Why It's Hard To Stop Doing Wrong

In review of 1 John 1:8 it says, “If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.”

Bottom Line:

You are only deceiving yourself if you think you are without sin.

What this means to me:

If I think that I’m without sin, or can’t think of any, I’m only deceiving myself, and refusing to accept the truth.

It seems sin always involves some form of self-deception. The moment I’m sinning, I’m deceiving myself because I think that what I’m doing will actually produce better results than what God has already told me to do.

So In order to stop defeating myself, I must stop deceiving myself. I’ll need to take an honest look at my life, face the truth, and deal with any issues. Is there something in my life I’m pretending isn’t a problem? I’m not going to get healing until I first acknowledge the root of a problem.

I won’t have to hit rock bottom. There will usually be wake-up calls going on all around, I just need to tune in to them.

I think the biggest problem many folks have is waiting too long before they ask for help. By the time they ask, its difficult or almost impossible to turn it around.

Today’s verse says, “If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us” (1 John 1:8 NIV).

Today, I need to consider what are the hard questions I need to be asking about the sin in my life? Are their warning signs I’ve been ignoring? If I am to obtain healing, I’ll need to acknowledge the root of the problem and face the truth about it.

In summary sin can be self-deceiving, when I’m in it I may not be recognizing the truth and only deceiving myself. God it seems when my selfish desires take over and I convince or deceive myself into thinking I’m ok, or what I want to do is better than what God wants for me. I’m not really recognizing the truth. Thank you for the reminder this morning that I need to not rationalize or deceive myself. I need to consider my repeated sins and look to determine the root cause. I need to eliminate pride and reach out for help early so that I can deal with it before it becomes really destructive to myself or others.