Quotes about Self-deception

Even Christians taking in the teaching of the Bible can be deceived about our own sins. We somehow feel that consent to the teaching of scripture is equivalent to obedience.

The indissoluble link between prideful self-love, aversion to truth, self-deception and hypocrisy is one of the great themes of the Bible—for example, the drumbeat repetition that "the way of a fool is right in his own eyes" (Prov 12:15). Sinful minds therefore claim both self-rightness in terms of truth and self-righteousness in terms of goodness.

We keep on deceiving ourselves in regard to our faults, until we at last come to look upon them as virtues.

Men who cannot deceive others are very often successful at deceiving themselves.

It is one thing to insist on walking south when the compass is pointing north. But to "fix" the compass so that it tells you that the wrong way is the right way is far, far worse. You can correct a mistake. But once you tell yourself it wasn't a mistake there's no way back.

Deceit finds its way into every religion, including Christianity. In fact, deceit was at work from the very beginning. Two sorts of deceit are found in our verses: some leaders deceive the people of God (7:15—20), while some deceive themselves (7:21—23).

The scary deception of sin is that, at the point of sinning, sin doesn't look all that sinful.

Now I was, as they said, become godly; now I was become a right honest man.  But oh! when I understood these were their words and opinions of me, it pleased me mighty well.  For, though as yet I was nothing but a poor painted hypocrite, yet, I loved to be talked of as one that was truly godly. 

One of the most dangerous delusions for each of us is the delusion of our own sovereignty. And one of our most dangerous idols is the idol of control.

The idea of sin being able to deceive us, suppressing truth so that we believe a lie, should send shivers down our spines. It is one thing to deceive other people. That is scary enough. It is even more frightening when we realize that each lie we tell leaves us more self-deceived. All practiced sin teaches us to believe lies. WE don't often consider the boomerang effect of our deception. In the end it will get us.

Almost every man wastes part of his life in attempts to display qualities which he does not possess, and to gain applause which he cannot keep.

It's not right to spend money you don't have to perpetuate a lie about who you are.