the right thing but in the end it leads them to their death." It may seem like we're making the right choice. It may feel like we're making the right choice, but it doesn't guarantee that it is the right choice. You need a more objective authority for your decisions than simply your own feelings or intuition.
The Biblical Warning About Self-Deception
Now, three times in the book of James, he says, "don't deceive yourself." He's talking about self-deception. He says it three times, and in many other places in the book, he warns you against trusting your own fallible thinking. In fact, self-deception is a major theme of this book. Now, almost 600 years before James wrote his book in the Bible, God told us the same thing in Jeremiah 17:9. It says this: "The human mind is the most deceitful of all things. It is incurable. No one can understand how deceitful it is."
That's what God says about my mind and your mind. The human mind is the most deceitful of all things. It is incurable. No one can understand how deceitful it is. That's a pretty shocking statement, but you know what? Our lives prove its truth literally every day. The fact is, what you tell yourself is not always the truth, and what you feel is not always true. Feelings lie. Your thoughts and your feelings can be created by a whole lot of un-trusting and untrustworthy causes.
I've often pointed out to you that we lie to ourselves far more than we lie to anybody else. Sometimes we tell ourselves that things are worse than they really are, and sometimes we tell ourselves that things are better than they really are. You're not really a good judge of you. You're not really a good judge of your own life. Why? Because you certainly aren't impartial. Your mind is filled with all kinds of biases from your experiences in life and prejudices—you know, all these things that have come to color how you see things.
Now, what God says about your thoughts and about your feelings—that they are deceitful, that we deceive ourselves all the time—you know what? That's the exact opposite of what everything in our culture tells you. Jeremiah 17:9, that verse we just read, is a counter-cultural verse. Why? Because everything in our culture today tells you to look within yourself whenever you want to know the right thing to do.
If you don't believe in God, or if you're not trusting in God, where do you look? Well, they always say, look within. It sounds so spiritual, and you've—all our lives we've been bombarded with these little slogans, like "trust the force." You know, that's inside you. "The answer is inside you," or "do whatever feels best to you." Have you ever heard that one? Yeah, you may have said it to yourself. "I've got to do what's best for me," or "go with your hunches," or "follow your instincts," or "listen to your inner voice," or "if it feels right, do it," or "just trust your gut."
You know, the problem with all of these pieces of worldly advice? They don't work. They don't work because they're based on a lie. The truth is, you don't have all the knowledge of the universe inside of you. Your brain holds only a very small fraction of all the knowledge that is out there. And the knowledge that you do have gets distorted by your experiences, gets distorted by your emotional needs, gets distorted by your current blood sugar level, your relational conflicts, and hundreds of other factors—including the fact that we all have a broken brain.
Everything on earth is broken from sin. Your brain doesn't always work perfectly because everything has been broken by sin in this world. So as I said, James talks about this theme of self-deception and how easy it is to fool ourselves with our own rationalizations. Now, to rationalize is to tell rational lies. That's what it means to rationalize; you tell yourself rational lies. In other words, I try to convince myself in my mind that something is okay that I know in my heart is not okay. I tell myself a rational lie.
It's a battle, and this battle is going on in your life constantly, between my consciousness and my conscience. So what I want to do today is quickly just give you some examples from the Bible of ways that we regularly deceive ourselves. Then I want to show you what the Bible says you should do about it. First, we have to ask: why is it important that we tell ourselves the truth? Because we don't tell ourselves the truth all the time. Why is it important to tell ourselves the truth about ourselves, even when it's painful?
Well, Jesus said it is the truth that sets us free. It is the truth that solves our problems. It is acting on the truth that brings us happiness and joy. And the more you can stop listening to self-thoughts and feelings that aren't true, the happier and the healthier and the more holy you're going to be. So now let's look at some common examples of ways that we get trapped by our own untrue thoughts and our own false feelings, okay? So let me just give you a list. We're going to go through these pretty fast. You're going to have to write them down fast.
Eight Common Self-Deceptions
First, God says I am deceiving myself when I think that all I've earned and deserve is what I have. In other words, when I think I've earned and I deserve all that I have. You say, what do you mean by that, Rick? Well, in today's culture, we admire, we even idolize what we call the self-made person—the guy who supposedly pulls himself up by his own bootstraps and makes a success of himself. But in reality, there is no such thing as a self-made man.
Did you make your own eyes? Did you make your own ears to hear? Who gave you the brain to think up all those good plans and business ideas? You would have nothing if God hadn't given it to you. So there is no such thing as a self-made man. You make the most of what God gave you, but it all came from God. He could have had you be born to different parents. You could have been born in a different place at a different time with different gifts and different talents. All those things came from God.
Now, God wants you to succeed in life, but he just wants you to recognize that it's all a gift from him and be grateful for it. And when you think that you've done it all on your own without God's help, you are deceiving yourself in the biggest way. See, even unbelievers should be grateful that God allowed them to live, allowed them to have the gifts and the plans that they do.
God allowed one time the King of Assyria to defeat Israel because they had turned away from God, and so he let the King of Assyria bring discipline to the Israelites by beating them in a war. But that king, the King of Assyria, became boastful and he became so proud. So God said this to the King of Assyria in Isaiah chapter 10, verses 12 and 13: "I will punish the King of Assyria for his prideful arrogance. He claims, 'I've done this all by myself. By my own strength, I've won these battles. By my own clever wisdom, I've captured many nations and I've made myself wealthy.'" God says, "No, you didn't." None of that would have happened if I hadn't allowed it.
This is the first and most common self-deception: thinking that everything I have, well, I earned it and I deserved it because it was all done by my effort. No, no, we forget God. And here's what James says about that. James 1:16 to 18: "Don't be deceived. Don't deceive yourselves, dear brothers and sisters. Every good gift you have is a perfect present from God above. It's come down from the father who created all of the heavenly lights." So this is the first deception: when I think that my success is caused by me. When I think that I made myself and I don't give God any credit for it, then I'm in real trouble because I'm deceiving myself.
Number two, God says I'm deceiving myself when I think hearing God's word means that I've obeyed it. Now, this is a real common one too. When I think that just hearing God's word, like you're listening to me right now, means that you have obeyed it, that you've done it, that you've applied it in your life. You know, we may attend a worship service or watch online, like we're doing right now, or even take notes on what we hear. But that doesn't mean we've actually applied it in our lives, that we have obeyed what God said to do and that we've actually done anything about it.
This is the second big self-deception in life. James talks about this in verse 22 of chapter one. He says this: "Do not merely listen to the word and so deceive yourselves." Did you hear that? He said, "You must do what it says to do." He says, if you're just listening to this message right now and you don't do anything about it, you have deceived yourself once again. It didn't really help you.
I want to show you this verse in some other translations. James 1:22 in the NCV version says, "When you only listen to God's word and you do nothing about it, you're just fooling yourself." Why is that? Well, a study done by the United States Air Force discovered that when you listen to something, if all you do is hear it and you don't write it down, you forget 90 to 95% of everything you hear within 72 hours. That's why I always provide an outline with all the verses written out and fill-ins for every message. 'Cause if you're just listening and not taking any notes, it means in just 72 hours you will have forgotten almost everything I've said.
You don't remember what I said last week or the week before that. It goes in one ear and out the other, as James 1:22 in The Message says: "Don't fool yourself letting the word go in one ear and out the other. Act on what you hear." So the first thing you've got to do is you've got to retain it. How do you retain it? Write it down. But even if you take notes, that doesn't guarantee you're going to apply the truth in your life. Jesus said this in John 13:17: "Now that you know these things, you will be blessed if you do them." Notice the blessing from the Bible doesn't come from knowing the Bible. The blessing comes from doing what the Bible says. That's a self-deception, thinking, "Well, I've heard all these sermons and Bible studies, so I'm a mature Christian." Not if you haven't done anything about them.
Number three, God says that I'm deceiving myself when I think I'm mature but I don't control my mouth. We did a whole session on this one, so I won't have to go into detail, but James 1:26 says this: "If you think you're religious, you think you're spiritual, you think you're mature, you think you're a disciple but you do not control your tongue, then your religion is worthless and you deceive yourself." Whoa. Your mouth reveals your maturity, okay? What you say is the acid test of your spirituality.
Just like when you go to a doctor and he asks you to stick out your tongue and he looks at your tongue to determine how healthy you are, God says your spiritual health is revealed by your tongue. James 1:26 in The Message says this: "Anyone who sets himself up as religious by talking a good game is self-deceived. This kind of religion is hot air and only hot air." So I can deceive myself by thinking that I did all the success myself, God didn't have anything to do with it. It's all a gift of God. I can deceive myself when I think I'm mature but my mouth is revealing that I'm really immature. My tongue is giving away my true level of spirituality.
More Areas Where We Fool Ourselves
Number four, God says I'm deceiving myself when I assume my viewpoint is what God thinks. God says, no, no, no, you've got this all wrong. When I assume that my viewpoint—what I think, my opinion, my political view, my spiritual view, my theological view, whatever—when I assume that my viewpoint is the same thing as God's viewpoint, that it's identical. You ever met anybody who thinks they're right all the time or almost all the time? Of course you have; it's you, it's me. You think your views are right most of the time, maybe secretly even all the time.
You've never said this, you've never admitted it, but we've all felt like Job at different times. Job 11:4: "You say to God, 'My beliefs are flawless. My beliefs are flawless and I can't be blamed for anything.'" Now that's bad enough when you're claiming that you've got it all figured out, that your political view or financial view is perfect. What's worse is when you start thinking that your opinions and viewpoints and perspective are identical to God's perspective and God's viewpoint. That's dangerous self-deception.
But you know what? I've actually noticed this a lot this year among Christians during the global infirmity of COVID-19, and the social instability and the racial inequality and the political incivility. I have talked to a number of Christians who act and think like God is a member of their political party and that God hates the other people in the other party as much as they do. Well, sorry, you're wrong, because I could show you dozens of Bible verses where God clearly points out that he's not a member of any political party.
In fact, Jesus said the exact opposite. He said, "My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were part of this world, then my servants would fight. They'd fight for it. But it's not of this world." Christians are members of a much more important party: the kingdom of God. So never confuse your politics with God's purposes in the world, and never confuse what you value with what God values the most. Let me show you this one verse, Isaiah 55:8-9: "The Lord says, 'My thoughts are completely different from yours.'" Does that shock you?
You think that because you're watching 24-hour news, you think this is important and this is important, God must certainly think this is important. God says, "My thoughts are completely different from yours." Now you either believe that or you don't. He says, "My thoughts are completely different than yours." He has a different perspective than you do. "And my ways are far beyond anything you could imagine, for just as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my views are higher than your views."
Now, based on that particular verse, let me ask you a very personal question. How long has it been since you changed your mind about anything? How long has it been since you changed your mind about anything because you got more truth—not fake news, but gotten more truth? You see, if you never changed your mind about anything major, it means you're not growing. You're not growing in your faith. You know, even somebody as brilliant as the apostle Paul had to change his views over time. In Acts 26:9, Paul says this: "I was once convinced that I had to do all that was possible to oppose the name of Jesus of Nazareth." Well, he obviously changed on that one.
God wants us to care about people no matter what their views, and to realize that those people who think their views represent God should realize, "My thoughts are different than their thoughts." Jeremiah 14:14-15 says this: "The Lord said, 'Some people claim to speak for me, but they're deceived and they're lying. I never even spoke to them, much less chose them to be my prophet. Their messages come from worthless dreams, useless predictions and their own imaginations.' He said, 'They're not a prophet. Therefore, I will punish these people for claiming to speak my will, even though I never sent them.'" All right, that's serious. Don't think your views are God's views.
Number five, God says I'm deceiving myself when I confuse keeping current with being wise. When I confuse keeping current with all of what's going on in the world with being wise—no, that's a big mistake. You know, being well-versed in all of the current news and gossip while being ignorant of the eternal truth of God's word is self-deceptive. Spending more time watching the news than reading and studying the good news—that's a problem.
Thinking that because I can quote the lyrics of the newest song or the most recent sports statistic or the stock market prices or the latest political news, that doesn't make you wise. You only get wisdom from God's book of wisdom. As I said a few weeks ago, you probably need to spend less time in Facebook and more getting your face in this book. First Corinthians 3:18, God says this: "Don't fool yourself... Don't think that you can be wise merely by being up to date with the times." Whoa. So if I've watched everything on my favorite news channel and I know everything that's going on, that doesn't make me wise? No, it doesn't.
So here's the problem: there's a lot of faulty information out there. There's a lot of fake news that you can't accept without fact-checking first. Jeremiah 7:8 says this: "You are trusting in deceptive words that are worthless." You need not more news in your life; you need more good news in your life. You need the gospel in your life.
The Final Self-Deceptions and the Solution
All right, sixth, God says I'm deceiving myself when I think I have the right to judge others. Oh boy, this one gets close to home for all of us. When I think that I have the right to judge you, when you think you have the right to judge anybody else, you are deceiving yourself. God says that over and over in Scripture. This one hits all of us because we all assume that we know other people's motives. You don't know other people's motives. You don't even know your own motivation most of the time. You can't figure out why you do what you do most of the time.
If you can't figure out what you do, what makes you think you have the right to judge other people and that you know why they do what they do? Over and over in this book, in Scripture, God says that judging others is a sin. James says it in chapter 4, verse 12: "God is the only law giver and judge, and he alone can save and destroy. So who do you think you are to judge somebody else?" It's self-deception. In other words, every time I judge somebody else, I'm deceiving myself. Every time you judge somebody else, God says you're deceiving yourself. I wish I had time to show you dozens of other verses, but I'll sum it up with Galatians 6:3: "If you think you're something when you're really nothing, you're only deceiving yourself." Bam. He says, don't judge others. When you do that, you're falling for self-deception.
Number seven, God says I'm deceiving myself when I think wrong friends won't influence me. Do you remember when you were a teenager and you were probably hanging out with somebody less than reputable? Your mom or your dad warned you, "You should stay away from that person 'cause they're bad news. They're going to bring you down." And how did you reply? "Mom, Dad, I'm not going to get into trouble. I won't let them influence me." But you know what that was? It was wishful thinking and it was self-deception. It's always easier for somebody to bring you down than for you to lift them up. Gravity is on their side. Moral gravity—it's easier to pull somebody down than for you to lift them up.
First Corinthians 15:33: "Don't fool yourself... Bad companions will ruin good character." Now, that verse doesn't just apply to teenagers. It applies to young adults and middle-aged adults and even senior adults. The wrong friends can bring you down at any stage in your life. If you don't believe that, then God says you're deceiving yourself. Self-deception.
Finally, let me just give you one more. I could have given you a long list of these. God says I'm deceiving myself when I think I can sin without consequences. When I think I can sin without consequences. You know, we think that if nobody knows about our sin then we're getting away with it. But God says that's a self-deception. We always, always, always reap whatever we sow. It's a universal law. Galatians 6:7 says, "Don't deceive yourselves. No one makes a fool of God. You will reap exactly what you've planted."
So, if I plant the seed of gossip, then people are going to gossip about me. If you cheat other people, you will be cheated by others. If you demean and dismiss and are arrogant to other people, other people are going to do that to you. You will reap what you sow. If you're unfaithful, if you betray other people, you're going to find yourself betrayed in some area of life. It's the law of the harvest: what you sow, you will reap. It's a universal law, and to think, "Well, I can get away with this, it won't happen to me"—there's a word for that: self-deception. It's also self-deception to pretend we're perfect. First John 1:8: "If we claim to be without sin... we deceive ourselves." There's that word again. You see how much the Bible has to say about self-deception? "We deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us."
Now, I just quickly ran through eight of many ways that we tell ourselves things that are not true. So then the question becomes: how do I find and change my natural tendency to lie to myself? To believe my feelings when they aren't always accurate? To believe my thoughts when they aren't always the truth? How can I see the real me? How can I change the real me? How can I work on my blind spots? Well, let me just close and give you three simple suggestions to get started.
How to Overcome Self-Deception
Number one, ask God for clarity. That's where you start. When I know that my heart is deceitful, that I often tell myself things that aren't true about me—okay, I'm playing tapes that were sent to me by my parents or my peers or partners or friends—ask God for clarity. In Job chapter 34, verse 32, Job says this to God: "Teach me what I cannot see, and if I've done wrong, I will not do so again." That's a good prayer. Pray the prayer of Job: "Lord, teach me what I can't see." We all have blind spots, and the fact that they're blind spots means I can't see them. So first, ask God for clarity. "Teach me what I cannot see. God, show me the blind spots in my life."
Number two, after you've asked God for clarity, ask my small group for help. Yeah, God puts other people in your life to help you; they see things in you that you can't see. They can see your blind spots, just like you can see theirs. Proverbs 12:15: "Fools think they need no advice, but the wise listen to others." If you think, "Oh, I can just work on this by myself. I don't really need anybody to talk to me about my blind spots," really? That in itself is a blind spot. That in itself is self-deception.
The best place to do that is in the safety of a small group. Just say to your small group, "You know, guys, I really want to work on my blind spots. Can you help me? I know you love me. I know you accept me, and I love you and accept you with your blind spots. But I don't want to keep these all my life. I don't want to live in self-deception. Help me to see where I'm deceiving myself." Okay? You could do that with your small group. Second Corinthians 13:5 says this: "Look closely at yourself and test yourself to see if you're living the faith." Well, how can you do that? You can do it in a small group. "Help me to look closely at myself, to test myself, to see if I'm living in the faith. Am I? Where am I fooling myself? Where am I kidding myself?"
So I ask God for clarity. I ask my small group for help. Number three, I ask Jesus to change me. We all know that Jesus said, "I am the truth," and he said, "the truth will set you free." So the closer you live to Jesus, the more your life will be filled with truth. Now, what does that mean? It means you're going to be less vulnerable to self-deception, and it means that you won't give into it as much because you're walking in the light of God's truth. The more you walk in the light of God, which helps you see yourself as you really are and helps you see others as they really are, the more we're going to move out of self-deception into reality.
You know, this is one of the real reasons Jesus came to earth. He came to save you by dying on the cross and paying for all your sins. But in John 9:39, Jesus said this: "I have come to give sight to the blind and to show those who think they see that they are really blind." So he's clearly not just talking about physical blindness here. He's saying, "I've come to earth to help you see your blind spots and to help you get your sight so that you can see yourself as you really are."
Next week, we're going to talk about authenticity in life. This is the foundation of it: to stop self-deceiving. What I would do is I would pray the prayer that David prayed in Psalm 19:12, and here's what he says: "None of us can see our own errors." Do you see that? "None of us can see our own errors." I can't see my blind spots. You can't see your blind spots. "So deliver me, Lord, from hidden faults." I want us to make that our application this week. I want us to pray, "Lord, deliver me from my hidden faults, from my blind spots, from my self-deceptions."
In fact, I'd like to end with a prayer of deliverance right now, just as David said, "Deliver me, God." I want to be free from these. I want to be able to see them. So I'd like to end with a prayer of deliverance. Will you pray with me? Let's bow our heads.
Dear God, this has not been an easy message, but it's an important one. Because as you said, when you know the truth, the truth will set you free. I want to be free, and I want everybody who's listening to this message to be free—to be free from the delusions and the deceptions, not just the ones that the world sends us, the fake news and the fake values, but the ones that we have inside ourselves. There are people who see themselves as incompetent, and it's not true. There are others who see themselves as unworthy, and it's not true. There are others who see themselves as unlovable, and it's not true. And there are others who see themselves as unforgivable, and it's not true. Lord, help us to realize that when we live our lives based on lies we tell ourselves, we're never going to be happy and healthy and holy. But when we face the truth and we live in the light and we see the real me, then you can change us. So help us today to take these steps.
I'm going to ask you to pray this prayer. Say:
God, first I'm asking you for clarity. Show me what I can't see. Just like Job prayed. I'm asking you to show me in my life the weaknesses, the faults, the blind spots in my life that I can't see. I'm asking you, like Job, for clarity. Show me what I can't see. And then, Lord, give me the courage to ask my small group to help me grow. I don't want to carry blind spots into the new year. I can't work on something unless I know it. I've got to name it before I can change it. So give me the courage to get some people in my life and to ask for advice, and to not just think I can figure this out on my own, 'cause I can't see my own blind spots, but I'm sure others can. And then, Jesus Christ, I'm asking you to change me, transform my life, make me like you. I want you to work on my weak spots. I want to be stronger. I want to be better. I want to be healthier. I want to be more like you, and I'm asking you, Jesus Christ, to do that. Help me to review these notes and these eight ways that I have often deceived myself, and help me to actually work on each one of them one at a time so that I would be living in the light and living in the truth. Jesus Christ, I give myself completely to you, and I ask you to change me and transform me. In your name, I pray. Amen.