What Humility in the Bible Teaches Us About Self-Deception

Gardening has been challenging in 2025. I planted green bean seeds in rows around the middle of May. After they germinated and grew to about six inches tall, the local deer found them.

They chewed about ninety percent of them down to the ground. I picked the few remaining green beans around mid-July—just enough for one serving for two people. That was the harvest. I had hoped for twenty times as much.

My cute, four-legged pests with undisciplined appetites weren’t finished raiding the garden pantry. Their next target was the tomato plants.

They’ve eaten most of the leaves and sampled some of the green tomatoes. So far, they haven’t touched the cucumbers, bell peppers, broccoli, or zucchini—but they haven’t issued any guarantees of no further damage.

Judging by all the deer tracks in my garden, I assume it must be the newest dance hall for deer in the area! I imagine there’s a lot of "doe-si-doe" going on!

Do you know how many deer I’ve caught in the act of munching in my garden? None. Not one. They must work the night shift! I know the deer are the vegetable criminals because their tracks give them away.

It occurred to me that our sin is similar to the deer tracks I discovered in the garden. Others can see the evidence here, there, and everywhere in our lives—while it remains invisible to us.

Like bad breath or body odor, we offend everyone around us without realizing it. Like deer, we’re only doing what comes naturally, with no inkling that we’re hurting the “gardeners” of the world.

We can justify our behavior without even getting slightly winded. We are all in terrific self-justifying shape.

It’s as much a reflex as jerking our hand away from a hot pan. We consider what we say, do, and think to be right by definition. We are the plumb line and the measuring standard against which we compare all others.

Like a deer saying, “Hey, I browse on green stuff, Mr. Gardener—that’s what I do. Get over it. If I hear you complaining, the zucchini gets it next. And just so you know, my hearing is exceptional!”

We see this self-excusing in Scripture in a man who is just like us: “The man wanted to justify his actions, so he asked Jesus, ‘And who is my neighbor?’” (Luke 10:29 NLT).

If we deny that we justify ourselves, we are almost surely demonstrating what we deny! Too often, we spit into the hurricane winds of biblical truth. We deceive ourselves so easily. “As the Scriptures say, ‘No one is righteous—not even one’” (Romans 3:10 NLT). Yet we tend to behave proudly as if we are the only exception.

Humility is the bridge to reality. It is seeing ourselves truly. It opens the spigot of God’s undeserved favor, turning the desert of our self-deception into an oasis that blesses us and others. “And he gives grace generously. As the Scriptures say, ‘God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble’” (James 4:6 NLT). See additional free spiritual growth resources for Christians. #discipleshipresources #evangelismresources #christianleadershipresources

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