"Self-Righteousness is Prejudice"

“Interestingly, all the words, “prejudice,” “arrogance,” and “self-righteousness” are directly related to the issue of justification. In the Bible those who were self-righteous sought to justify themselves (Luke 10:29; 16:15), while those who trusted in Christ believed they were justified by Christ and did not need to fight for themselves. To be self-righteous is to believed that one possesses personal goodness or righteousness that God will accept. Prejudice grows out of building one’s own right-ness through group pride. To be prejudice means to pre-judge another under the assumption that the “judge” has the proper right-ness. Arrogance means to claim what is unwarranted. It is unwarranted for us to claim a righteousness which encourages us to vilify others. Since all have sinned and come short of the glory of God, we are all in the same boat (Romans 3:23). None has sufficient personal or group righteousness to disdain others (Romans 3:9-12). We can only stand in the righteousness of Jesus (Romans 4:2,3).”

Bernie Gillespie, “Can We Be Saved By Our Right-ness?” March 12, 2004, pp. 8.