Over the years, I have been the love-to-hate antagonist on social media. I have deliberately posted taboo topics which, as it does, reveal people’s internalised self-righteousness. From homosexuality versus God’s Holy Bible, abortion, slavery not being ethnic exclusive, and external expression not being a remedy for internal dysphoria. It has been an absolute blast. I have learned a lot. More importantly, I have had to do some serious deep-diving into my latent self-righteousness too. After all, we must walk our talk, right?
I UNDENIABLY love God’s Holy Word. God is decisive in His strict but loving approach to saving us. The purpose of His Agenda is not necessarily, personal comfort immediately; instead, God is busy with the rescue plan to save us from an eternity of unmentionable and horrendous sorrow. As uncomfortable as it is, God has predestined a Judgement Day from which none escape. This scratches our ego, and we grapple with self-righteousness and indignation, proving God correct. This makes me love God and His Word, forcing me to examine the need below my ‘acting out’ humanism.
WHY DO WE BECOME SELF-RIGHTEOUS?
‘PsychCentral’ tells us, “In a new study, researchers from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business asked whether the extensive research on this type of self-righteousness overlooks an important ambiguity: When people say they are more moral than others, do they mean they are more saint-like than others or less of a sinner? In other words, do people believe they are “holier” than others or “less evil?”
To find out, researchers Drs. Nicholas Epley and Nadav Klein conducted four experiments to investigate how people judge themselves compared to other people in a variety of contexts.
All of the experiments show that self-righteousness is “asymmetric,” meaning that people tend to believe they are less evil than others but no more moral than them.
Specifically, participants were less likely to make negative character inferences from their own unethical behaviour than from others’ unethical behaviour. They also believed they would feel worse after an unethical action than others would and believed they were less capable of extreme unethical behaviour compared to others. One of the causes of asymmetric self-righteousness is that “people evaluate themselves by adopting an ‘inside perspective’ focused heavily on evaluations of mental states such as intentions and motives, but evaluate others based on an ‘outside perspective’ that focuses on observed behaviour for which intentions and motives are then inferred,” said the researchers.’- https://psychcentral.com/news/2017/07/15/whats-behind-a-self-righteous-attitude#2
TH Jacobs, Jr, Executive Protection, Security and Investigative Specialist, reflects on self-righteousness as, “If self-righteous indignation isn’t real and it makes us frustrated and angry, why do so many of us do it? Because it feels good. It feels “right”. We feel superior to that idiot over there doing things “wrong”. We feel better than that loser over there being “unfair”.
“Criticism is another form of self-boasting.” Emmet Fox
By pointing out someone else’s errors, we are attempting to position ourselves as better than them.”- https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/outrageous-psychology-self-righteous-indignation-t-h-jacobs-jr/
English novelist and poet Charlotte Bronte offers a scathing critique on self-righteousness, reminding us that Jesus is God’s Standard to which we are measured. In light of such perfection, we need to humble our self-view.
Leon F Seltzer, PHD, defines self-righteousness in ‘Psychology Today’as, “Jesus was 100% righteous and, too, 100% right. And since we’re all sinners, when we deign to see ourselves as righteous, we’re actually being self-righteous. The irony of self-righteousness is that it trust[s] in itself, its feelings, its emotions, its desires, its logic, and its understanding. So it never sees the error in its own ways. People labeled as self-righteous are negatively identified as characteristically vainglorious and self-deceiving; gratuitously feeling superior; and being arrogant, elitist, and self-aggrandizing (sometimes falling headlong into the pitiable pit of narcissism).
Beyond that, the self-righteous are also regarded as hypocritical in that they employ a double standard when it comes to “right” behavior.”- https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/evolution-the-self/202101/righteous-vs-self-righteous
WHERE AM I GOING WITH THIS?
God’s Holy Word incredibly shows this principle of being humble before God and God exalting one as He deems valid for his Salvation Plan, which benefits us both presently and in the next when Jesus Returns. Numbers 12 vs 3-8 and Deuteronomy 34 vs 10-11 are juxtapositions of the same person- Moses. Exodus 4 vs 1/10/13 regale the story of a cowardly Moses.
Moses answered, “What if they do not believe me or listen to me and say, ‘The Lord did not appear to you’?”
Moses said to the Lord, “Pardon your servant, Lord. I have never been eloquent, neither in the past nor since you have spoken to your servant. I am slow of speech and tongue.”
But Moses said, “Pardon your servant, Lord. Please send someone else.”
In Exodus 4 we see Moses the coward. In Numbers 12 we see humility. But, Deuteronomy 34 Moses has died and the God-exalted status of Moses has changed to radical leader.
SO HOW DO WE HUMBLE OURSELVES BEFORE GOD SO THAT GOD CAN EXALT US?
James 4 offers some keen insights.
James 4 vs 1-10:
‘What causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? Is it not this, that your passions are at war within you? You desire and do not have, so you murder. You covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel. You do not have, because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your passions. You adulterous people! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. Or do you suppose it is to no purpose that the Scripture says, “He yearns jealously over the spirit that he has made to dwell in us”? But he gives more grace. Therefore it says, “God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.” Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Be wretched and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will exalt you.’
One of the best methodologies I have found to help us put James 4 vs 1-10 into easy but practical steps that guide us to get a grip, graciously, by stepping out of denialism and facing the truth of ourselves is the 12 Steps of Recovery.
#Hayibo 