Discovering Delusions

Years ago I worked for a company that had a softball team I played on.  After a big win, we had dinner afterward and reflected on the twists and turns of the game.  One infielder voiced the opinion his defence had been particularly stellar, and as he did so we all looked at one another with amazement:  was this guy serious?  Indeed, his defence had been such a liability it was a factor why the game was close at all!  It turned out he seriously thought his play should have been highlighted on ESPN SportsCenter--so great were his delusions.  He overlooked all the errors he made on the field (as if they had not happened) and viewed his routine plays as requiring the utmost athleticism and skill.

While some people may be overly critical of themselves for making errors, my teammate illustrated how self-delusion can blind us from seeing ourselves in truth.  Had my teammate kept his thoughts to himself, he would have remained comfortable in his very positive self-assessement.  But when he voiced his high views of his play openly, people carefully, gently called him to account.  People had gone out of their way not to bring up the litany of errors he committed during the game, but the discussion brought to light he did not comprehend all those times the ball rolled right between his legs into the outfield were errors!  While reading Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, there were sound points made concerning our propensity to be self-deluded and how speaking to others honestly about our faults is an important and necessary step to overcome them.  Here is an exerpt from the Step 5 chapter which Christians ought to consider in relation to our need for genuine fellowship that includes confessing faults one to another:

"Hence it was most evident that a solitary self-appraisal, and the admission of our defects based upon that alone, wouldn't be nearly enough.  We'd have to have outside help if we were surely to know and admit the truth about ourselves--the help of God and another human being.  Only by discussing ourselves, holding back nothing, only by being willing to take advice and accept direction could we set foot on the road to straight thinking, solid honesty, and genuine humility.

Yet many of us still hung back.  We said, "Why can't 'God as we understand Him' tell us where we are astray?  If the Creator gave us our lives in the first place, then He must know in every detail where we have since gone wrong.  Why don't we make our admissions to Him directly?  Why do we need to bring anyone else into this?"

At this stage, the difficulties of trying to deal rightly with God by ourselves are twofold.  Though we may at first be startled to realize that God knows all about us, we are apt to get used to that quite quickly.  Somehow, being alone with God doesn't seem as embarassing as facing up to another person.  Until we actually sit down and talk aloud about what we have so long hidden, our willingness to clean house is stall largely theoretical.  When we are honest with another person, it confirms that we have been honest with ourselves and God.

The second difficulty is this:  what comes to us alone may be garbled by our own rationalization and wishful thinking.  The benefit of talking to another person is that we can get his direct comment and counsel on our situation, and there can be no doubt in our minds what that advice is.  Going it alone in spiritual matters is dangerous.  How many times have we heard well-intentioned people claim the guidance of God when it was all too plain that they were sorely mistaken.  Lacking both practice and humility, they had deluded themselves and were able to justify the most arrant nonsense on the ground that this was what God had told them." (Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions. Alcoholics Anonymous World Services, 1981. pages 59-60)

How valuable is God's word and fellow brothers and sisters in Christ who know Him and follow Him!  Many times simply saying something out loud that sounded sensible in my mind showed me how foolish and thoughtless I had been.  When we are in fellowship with followers of Jesus who love God, are led by the Holy Spirit to rightly divide God's word, and are honest concerning themselves and their struggles, it is a blessing to better understand of God and even the ugly truth about ourselves so we might humble ourselves, confess our sin and grow in grace.  Those who admit their blindness can have their eyes opened by Jesus, yet those who proudly imagine they know it all and can do no wrong will remain in sin.