Sin as Self-Deceit

Overview

What’s wrong with us, the human race? The answer of the Bible is all of our sociological and psychological problems are theological problems, and the only answer that possibly gets underneath all of these other semi-answers is the real problem of sin.

We now look at what I’m going to call our capacity for self-deception. What is the capacity for self-deception? It’s the almost infinite ability of the human heart to hide the truth from itself when that truth is too unpleasant or uncomfortable. Self-deception is not the worst thing we do, but it’s the reason we can do the worst things.

There’s no better example of the tragedy of self-deception and the dynamics of it than this tragic story of Saul, the first king of Israel. This text tells us about the fact of self-deception, the structure of self-deception, and a prescription for the healing of it.