10.2 Self-Rightness
© 2019 Christ Revealed Bible Institute
Before continuing further, we re-insert this fact about Christian, that he knows and loves the Jesus of his heart. Again, we are looking at two very different centers of identity. Christian knows and lives out from the grace of Christ centered in his heart, but he lives under what he imagines “must be true” going on in a continues swirl inside his brain.
Here is how Paul describes this very dilemma. – For death is the thought of the flesh, but life and peace are the thought of the Spirit (Romans 8:6). The thought of the flesh is the identity of “self” separated from God and living under the confusion of the serpent’s Christianity. The thought of the Spirit is utter rest in Christ our only life.
The “False” Self. God is made visible through our relationship together as believers in Jesus, that is, loving one another – God among us. The false self is also made visible through our relationship together as believers in Jesus. And when we say “false” self, we are not speaking of some entity that “must die.” We refer only to meaningless thoughts that must be replaced by speaking Christ.
And do not share the same outward pattern of expression with this age but be transformed by the renewing of the mind, into proving out God’s desires, that which is good, well-pleasing, and complete (Romans 12:2). God must change the way we think.
Fake Rightness. So, what is this “outward pattern of expression” that arises from the ideas of the serpent bouncing around in Christian’s brain? – Indeed, being ignorant of God’s just rightness, and seeking to establish and make a stand upon their own fake rightness, they have not placed themselves under the just rightness of God (Romans 10:3).
“Seeking to establish and make a stand upon their own fake rightness.” Or – self-righteousness, or more common to human expression “I am right,” that is, self-rightness. This outward pattern of expression, then, takes on two forms in human relationships – pretending to others on the one hand and manipulating others on the other hand.
Pretense and Manipulation. Everyone thinks that “original sin,” that is, our “genetic inheritance” from Adam, is that we “sin” as defined by our disobedience to commandments. Adam’s sin was hating the way God made him as what God looks like, that is, unthankfulness. Yet Adam used that very unthankfulness to accuse God and thereby to drive God far away from him. And the outward actions of Adam as a result of his inner rejection of God were pretense and manipulation.
No matter how born of God and filled with the Holy Spirit Christian might be, he still shares Adam’s dislike of God, and thus Christian wears the masks and reaches out his hand to control others in the same way Adam did.
Wearing Masks. Just as Adam covered over his shame of looking like God with fig leaves, so Christian wears all the masks that say, “I am living the good Christian life,” in order to cover his own shame of being weak just like Jesus. And just as Adam hid behind the tree trunks in the garden in order to keep God at arm’s length, so Christian identifies with, that is, spins his own story of self out from the larger groups he calls his own inside his world, whether those “tree trunks” are countries or church groups or country clubs.
Wearing masks is what humans do best.
But what we are after is the thought processes going on in Christian’s mind behind his wearing of masks.
Defining Pretense.
Pretense (Webster’s 1926): 1. Act of laying claim; the claim made; pretension. 2. Act of holding out or offering to others something false or feigned; presentation of what is deceptive or hypocritical; deception by showing what is unreal and concealing what is real; false show; simulation. 3. That which is pretended; false, deceptive or hypocritical, show.
Pretend (Webster’s 1926): 2. To hold before or put forward as a cloak, veil, or disguise for something else. 3. To hold out or represent, especially falsely; to put forward and offer as true or real (especially something untrue and unreal); to assert or allege, usually falsely. 4. To put forward, assert, or allege as a ground, reason, pretext, or excuse. 5. To lay a claim to; to allege a title to; to claim.
“Stretching Forth” an Image. – “THIS IS ME!” – No, it really is not.
You see, humans really are created as the image of Someone else, and Christian really is, as he is, the image and likeness of God. The entire enterprise of the false human psyche, then, is to “stretch forth” an image for others to see that is far better than God, an image of the super-Christ.
The term “righteousness” refers to how we treat other people; whereas the term “holiness” refers to our devotion to God. Because “self-righteousness” includes both directions, towards other people and towards God (that is, it is a social concept), we must bring in the terms “manipulate” and “control” before we can look at the actual thoughts in Christian’s imagination.
Defining Manipulate and Control.
Manipulate (Webster’s 1926): 1. To treat, work, or operate with the hands, or by mechanical means; to handle or manage, especially with skill or dexterity. 2. To treat or manage with the mind or intellect, especially to handle (matters requiring intelligence) skillfully. 3. To control the actions of, by management; also, to manage or treat artfully or fraudulently.
Control (Webster’s 1926): Verb – 1. Originally to check by a duplicate register or account; now, to check or regulate. 2. To check, test, or verify by counter or parallel evidence or experiments; to verify by comparison or research. 3. To censure or call to account. 4. To exercise restraining or directing influence over; to dominate; regulate; hence, to hold from action; to curb; subject; overpower.
A Vicious Circle. You can see that these can be good terms when they are used for inanimate objects, even including manipulating the flow of work on a job site. But when these practices are directed towards other people, we are talking about something very common and very sick.
Consider definition #1 under “control” – To check by a duplicate account. The “duplicate account” in Christian’s mind is his own intellectual image of the super-Christ. Thus, Christian thinks thoughts of control against others by judging them by his own account of what God “ought to” look like.
Yet what we are looking at in Christian’s mind is really a self-eating and vicious circle of endless thoughts, as pictured by a fiery serpent in a circle, eating itself.
“God Is NOT My Source.” Let’s trace out this mental horror, undergirded by Christian’s fundamental theological “belief” that his mental definitions of God, of man, of Christ, and of salvation are all “correct.”
Serpent Rule # 2: God and man exist by different substances and are mirror opposites of each other. (You are NOT like God, but you can be if you change what you are.)
Now, the root of all human rebellion, as we have seen, is unthankfulness – “God, I hate looking like You.” But the immediate fruit of this unthankfulness is, necessarily, contempt for others. Contempt, then, coming out of unthankfulness, is the reason why Adam threw everything away as he reached for control over Eve.
A “Super” Christ. All mask wearing and all manipulation of others is the result of a deep underlying contempt for God. Standing in, then, as “what God ought to look like,” is Christian’s mental image of a “super-Christ.”
Serpent Rule # 1: Christ is superior and separate (not really human at all).
But Christian wants other people to think highly of him as one who is a “good Christian – like ‘Christ.’” It is this rule inside his made-up mental definitions that inspires Christian to “put on a good show” – “keeping up appearances.” Nonetheless, Christian sees right through the show being put on by other Christians and holds them, and Christ as them, in contempt.
The Lie of Fixing Ourselves. You see, the only thing Christian knows is himself, and because he despises himself, he judges all these “others” out there only by his contempt for himself. He sees through their masks, without ever realizing that everyone else is busy seeing through his mask and holding him in the same contempt they feel for themselves. The “super-Christ” image, then, is matched by the third anchor of twisted thinking.
Serpent Rule # 3: Salvation is human correction and betterment.
Because Christian is convinced that he is his own source, his own “god,” always making himself “sinful,” he works and works on the image he presents to other people.
The Sickness of Fixing Others. Now, this is really messed up. Christian imagines that his own self-righteous show impresses God and others. He has convinced himself that he has made himself “better.”
Because Christian is convinced that his show of pretense (self-rightness) is successful, especially towards God, that is, because he is sufficient in himself, his strongest mask towards others is the hard forehead of domination. “Since you clearly do NOT look like ‘Christ,’ and since I am clearly ‘better,’ God has gifted and anointed me to fix you.”
Mask wearing, pretending that one looks like ‘Christ really should look like,’ is always accompanied by religious manipulation and control of other Christians based on contempt.
Be Silent and Incapable. Now, you would naturally think – “Surely, surely, someone who loves the Jesus of his or her heart would see clearly how false and shameful all these thoughts really are.” But if you attempt to counter the theological roots underlying this unending circle of cursed thoughts, you will provoke in Christian a total defense of his “faith in God,” and he will throw you out.
In the end, there is only one answer for Christian in the hardness of his mind against God. First, Christian must learn to give thanks in and for all things. Then, Christian must SEE and must KNOW how badly he fails to measure up, how flawed his show of rightness really is, and how sick his manipulation of others appears to everyone not subject to his fake religious superiority.
So Simple and So Good. Christian must KNOW that he is INCAPABLE of ever pleasing God, BECAUSE that is how God made him, just exactly like Jesus. And then he must know that the Jesus of his heart is the only Jesus he ever needs to know.
Christ lives in my heart through faith.
Every verse in the Bible, if it is found inside of that one line, is the tree of life. Every verse in the Bible, if it is found outside of that one line, is the tree of death. Even the largest statement in the universe – filled with all the fullness of God, is smaller than, and fits entirely inside of – Jesus lives inside of my heart through “Let it be to me.”
The gospel is so simple and so good.