I hear these words everywhere I go. Parents say their kids have low self-esteem. Women blame all their wrong decisions on it. Phycologist tells people to think highly of themselves, and parents tell their kids they are great, and they are better than others. In the world’s view, we are all “good” within. We need to stop putting ourselves down and start building ourselves up. We are told to “love ourselves.” The new phrase is “they don’t have enough self-love.” This message is even in the church. While there may be a tiny bit of truth in some of these ideas, the absolute truth of this thinking is a lie sold to us by Satan.
The real sin involved in promoting self-esteem and self-love the world’s way is pride. The Bible speaks much about the sin of pride. It was the sin that Satan committed when he was banished from Heaven. His fall was a direct result of his self-exaltation that stemmed from his pride. Pride keeps men from seeking God. Pride promotes being your own God and pushes the true God out of the way. Though no one will say they are their own God their actions show differently. Pride will bring destruction in the end.
Psalm 10:4 “The wicked, through the pride of his countenance, will not seek after God: God is not in all his thoughts.”
Proverbs 16:18 “Pride goeth before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall.”
Proverbs 29:23 “A man’s pride shall bring him low: but honor shall uphold the humble in spirit.”
We have made feeling good about ourselves our focus, which takes our eyes off Christ, and onto ourselves. Our worth is not based on what the world thinks about us. It is not bound up in how we feel about ourselves. It is based on how the one who created us feels about us. His opinion is the only one that really matters and the only one who has control of our destiny. However, our world teaches the opposite of this. We are told to love ourselves, but God says to deny ourselves in Luke 9:23 and follow Christ.
Luke 9:23-24 “And he said to them all, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me. For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: but whosoever will lose his life for my sake, the same shall save it.”
At the heart of all the self-esteem babble is self. We have become a society that worships ourselves and the pleasures we can find. We look for accolades from those around us and we feed off what others think about us. The Bible teaches us that none are good. That all our righteousness is as filthy rags in the sight of God. Many will refuse this thought pattern, but stay with me and follow it through. We think we are good because our standard is someone else, but comparing ourselves to others has no value. There will always be someone who has higher values and actions and there will be those who have lower values than us. God says our standard for ourselves is Jesus. He is perfect!
Psalm 14:3 “They are all gone aside, they are all together become filthy: there is none that doeth good, no, not one.”
Isaiah 64:6 “But we are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags, and we all do fade as a leaf; and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away.”
Mark 10:18 “And Jesus said unto him, Why callest thou me good? there is none good but one, that is, God.”
It may be hard to believe, but the solution to our problems of self-esteem is not in promoting self but in denying self. Looking to Jesus and becoming consumed with Him causes us to forget about ourselves and think about Him. It is through this process that he can truly work in our lives. We have placed our faith and our worth in His hands. In Christ only can we find real purpose and fulfillment. It is through Him that I can do all things.
Philippians 4:13 “I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me.”
In Philippians 3:3, Paul tells us to put no confidence in the flesh. When we depend on our own abilities to gain confidence we will always come up short. There is always someone who is thinner, prettier, more talented, smarter, and on and on than we are. However, when we place our confidence in who He is, and what He can do, our perspective changes. Our confidence grows because of the one we have placed it into.
Lasting confidence is never achieved by building ourselves up. It is a vicious cycle of highs and lows that never ends. As Christians, our lives are not to be based on our talent, intelligence, willpower, money, or whatever there is about us that we think is great. As we let Christ increase and we decrease we will slowly fade into the background. Lasting security will only come as we find our security in Him and who He is. When we are seeking Him, and failures come we will accept it as God pointing us in another direction that He has deemed best. Knowing Him and putting our confidence in Him is where we find real success.
