Older son vs. Younger son

I think that I swing back and forth between the older and younger son mindsets. A lot of the time I find myself thinking that my good works have given me the 'right' to have a good life. I know this because when something bad happens I have a tendency to complain and ask God why that bad thing happened. On the other hand, when I am having difficulty in a particular area of sin then I kind of expect something bad to happen.

All of this has helped me to see how dangerous the sin of deception is. All other sin is at least evident to our senses... we know that we have sinned and that we are in the wrong. But when we allow ourselves to be deceived we don't know that we are being deceived!

So no matter what mindset I find myself in, I need to pray and ask God to shred the deception that may be clouding my mind. The truth is that neither mindset is biblical, but deception can sometimes make me think that the older brother mindset is somehow more moral and pure. It isn't. It is just as sickening in God's sight as a complete abrogation of the faith.