Self Esteem

Tentmaker measured by Tentmaker's definitions:
"The one person in the Bible with
the most self esteem (self-conceit) was the Devil.
See Isaiah 14. Others such as John
the Baptist, Paul, even Jesus Himself
according to popular humanistic thinking
had a problem of low self esteem (self-conceit).
This is the real root of this
heretical teaching-- "doctrines of devls".
Why, should a believer and truster
in the all-sufficeincy of Christ
have any confidence, pride, self worth,
self value, ad nauseum in sinful corrupt flesh?"

Tentmaker speaks of self-conceit, and is
correct. To bad that the rest of the crowd
is talking about self-respect.

BTW, Isaiah 14 doesn't speak of the lead devil
AKA "Satan", AKA "that old dragon", etc.

"according to popular humanistic thinking"
ah, i get it, there is an opinion that
"self-esteem" is a humanistic concept.
But the term, as shown in Tentmaker's quote
above, has been around since 1657, a bit
early for the humanistic movement.

 

Amen, Brother Johnv -- Preach it!
Of course, you speak of the self-worth kind
of self esteem.

BTW, Brother JohnV, did you know you are a
Prince! Yes, because you have accepted the
prepaid salvation aviailable through Jesus,
you are adopted into the Family of God
and are a join heir with Messiah Jesus.
One day Jesus will come back to Earth as
king of king and Lord of Lords. And you
are his joint heir. That makes you a prince!
"Prince JohnV" -- I like it!

 

Abiyah: "This is a serious issue for me--a
life-issue."

Yep. You speak of the self-respect type
of self-esteem, which you seem short on.
Let me share something with you:

Did you know Sister Abiyah that you are a
Princess? Yes, because you have accepted the
prepaid salvation aviailable through Jesus,
you are adopted into the Family of God
and are a join heir with Messiah Yeshua.
One day Yeshua will come back to Earth as
king of king and Lord of Lords. And you
are His joint heir. That makes you a princess!
"Princess Abiyah" -- I like it!

\o/ Praise Yeshua! \o/
\o/ Glory to the Lord! \o/

 

Huh? To first quote. Most sound, conservative Bible scholars know that Lucifer is the devil.
As to the second, I didn't mention the "humanistic movement". I'm referring to humanism, the kind that began in the garden of Eden, with Adam and Eve placing themselves above God's Word.

 

Pastor Larry: "I am convinced the problem is not
a lack of self-esteem--a low view
of oneself but rather too high
a view of oneself."

Does not compute?
Real people, even born-again Christian saints,
have a real problem with low self-esteem
(low self-worth).
As for self-esteem (self-conceit), it isn't
a problem, it is a desired goal for the
true Christian. And you have hit the self-conceit
issue on the head (several times).
The "low self-esteem (self-worth)" problem
is a problem with a misunderstanding
of basic Godly principles.
God felt each of us was worth enough that
He sent His only Begotten Son, Jesus,
to die for our sins. He must have though
we were worth something, to pay such a
terrible price.

I believe that "edify" means to
help teach people their true worth
in God's economy. I.E. these verses
are self-esteem verses.

Ro 14:19 (nKJV):
Therefore let us pursue the things which
make for peace and the things by which
one may edify another.


1Th 5:11 - (nKJV):
Therefore comfort each other and edify
one another, just as you also are doing.

Next post i'll show how we are required
to comfort those who suffer from
low self-esteem (self-worth)

 

As I have stated, this is a life-long issue for me.
It has effected my relationship with our God, my
school career, my work, my relationships with
my husbands, and my relationships with others.
Thus my being here, hoping someone would say
something that would trigger some deep
understanding in me that would stop the "I am
worthless. I am stupid. I will never succeed"
"tape" that plays over and over.

Common sense tells me that the "tape" is wrong,
but on it plays, and the tendency is to believe and
respond to the "tape" rather than to common
sense, because, in fact, the "tape" was started at
that tender age before common sense took over.

Some here would have me think that the "tape's"
message is more godly than the idea of self-
confidence. How so? The "tape" has done
nothing good; rather, it has been quite
damaging.

I will admit what started my concerns voiced here.
I got a 90% on a test, and I fell apart--simply gave
up. I responded to it in the same way as I did to
the C in biology, even though I knew the reason
for the C was that the professor, in his retirement
year, had deliberately pulled a rude and
unprofessional stunt on his classes and basically
told us, "Too bad! Deal wih it, because I don't
care. I won't have to deal with you after this year."

So common sense tells me that neither the C nor
the 90% are actually devastating, but the "tape,"
which takes over, tells me I am worthless, stupid,
and will never succeed.

I once had a beautiful 15-year-old child move in
with me. A neighbor, she was kicked out of her
home for being a believer--quite literally. My
children and I were in the camper, backing down
the driveway, on the way across the country, when
she pounded on our windows and told us she had
no place to live.

She lived with us over a year, and as her caregiver,
I saw the damage the devaluation of one's self-
esteem can do to another. The main things I
worked on with her were to build up her self-
confidence and to help her understand that she
was a wonderful, valuable person.

Her 'tape" told her what mine does, and it
certainly negatively effected both her school work
and her social life.

How can this be thought of as godly? To me, it
is a work of satan to keep people down, feeling
hopeless, without value.

 

As he has pointed out my husband says PTW, Pastor Larry, and others are talking about oranges and Abiyah, I and others are talking about apples.

PTW and Pastor Larry, No one has answered my question and I am very serious and would like an answer:

How do you counsel a person who is having trouble with self-respect or self-conceit?

It is a very real problem today.

Further, how do you encourage your children?

What do you say if they tell you "this is just the way I am, I can't do any better" when you know that they can?

OliveBranch, I am not endorsing today's belief that we can depend only on ourselves. As Christians, we know we depend on God.

Further, when one is bettering themselves to live a Christian life, I do not think that it is of the flesh.

I assume when some of you are referring to flesh that you are referring to sin because we do have to take care of our bodies, mind, and spirt.

Again, PTW and Pastor Larry, if you think this reasoning is so wrong, how do you counsel people who are dealing with self-respect and self-conceit?

 

Here you have demonstrated exactly what is wrong with everything that is being said here when you talk about the atonement and our self-esteem. Where does Scripture teach that God saved us because we were worth something? You say that God felt each of us was worth enough to send his Son, but Scripture does not say that. God tells us that our salvation is about him, not about us. This position you have put forth Ed, is so antibiblical, that I find it remarkable coming from you, from whom I have seen many good things. God did not save us because of who we are. The whole fact of salvation is indeed what undermines the concept of self-esteem as being promoted by the world. What are we worth if we cannot even help ourselves?? The reason God sent his son is because our self worth was non-existent. We could do nothing for ourselves. We could not even lift a hand to approach God. We were dead, opposed to God, helpless, useless, by nature children of wrath, etc. That does not present the image of our "worth to God." God saved us to glorify himself, not to validate our self-worth. I would present you the challenge I have given to everyone else here: Show us a place where Scripture tells us to deal with problems by incrasing our self-image. While you are at it, show us a place where Scripture says God saved us because of what we were worth.

As for my statement about having too high self esteem, my point is this: When someone gets down on themselves, it is because they think they deserve something better or they should be something better. Hence, their opinion of where they should be does not coincide with where they see themselves at. If their opinion of self corresponded to the biblical picture, we would see that our very existence is more than we deserve and our very existence, no matter how bad the situation, would bring praise to God that he does not treat us immediately as our sin deserves.

I think you have grossly overestimated the human character as presented in Scripture.

 

Why are you listening to "the tape"? That tendency you mention is called the sin nature and Paul tells us to put it off. When you follow PHil 4:8, it tells us how we should think. It sounds to me like you are not thinking biblical thoughts. These thoughts that you are repeating to us here do not fit any of the qualifications of Phil 4:8 so renew your mind and change them. So long as you think about yourself, my suspicion is that your thoughts will continue down this path. Which leads me back to my original solution: The answer to low self-esteem is stop thinking about yourself. Get your head up and out and look at God and others.

 

I tell them to stop thinking about themselves and obey the biblical command to think about God and others. Be transformed by the renewing of your mind (Rom 12:1-2); Put off, be renewed, and put on (Eph 4:22-24); Esteem others as Christ did (PHil 2:1-11). We address the root problem: wrongly directed thoughts.

I still place my challenge: Tell us where Scripture says to deal with a problem by increasing self-esteem.

Then I correct them. I would not allow them to continue with unbiblical thinking. "Just the way I am" is a capitulation to the sin nature that God has told us to deal with by changing our behavior.

Think biblically.

The question here is: Do you control what you think about? Are you able to be renewed in your mind?

Consider the psalmist who was driven often by fear and mistreatment. He was chased across the desert by a king; driven from his throne by his own son; His remedy is not "Help me feel better about myself." Notice the self-esteem problems in Ps 42-43. He was destroyed; his answer was "Hope in God." That is a key text that demolishes the idea of the pursuit of self-esteem as a solution to problems. The psalmist's solution is not "feel better about self." It is "think right thoughts about God."

You are right that self-esteem issues are an epidemic. But we must deal with the epidemic through means that give us hope. God is the one who gives us that hope. And our trust is to be in God, in obedience to his word in all areas.

 

1. I thought Pastor Larry did answer so perhaps you could give a hypothetical situation so we can answer that for you.

2. Such an attitude is unbiblical to start with. I would not accept a murderer saying that they had no choice because of the way they are. It is a sinful attitude to begin with and can be used for any sin. My son could say that he is lazy (he isn't, he is not even 2) because that is just how he was made. This is a cop-out and an excuse to continue in sin.

3. We know that God values humanity because it was worth the death of his Son to restore us to him. We know that he has commanded that we protect life. Humanity is in his image. Those things are clearly and explicitly in the Bible. That is how a person may think of himself in terms of self-respect/self-worth.

When a person rolls this over into self-esteem, you start thinking that you are the center of everything and the reason God did what he did. God sent his Son to die, because it pleased him to display his grace, mercy, and love. God did not send his Son because humanity has some intrensic goodness about it.

Now, I have offered two passages that have gone unanswered. They are extremely relevant to this discussion.

 

Once again I find myself too ignorant to understand what the big fuss is about on a thread. So what's new When I was called into Ministry I too felt that any thought of self esteem or acceptance of peoples good wishes was contradictory to the scriptures to the point that when someone would say "that song was excellent you have a great voice" I would almost get into an argument with them over the fact that I should not be getting any of the credit. My Pastor told me to kindly say "thank you" to their kind words. This still did not convince me until while singing at a revival the crowd was applauding and I said for them to applaud to God and not me. Later the evangelist noted my words and made a statement that set me strait. He said that of course God provided the voice but there was no harm in applauding the singer because anyone who saw a turtle sitting atop a fence post would know that he couldn't get up there by himself. What is my point, I am not certain except that I don't feel anyone here is ignorant enough to take away the glory from God and I also don't feel that any of us are too ignorant to understand that since God loves us we should surely love ourselves.

Murph

 

did you know you are a Prince! Yes, because you have accepted the prepaid salvation aviailable through Jesus, you are adopted into the Family of God and are a join heir with Messiah Jesus.

May the King always see me as fit to serve His Kingdom!!