I’ve been reading Respectable Sins by Jerry Bridges. In it, he wrote a chapter about the sin of pride in which he pointed out the particular sins of pride that evangelical Christians are most likely to commit. One was the sin of moral self-righteousness. It seems that in an election year, many believers in the US risk falling into this trap. Living overseas, it is easy to also fall into this sin as we observe various sins in the society and among the people where we live.
Jerry Bridges wrote, “I venture that of all the subtle sins we will address in this book, the pride of moral superiority may be the most common, second only to the sin of ungodliness. But though it is so prevalent among us, it is difficult to recognize because we all practice it to some degree. In fact, we seem to get a perverse enjoyment out of discussing how awful society around us is becoming. When we engage in this kind of thinking or conversation, we are guilty of the pride of moral superiority.”
We need to remember that only God’s grace separates us from society as a whole. We are not saved because of our own righteousness but because of Jesus’ righteousness. We should prophetically speak against sin in society, but only with humility that recognizes that we are made righteous by God’s action and not our own actions. We should engage in social action, but recognize that the true transformation of people and society only comes about as people are changed by God’s power in their lives. Therefore, the proclamation of the gospel and the making of disciples is the greatest act of social activism that we can do.
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