Wednesday, April 20, 2011

The Self-Esteem Nightmare

What is self-esteem?  The word explains the definition, we are to esteem ourselves.  Does this sound biblical?  Far from it.  The opposite is actually true.  We should see our utter helplessness and depravity which drives us to utterly depend on God alone and esteem Him for His goodness and not ourselves.  The self-esteem movement has become rampant in this age.  Here is an example from Joel Osteen's book, "Your Best Life Now":

He writes, “Every moment that we go around with that weak worm-of-the-dust mentality, we’re eating more cheese and crackers….It’s time to step up to God’s dining table. God has prepared a fabulous banquet for you, complete with every good thing imaginable. And it has already been paid for. God has everything you need there—joy, forgiveness, restoration, peace, healing” (84-85).

Just doing an Internet search on "Christian self-esteem" I found countless resources on how to improve your self-esteem.  Here is just one:

There is nothing negative about God. So doing what you can to eliminate the negative stuff in your life will go a long ways toward improving your Christian self esteem.  God has a specific plan for your life, but in order to start moving in the right direction, it's necessary to start focusing on positive things that will make you feel better about yourself.  Building Christian self esteem isn't as simple as just going to a website, reading the material, and presto....you instantly feel better about yourself and everything in your life. Unfortunately, it's a lot more complicated than that.

The reason it is complicated is because "Christian" self-esteem is unbiblical and demonic.  See the problem here?  Now compare this non-sense with a prayer of a Puritan:

Lord Jesus,
I sin --
Grant that I may never cease grieving because of it, never think I can reach a point of perfection.  Kill my envy, command my tongue, trample down self.  Give me grace to be holy, kind, gentle, pure, peaceable, to live for thee and not for self, to copy thy words, acts, spirit, to be transformed into thy likness, to be consecrated wholly to thee, to live entirely to thy glory.

See the difference?  Which is more biblical?  I think it is obvious.  Kill your self-esteem and esteem God alone, for He will share His glory with no one.  Here is a video of Paul Washer on self-esteem.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Amen Scott! The self esteem movement is so subtle, and they are really good at twisting and distorting God's Word. I just can't understand how they can take Jesus telling us that be His disciples we must DENY self, take up our cross and follow him and turn that into self esteem.
Joan