The Sinful Flatter Themselves and Don’t Hate Sin
Our world needs to recover the fear of the Lord, and as we go on through Psalm 36, we’ll see some other things the sinful world needs to be redeemed from. David is giving a message about the sinfulness of the wicked, and he says in verse 2: “In their own eyes they flatter themselves too much to detect or hate their sin.”
Flattery and Sin
If ever a verse described the modern Western world, this is probably the one! We are surrounded by a culture that says “flatter yourself, and don’t worry about sin.” This is such a godless way of living, and it’s a little bizarre to find that a culture which was built on Christian values has now gone in the very direction that David warns of here.
You see, the Christian way is not to flatter yourself, but to humble yourself before God. It is the godless who think much of themselves, but the godly are those who see themselves as needy before God. Not that the godly hate themselves. And I want to be clear about this – David is not saying you should hate yourself – in fact he warns against flattering yourself too much, which suggests that there is a healthy level of self-acceptance which God smiles on. It’s when it becomes too much – when it’s turned into pride and self-exaltation, that you have lost your way.
Recognizing Our Sin
Because inevitably, when you think too highly of yourself, you minimize your sin. The question is: am I flattering myself so much that I am not acknowledging and hating sin in my life? I don’t want to be so egotistical that I consider my own feelings and desires to be more authoritative than God’s Word. I don’t want to be so self-obsessed that I reject the Bible’s teachings on sin so I can do what I want to do. I want to be humble and godly enough to honestly see the things within me that are sinful, and to hate them and drive them out of my life by God’s grace.
Jesus said that if your right eye causes you to sin you should gauge it out and cast it from you. This was clearly hyperbole, but the principle of violently driving sin out of your life because you so hate it, that principle stands.
Pursuing Holiness
Friends, let’s not hate ourselves because of our sin. God is gracious and forgiving towards those who are in relationship with Him. But oh let’s not fall into the trap of downplaying our sin, thinking too much of our own desires and tendencies.
Let’s identify the sin within, and be rid of it, prayerfully asking for God’s help as we resist and flee from the temptations that might affect us.
We’re called to holiness through His grace, and so unlike the wicked people in David’s day, let’s quit flattering ourselves and downplaying the very sin that Jesus came to free us from.
