July 30

Jul 30 - Today from Proverbs 30 we look at verse 12
"(There are) those who are pure in their own eyes and yet are not cleansed of their filth."

Religious folks get to a place where they are confident that by merit of their own goodness they are pleasing in God's sight. "Lord preserve each of us from self-righteousness." The only way we are ever pleasing to God is in Christ Jesus. The only way we can abide in Christ is to die to self. It is one of the paradoxes of Christianity - the very element of our being which strives to be righteous in order to please God is the same element which He calls us to crucify daily - self.
It seems that the most difficult people to reach with the gospel of the kingdom in Jesus' day were those who were pure in their own eyes - the self-righteous. It is not much different today. In Matthew 18 the disciples wanted to know who was the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. You can bet that their inquiry was rooted in the idea of self-righteousness. Their entire culture was permeated with the theology. I can well imagine that Jesus' response was the last thing they expected. He called a little child and had him stand among them. "Unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven." (vs. 3, 4). Metaphoric theology. Jesus was a master of it. The child was a little child. Little children are not concerned about social position. Little children have not yet been cultured into self-importance. They live trustingly from day to day that they will be fed, sheltered and clothed - and that is enough. In a whole crowd of little children, it would never have entered the mind of even one of them to ask who would be the greatest in the kingdom of God. A child's curiosity is preoccupied with the wonders of creation and the greatness of the God who must have created it all. His mind does not focus on how great he might be in the sight of that God. Being a father and now a grandfather, there is something pure about seeing vicariously through the eyes of a little child.
It seems that in Jesus' day the self-righteous were often the most oppressive people in the community of believers. It is not much different today. I have been involved in church leadership for over twenty years now, and invariably when there are troublesome and divisive issues and activities underfoot you will see a handful of self-righteous people at the root of the problem. They are stubbornly unteachable because they are already right in their own eyes. They seldom, if ever, think of the witness they are conveying to the innocent of the flock or to the already skeptical public. They are only focused on having things their way because it is the right way. How the body has suffered at the hands of the self-righteous!
It seems that in Jesus' day the self-righteous were the most useless in carrying out God's purposes. It is not much different today. These type of people are most interested in being with people like themselves, or in seeing people become like themselves. They have little regard for 'soiling their hands' in dealing with the socially immoral. The self-righteous condemned Jesus for this very thing. Jesus intermingled with, ministered to, and ate with the 'sinners and tax-collectors'. That which the self-righteous considered shameful acts, Jesus considered honorable.
In Luke 18 Jesus tells a parable of a Pharisee and a tax collector in the temple praying. The Pharisee confidently presented himself to God because he tediously kept the whole of the law. The tax collector came under conviction and cried out for mercy. Only one of them went home justified that day. It was the one who became as a small child and wondered about the awesomeness of the God of creation. The other was focused on the awesomeness of self, which is infinitely small in the scope of the things of God.
Our righteousness comes only through the shed blood of Jesus. "Lord preserve each of us from self-righteousness."