“One thing I must consistently remind myself, every morning in prayer, is that I am not ‘basically a good guy.’ Quite the contrary; I am radically a wicked fellow. I am, indeed, far worse than I ever imagined, but I know that God’s grace is more wonderful than I ever dreamed! The same must be true of you.
To acknowledge and live in the light of this truth is what keeps you and me from becoming Pharisees. The root problem of those self-righteous men, who spurned gospel and grace, was their belief that they were ‘basically good people’ unlike the ‘tax-gatherers and sinners’ Jesus hung around with, and seemed to like. Because these men could not face the truth about themselves they could not embrace the truth about Christ.”
Dr. Mike F. Ross
“The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?” Jeremiah 17:9