Jesus answered them by saying, “My teaching is not My own, but His who sent Me. If anyone is willing to do His will, he will know whether the teaching is of God or whether I speak on My own accord and by My own authority. He who speaks on his own accord seeks glory and honor for himself. But He who seeks the glory and honor of the One who sent Him, He is true, and there is no unrighteousness or deception in Him.” -John 7:16-18

It is a humbling matter to link unrighteousness with deception. Those ‘nasty trickseys’ we play on ourselves: we surely can’t be perfect, but that doesn’t make us deceivers. But what if our unrighteousness was directly linked to deception? What if the only Way for us to not be deceitful is to be One with Righteousness. What if Jesus wasn’t lying when He said, “He who speaks on his own accord seeks glory and honor for himself.” But our ideas can be sooo good! We can ‘help’ so many people… we are so caring. Everyone can see that I don’t seek glory for myself… I am very slow in coming to learn – my ideas really aren’t that good. The web of self is thick and takes a Savior to free us from it… A Savior that can’t be taken into the web of deceit with us. This Savior stands apart and seeks only the Will of the One who sent Him… He is Righteous without deception. As we seek Righteousness, we let go of self… we can’t seek both. “But if your eye is bad [spiritually blind], your whole body will be full of darkness [devoid of God’s precepts]. So if the [very] light inside you [your inner self, your heart, your conscience] is darkness, how great and terrible is that darkness! No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon [money, possessions, fame, status, or whatever is valued more than the Lord].” -Matthew‬ ‭6:23-24‬ ‭AMP‬‬