|
Part 5b: Loving Self Correctly Introduction: A. Living in Four Relationships B. The Most Important Relationship C. The
Commandment - D. Agape
Love – Love which desires only the highest good for its object. I.
Loving
God A.
Loving
God the Father - The Father’s Highest Good - B. Loving God the Son - The Son’s Highest
Good – 1. Exalt His name above every name. 2. Bow your knee to Him and worship Him 3. Confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. C. Loving God the Holy Spirit - The Spirit’s
Highest Good – 1. The highest good we can do for the Holy Spirit is to allow Him to do His work in our lives! a) Do
Not Resist the Spirit – b) Do
Not Quench the Spirit (1 Thessalonians c) Do
Not Grieve the Spirit - d) Be
Filled with the Holy Spirit – II.
Loving
Self A.
Your
Highest Good – 1. Pleasing self or pleasing God? a) B. Loving Self Is Not Commanded 1. a) Jesus gives two great commandments: b) There is no third command to love yourself. 2. No one hates himself; rather, he loves, cherishes, and nourishes himself a) 3. Man’s problem is that he pays too much attention to self, not too little a) C. The Issue of Self-Esteem 1. Definitions from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary a) Self-Esteem: Undo PRIDE in oneself b) Pride: Over-high opinion of oneself; conceit c) Humility: Absence of PRIDE or self-assertion 2. "High" Self-Esteem - Self-aggrandizement (pride) 3. "Low" Self-Esteem - Self-degradation (false humility) 4. "No" Self-Esteem - No self-concern (true humility) D. Seeing Ourselves Correctly 1. As God Sees Us 2. Who does God say I am? 3. Loving ourselves correctly means seeing ourselves as God sees us! III.
Loving
Self Incorrectly - A.
Lovers
of Self For men will be lovers of
self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, revilers, disobedient to parents,
ungrateful, unholy, unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips, without
self-control, brutal, haters of good, treacherous, reckless, conceited,
lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God; (3:2–4) 1. Paul is specific about the dangers of loving self incorrectly. a) In this context, men does not refer to mankind in general but to members, especially leaders, in Christ’s church b) These are men who claim the name of Christ and also claim to be His ministers, but this can and does happen to anybody! c) They hold “a form of godliness, [but] have denied its power” (v. 5). d) In these 3 verses, Paul lists 18 characteristics of ungodly people, who have corrupted themselves with self love. 2. The root/overriding first characteristic is that these men will be lovers of self. a) The pride of self-love is a deadly sin that grips the human soul and is the foundation of all sin. (1) John Macarthur “It might be called the sewer out of which the rest of these ugly sins are discharged.” b) “Lovers of self” translates the single Greek word philautos, a compound of the verb phileō (to have great affection for) and the pronoun autos (self). (1) Phileō is not a wrong kind of loving, and the verb is frequently used positively in the New Testament. (a) In (b) It is
used of Jesus’ love for John (John 20:2) and is used once even of the
Father’s love for the Son (John (2) It is not the kind of love that is evil but the wrongly elevated object of that love, namely self. (3) Whenever love for self is raised, love for God and the things of God is lowered. (4) It started with Lucifer, then from Adam’s and Eve’s love of themselves over the Lord. c) In The City of God, Augustine wrote, “Two cities have been founded by two loves, the earthly by the love of self, even to the contempt of God. The heavenly by the love of God, even to the contempt of self. The former, in a word, glorifies itself, the latter the Lord.” d) Fortunately some psychologists and psychiatrists are challenging the myth that man’s basic problem is low self-esteem. (1) In a book called Psychology Through the Eyes of Faith, David Meyers and Malcolm Jeeves give abundant evidence against that myth. (2) In a chapter titled “A New Look at Pride,” they write, (a) Time and again, experimenters have found that people readily accept credit when told they have succeeded (Attributing the success to their ability and effort), yet they attribute failure to external factors such as bad luck or the problem’s inherent “impossibility.” These self-serving attributions have been observed not only in laboratory situations, but also with athletes (After victory or defeat), students (After high or low exam grades), drivers (After accidents), and married people (Among whom conflict often derives from perceiving oneself as contributing more and benefiting less than is fair). e) Later in the book the authors maintain that “the most common error in people’s self-images is not unrealistically low self-esteem but rather self-serving pride; not an inferiority complex but a superiority complex.” (1) Even putting yourself down, is a thinly disguised attempt to get others to build you up. (2) Samuel Johnson said, “He that overvalues himself will undervalue others. And he that undervalues others will oppose them.” self-love alienates men from God and from each other. f) What a contrast self-seeking love is to the self-giving love that God requires. 3. Following being lovers of self is being lovers of money a) This term represents materialism, the craving for earthly possessions. b) It
is being covetous, as the Greek word is here rendered in the 4. Being boastful is the outward manifestation of self-love. a) Boastful translates alazōn, a noun meaning “braggart,” which Plato defined as a person who claims greatness that he does not possess. b) They are know-it-alls who try to deceive people into thinking they are brilliant. 5. A person who is boastful is invariably arrogant. a) Huperēphanos (arrogant) has the literal meaning of placing above, hence the idea of superiority. b) They are always self-exalting and determined to have their own way. 6. Revilers translates blasphēmos, from which we get “blasphemous. a) The basic idea is of being abusive and slanderous. b) When you elevate yourself, you automatically lower others and will eventually revile them. 7. Disobedient to parents is the next evil. a) The cause of disobedience of children to parents is not hard to find. b) Children are born with a bent to self-will and disobedience c) But the disappearance of mothers into the work force and the spiritual failure of fathers has made worse the constant self-love that is promoted in modern society. d) Children who will rebel against their parents do not hesitate about rebelling against anyone else. 8. Ungrateful is self-explanatory. a) The person who elevates self above all others will feel he deserves everything good he receives and therefore feels no need of gratitude for it. b) The ungrateful person despises the very idea of grace - goodness received that is undeserved. c) This is a terrible sin against God. d) 9. Unholy translates anosias, which carries the idea not so much of irreligion as of gross indecency. a) The unholy person is driven by self-love to gratify his lusts and passions, with no thought to propriety, decency, or personal reputation. 10.Unloving translates astorgos, a negative adjective form of the verb storgē. a) Storge is commonly used of family, social, and patriotic love. b) Benjamin Warfield “that quiet and abiding feeling within us, which, resting on an object as near to us, recognizes that we are closely bound up with it and takes satisfaction in its recognition.” c) It is not natural for people to love God or the things and people of God, but it is natural for them to love their own families. d) To
be astorgos is therefore
to be “without natural affection” e) Unloving behavior is reported daily in the news today. 11.The irreconcilable are those who refuse to change, no matter how desperate even their own situation becomes. a) They are determined to have their own way regardless of the consequences, even to the point of knowingly destroying their own lives and the lives of their families. b) They do not forgive and do not want to be forgiven. 12.Malicious gossip is a sin of an even more evil and destructive sort. a) Gossip is often thought of as being relatively harmless, but at best it is unkind, harmful, and ungodly. b) The irreconcilable person tends to disregard and neglect others, but malicious gossips make a point of harming others. c) They take perverse pleasure in damaging reputations and destroying lives. d) Malicious gossips = diabolos, suggests the severity of this evil. e) Diabolos means “accuser” and is used 34 times in the NT as a title for Satan f) Engulfed and blinded by self-love, malicious gossips do the very work of Satan. 13.Akratēs (“without self-control”) = incontinence, in this context a moral and spiritual kind. a) Without self-control describes the person who has no inhibitions and shame. b) The lover of self eventually becomes a slave to his passions and ambitions. 14.Brutal refers to savagery, like wild beasts, which attack enemies and tear them in pieces. 15.Next in their downward spiral, self-lovers become haters of good. a) They hate what should be loved and love what should be hated. 16.Lovers of self eventually become treacherous, turning against even their own families and friends. a) Treachery comes naturally to a person who loves money, who is boastful and arrogant, ungrateful and un-holy, unloving and irreconcilable, a malicious slanderer who has lost self-control, and who is brutal and hates what is good. 17.The reckless person is careless, negligent, and rash. a) This characteristic often is manifested unconsciously. b) The self-centered person is so preoccupied with his own interests that he simply does not notice people and things around him that are not related to those selfish concerns. 18.The self-lover is conceited, having a much higher view of himself than is justified. a) Tuphōo = conceited = root meaning of being enveloped in smoke, or clouded, so that what is outside one’s circumscribed world of self cannot be seen. 19.The final sinful characteristic of dangerous false teachers given in this list is their being lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God. a) Lovers of pleasure translates the single Greek word philēdonos, a compound of philos (Loving) and hēdonē (pleasure), from which we get “hedonist” and “hedonism.” b) Pleasure in this context is not limited to the desire for comfort, fine food, sexual satisfaction, and other indulgences normally associated with hedonism. c) A self-centered person derives pleasure from malicious gossip, brutality, and treachery. d) He enjoys the pain and misery he inflicts on others, including parents and friends. e) This depraved pleasure is not loved more than God, but rather than… God. IV. How to Love Self Correctly A.
What
You Need to Know 1. There is a godly love for self that is natural and pleasing to God. a) It is a love that stirs a strong self-image, confidence, and assurance. b) It is a love that even helps in preventing some illnesses such as ulcers, tension, and high blood pressure. 2. The godly love of self comes from knowing three things. a) That one is actually the creation of God: the highest creation possible. b) That one is actually the object of God’s love: the most supreme love possible. c) That one is actually the trustee of God’s gifts: the greatest gifts possible. 3. God’s plan focuses on a denial of self in order to please Him and be a blessing to others. a)
b)
It esteems others better than self. (Phil. 2:3). c) It walks humbly before others. (Phil. 2:3-7) B. What You Need to Do 1.
Take
the focus off yourself in daily situations and relationships by following
God’s commandments (Matthew 2.
Delight
yourself in the Lord, commit your ways to Him, and wait patiently for Him
(Psalm 37:1-9). 3.
Know
that you are not your own since you have been bought with the precious
sacrifice of Jesus Christ (I Corinthians 6:19-20; I Peter 1:17-19) 4.
Examine
(judge) yourself continually in a biblical manner (Matthew 7:5; I Corinthians
5.
Do
not compare yourself with others to determine whose approval you ultimately
seek. 6.
Ask
God to help you all in your life that hinders you from serving Him and
edifying others. 7.
Practice
love without hypocrisy (play-acting) (Romans 12:9) in your thoughts, speech,
and actions (Matthew |
|
Copyright © 2008, by ToBeLikeHim
Ministries