“Render therefore to Ceasar the things that are Ceasar's, and to God the things that are God's.” (Luke 20:25)
Luke 18: 18-30
“Now a certain ruler asked Him, saying, 'Good Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?' So Jesus said to him, 'Why do you call Me good? No one is good but One, that is, God. You know the commandments: 'Do not commit adultery,' 'Do not murder,' 'Do not steal,' 'Do not bear false witness,' Honor your father and your mother.'
And he said, 'All these things I have kept from my youth.' So when Jesus heard these things, He said to him, 'You still lack one thing. Sell all that you have and distribute to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me.' But when he heard this, he became very sorrowful, for he was very rich.
And when Jesus saw that he became very sorrowful, He said, 'How hard it is for those who have riches to enter the kingdom of God! For it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.' And those who heard it said, 'Who then can be saved?' But He said, 'The things which are impossible with men are possible with God.' Then Peter said, 'See, we have left all and followed you.'
So He said to them, 'Assuredly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or parents or brothers or wife or children, for the sake of the kingdom of God, who shall not receive many times more in this present time, and in the age to come eternal life.'”
Thomas a Kempis writes, “For it is not given every man to forsake all things, to renounce the world, and undertake the religious life.[1] As commentary notes about these verses, Jesus did not invite everyone to leave everything and follow Him, He had said this only to His disciples.[2]
John Maxwell writes, “Even though he claimed to obey all the commands, he miserably failed at the first one: 'You shall have no other gods before me' (Ex. 20:3). Jesus went straight to the central issue, preventing him from making a commitment he desperately needed to make. The man walked away, full of sadness. He clung to what he had instead of committing to what he could obtain.” [3]
This rich man who thought he was following God and obeying His commands, was really obtaining his worth and life outside of Christ. He chose to walk away from Christ and hold onto what was giving him his sense of significance rather than letting it all go to become a true follower.
Jesus turned his world upside down when he told him to sell all he owned and give it away. As one commentary notes, most Jewish people believed that wealth was evidence of God's blessing, so His statement would have been shocking. [4]
“Not to us, but to Your name be the glory” sings in the background
Too often we can try to get our sense of worth and significance from what we do for Christ or what we have been given by Christ rather than truly following Him. In order to follow Him, we need to let go of everything else that we get our sense of identity from.
Thomas a Kempis writes that it is a great honor to serve God and despise all worldly things for His sake. He writes, “They who give themselves gladly to Your most holy service will posses great grace. They who cast aside all carnal delights for Your love will find the most sweet consolation of the Holy Ghost. They who enter upon the narrow way for Your name and cast aside all worldly care will attain great freedom of mind.” [5]
Jesus invited the man who was holding onto his identity in the world to follow Him instead. To follow, the Greek word akoloutheo, does mean to become like and learn from someone as their disciple. But it also means to accompany. One of the root word of the prefix expresses union with God. [6]
God was inviting this rich young ruler to learn to be with Him. Rather than strive to live out the commandments while he was getting his sense of identity from the approval of the people around him, he could give it all away for the one thing that he truly needed -God. However, he chose to walk away instead and was very sad about it.
When Mary and Martha were with Jesus, Mary sat at His feet and listened to His words. Martha, however, hurried around distracted from Jesus by all her serving. Martha stopped to tell Jesus, “Lord, do You not care that my sister has left me to serve alone? Therefore tell her to help me.' And Jesus answered and said to her, “Martha, you are worried and troubled about many things. But one thing is needed, and Mary has chosen that good part, which will not be taken away from her.” (Luke 10:38-42)
It was not Martha's serving that was the problem. Jesus tells His disciples in Luke 22:24-27 that He is among them as one that serves and that the greatest among them is the least and the one who governs as he who serves. The issue was that Martha's service to Jesus was distracting her from the 'good part' – being with Him. Her service was not out of a place of fellowship and abandonment, being filled by God, but rather out of a place of trying to get her life from what she was doing.
John Maxwell writes about these verses, “When Martha became preoccupied with impressing her guests, Jesus clarified for her the most important activity. Jesus revealed to her that only 'one thing is needed' (Luke 10:42).” [7]
Our service to Christ needs to humbly flow out of our relationship with Christ and love for Him. Jesus says in John 12:26, “Whoever serves me must follow me; and where I am, my servant also will be.”
As we come to know Christ, we serve Him with the way we live our lives. It is not the significant things we do for God that matter to Him. And these are not what He will judge us on. Rather, He judges us on how well we know Him and the simple ways we show our love for Him in our choices and actions.
Jesus tells the people in Matthew 7:21-23“Not everyone who says to Me, 'Lord, Lord,' shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. Many will say to Me in that day, 'Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?' And then I will declare to them, 'I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!'”
“You are everything I want, You are everything I need, I want You to be my one consuming passion, Everything my heart desires” sings in the background.
Fenelon writes, “When it comes to accomplishing things for God, you will find that high aspirations, enthusiastic feelings, careful planning and being able to express yourself well are not worthy very much. The important thing is absolute surrender to God. You can do anything He wants you to do if you are walking in the light of full surrender.” [8]
We need to let go of all we get our life from in order to truly follow God in our serving. Fenelon goes on to write, “Living in this blessed way involves a continual death which is known to very few, but it is in this position that you can be really effective for God. A single word spoken to another person from this restful, abandoned position will do more to change circumstances than all our most eager and carefully planned schemes. You see, when you speak from this position of abandonment to God, it is the Spirit of God who is then speaking, and the word you speak out of context loses not of its force and authority. Only one word perhaps- but it enlightens, persuades, blesses, and moves to action.”[9]
Brother Lawrence is someone who learned this type of serving that flowed out of his relationship with God. Everything he did was motivated by his love for God. His deepest heart desire was not to accomplish some great feat, but to simply be entirely lost in the love of God. He thought it was a shame that some people pursued certain activities mistakenly as a means for the end. He noted that one does not need to change their activities so much as the reason they are doing them – for God rather than themselves. [10]
“I want you to be my one consuming passion... Be my magnificent obsession” sings in the background.
Brother Lawrence wrote, “What I wanted was simply to belong totally to God. So I decided to give everything I could give in order to attain the greatest blessing in return, knowing Him. I gave myself completely to God, accepting His forgiveness of my sins, after which I renounced everything that would offend Him. I began to live as if there were no one but God and myself in the world.” [11]
As it is often said, 'you will eventually get what you pursue. ' Because Brother Lawrence pursued a relationship with God over any activities or benefits that God could give Him, this is what He obtained – an incredible relationship with God that has inspired Christians for many generations.
Brother Lawrence wrote, “The soul learns which activities bring God's presence nearer. It remains in His presence by practicing those activities.” Brother Lawrence moved towards those things that gave him life spiritually and moved away from those activities which distracted him from God.[12] He truly sold all his worldly riches to follow Jesus.
“Turn your gaze to heaven and raise a joyous noise” sings.
Like with the rich young ruler, it may seem overwhelmingly impossible to let go of all those things we hold onto in the world, forsaking all to follow Him. However, Jesus promises, “The things which are impossible with man are possible with God.” (Luke 18:27)
What can be our greatest hindrance to, like Mary, sitting at His feet and enjoying fellowship with Him is not that we are bad people or have bad intentions. We have a need for significance and will naturally try to get this need met. Brene Brown writes that love and belonging are essential to the human experience. [13]
It is how we go about get this need met that causes us problems. When we struggle with believing we are worthy of love and belonging, we will naturally work to earn our value with God and others by our performance. We will strive to obtain what we need, performing to earn approval, rather than surrendering to God. And it is this very thing that will get in the way of choosing the 'good part' -being with God.
Brene Brown writes that she realized when she was conducting interview that one thing separated men and women who felt a deep sense of love and belonging from those who seemed to struggle for it – their belief that they are worthy of love and belonging. [14]
She writes, “When we can let go of what other people think and own our story, we gain access to our worthiness – the feeling that we are enough just as we are and that we are worthy of love and belonging. When we spend a lifetime trying to distance ourselves from the parts of our lives that don't fit with those who we think we're supposed to be, we stand outside of our story and hustle for our worthiness by constantly performing, perfecting, pleasing and proving. Our sense of worthiness -that critically important piece that gives us access to love and belonging -lives inside of our story. [15]
As Brene Brown mentions, our greatest challenge for most of us is believing that we are worthy right now just as we are -without prerequisites. She writes, “Here's what is truly at the heart of Wholeheartedness: Worthy now. Not if. Not when. We are worthy of love and belonging now. Right this minute. As is.” [16]
Could it be that the rich young ruler did not walk away from Jesus because of greed, but because he could not get beyond seeing his own value by what he owned? Perhaps what is so hard for those who have worldly riches is not necessary letting go of greed, but letting go of getting their life from what they have and what they do. Perhaps if the rich young ruler could truly believe he was worthy of love and full acceptance, he could have let go of the riches.
I struggled for many years with believing that I was worthy of love. What I found is that after some time as a Christian, I just found new ways to strive for love and acceptance. I began to discover a new way to earn my approval -through serving. I began to serve to gain God and others approval and appreciation. I could not believe I was worthy of love or belonging so I tried to earn it by being helpful.
Once as I was sitting in the prayer room at the International House of Prayer, I saw a picture of this person wearing a ragged and tattered lion outfit. They were running and running but not getting anywhere. What I felt God speak to me was that this was me. I was doing tons of stuff for God, putting on a false righteousness, but not getting anywhere. I was just becoming more exhausted. It made me realize that I needed to learn another way.
Ironically, when I first became saved and then later healed from depression, before I was involved in serving, I had became very good at practicing the presence of God. His presence rested on me and gave me comfort and peace fairly continuous. When I started striving to earn God's approval by serving Him, I became much less aware of His presence and felt less connected to Him. I had replaced being with Him for doing things for Him.
When you feel unworthy of love and belonging, you naturally move towards trying to gain love and acceptance by God and others. When you enter a room, your thoughts are about being accepted by others around you. You feel out of place and can never feel at ease anywhere unless you know you are accepted and approved of.
On the other hand, when you already know you are deeply loved and belong to God, you no longer need to earn or gain this from others. You can enter a room with the freedom to ask, 'What may God be inviting me into here?'[a]
Brene Brown writes that many of us believe that belonging and fitting in are the same thing, when in fact, “fitting in gets in the way of belonging.” She writes, “Fitting in is about assessing a situation and becoming who you need to be to be accepted. She notes that we often try to fit in and seek approval as substitutes for belonging. [17]
Belonging, on the other hand, doesn't require us to change who we are; it requires us to be who we are.” She defines belonging as “the innate human desire to be part of something larger.”[18] And it is only as we know that we are loved and can accept ourselves that we can truly feel like we belong.
As Brene Brown notes, it is very difficult to cultivate self-acceptance in our perfectionist society. She writes, “From gangs to gossiping, we'll do what it takes to fit in if we believe it will meet our need for belonging. But it doesn't. We can only belong when we offer our most authentic selves and when we're embraced for who we are.” [19]
Brene Brown suggests that practicing love begins with how we treat ourselves and the idea that we cannot love others more than we love ourselves.
Once when I was a fairly new Christian and someone was praying for me they told me that I needed to repent for my self talk. I had believed that there was something wrong and defective with me so this is what I was speaking to myself and how I treated myself . When others rejected me, it just confirmed for me what I believed about myself. I was continually looking for others approval and acceptance. When I failed to receive it, it was incredibly painful because it validated what I believed – I was unlovable and there was something wrong with me.
When I stopped to repent for speaking this way about myself, I felt God speak to me to look in the mirror and begin to speak that I was worthwhile. I'll never forget the first time I did this. I felt silly standing in front of a mirror talking to myself. But when I spoke those words and looked in the mirror, I began to sob uncontrollably. It was the beginning of what has been many years of letting God's light in to heal me.
“So, I'm just fine, I see a smile from Heaven, My Father is proud and I know that I am simply fearfully and wonderfully made in You. You make it beautiful somehow” sings.
Lord, You are truly the pearl of great price that is worth everything we have to offer You. We long to be those who sell everything and give it away so that we might come follow You. Would You show us how? Help us to live surrendered to You at rest in Your love. Would you strengthen us to give You all and no less, just as the song sings in the background.
a. This question came from a sermon sometime ago by Jen Lindwall, Pastor at Church of the Open Door, Maple Grove, MN.
1, 5. Kempis, Thomas a. The Imitation of Christ. Dover Publications, Inc. Mineola, New York. 2003.
2, 3, 7. Maxwell, John. The Maxwell Leadership Bible, Second Edition. NKJV. Lessons in Leadership from the Word of God. Thomas Nelson. Nashville, Tennessee. 2007.
4. Radmacher, Earl D. ; Allen, Ronald Barclay ; House, H. Wayne: The Nelson Study Bible : New King James Version. Nashville : T. Nelson Publishers, 1997, S. Lk 18:24
6. Strong, James: The Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible : Showing Every Word of the Text of the Common English Version of the Canonical Books, and Every Occurrence of Each Word in Regular Order. electronic ed. Ontario : Woodside Bible Fellowship., 1996
8-9. Fenelon. Let Go. Whitaker House, New Kensington, PA. 1973.
10-12. Brother Lawrence. The Practice of the Presence of God. Whitaker House, Kensington, PA. 1982.
13-19. Brown, Bene, Ph.D., L.M.S.W., The Gifts of Imperfection: Let Go of Who You Think Your're Supposed to Be and Embrace Who You Are. Hazelden. Center City, MN. 2010.
“Now a certain ruler asked Him, saying, 'Good Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?' So Jesus said to him, 'Why do you call Me good? No one is good but One, that is, God. You know the commandments: 'Do not commit adultery,' 'Do not murder,' 'Do not steal,' 'Do not bear false witness,' Honor your father and your mother.'
And he said, 'All these things I have kept from my youth.' So when Jesus heard these things, He said to him, 'You still lack one thing. Sell all that you have and distribute to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me.' But when he heard this, he became very sorrowful, for he was very rich.
And when Jesus saw that he became very sorrowful, He said, 'How hard it is for those who have riches to enter the kingdom of God! For it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.' And those who heard it said, 'Who then can be saved?' But He said, 'The things which are impossible with men are possible with God.' Then Peter said, 'See, we have left all and followed you.'
So He said to them, 'Assuredly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or parents or brothers or wife or children, for the sake of the kingdom of God, who shall not receive many times more in this present time, and in the age to come eternal life.'”
Thomas a Kempis writes, “For it is not given every man to forsake all things, to renounce the world, and undertake the religious life.[1] As commentary notes about these verses, Jesus did not invite everyone to leave everything and follow Him, He had said this only to His disciples.[2]
John Maxwell writes, “Even though he claimed to obey all the commands, he miserably failed at the first one: 'You shall have no other gods before me' (Ex. 20:3). Jesus went straight to the central issue, preventing him from making a commitment he desperately needed to make. The man walked away, full of sadness. He clung to what he had instead of committing to what he could obtain.” [3]
This rich man who thought he was following God and obeying His commands, was really obtaining his worth and life outside of Christ. He chose to walk away from Christ and hold onto what was giving him his sense of significance rather than letting it all go to become a true follower.
Jesus turned his world upside down when he told him to sell all he owned and give it away. As one commentary notes, most Jewish people believed that wealth was evidence of God's blessing, so His statement would have been shocking. [4]
“Not to us, but to Your name be the glory” sings in the background
Too often we can try to get our sense of worth and significance from what we do for Christ or what we have been given by Christ rather than truly following Him. In order to follow Him, we need to let go of everything else that we get our sense of identity from.
Thomas a Kempis writes that it is a great honor to serve God and despise all worldly things for His sake. He writes, “They who give themselves gladly to Your most holy service will posses great grace. They who cast aside all carnal delights for Your love will find the most sweet consolation of the Holy Ghost. They who enter upon the narrow way for Your name and cast aside all worldly care will attain great freedom of mind.” [5]
Jesus invited the man who was holding onto his identity in the world to follow Him instead. To follow, the Greek word akoloutheo, does mean to become like and learn from someone as their disciple. But it also means to accompany. One of the root word of the prefix expresses union with God. [6]
God was inviting this rich young ruler to learn to be with Him. Rather than strive to live out the commandments while he was getting his sense of identity from the approval of the people around him, he could give it all away for the one thing that he truly needed -God. However, he chose to walk away instead and was very sad about it.
When Mary and Martha were with Jesus, Mary sat at His feet and listened to His words. Martha, however, hurried around distracted from Jesus by all her serving. Martha stopped to tell Jesus, “Lord, do You not care that my sister has left me to serve alone? Therefore tell her to help me.' And Jesus answered and said to her, “Martha, you are worried and troubled about many things. But one thing is needed, and Mary has chosen that good part, which will not be taken away from her.” (Luke 10:38-42)
It was not Martha's serving that was the problem. Jesus tells His disciples in Luke 22:24-27 that He is among them as one that serves and that the greatest among them is the least and the one who governs as he who serves. The issue was that Martha's service to Jesus was distracting her from the 'good part' – being with Him. Her service was not out of a place of fellowship and abandonment, being filled by God, but rather out of a place of trying to get her life from what she was doing.
John Maxwell writes about these verses, “When Martha became preoccupied with impressing her guests, Jesus clarified for her the most important activity. Jesus revealed to her that only 'one thing is needed' (Luke 10:42).” [7]
Our service to Christ needs to humbly flow out of our relationship with Christ and love for Him. Jesus says in John 12:26, “Whoever serves me must follow me; and where I am, my servant also will be.”
As we come to know Christ, we serve Him with the way we live our lives. It is not the significant things we do for God that matter to Him. And these are not what He will judge us on. Rather, He judges us on how well we know Him and the simple ways we show our love for Him in our choices and actions.
Jesus tells the people in Matthew 7:21-23“Not everyone who says to Me, 'Lord, Lord,' shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. Many will say to Me in that day, 'Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?' And then I will declare to them, 'I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!'”
“You are everything I want, You are everything I need, I want You to be my one consuming passion, Everything my heart desires” sings in the background.
Fenelon writes, “When it comes to accomplishing things for God, you will find that high aspirations, enthusiastic feelings, careful planning and being able to express yourself well are not worthy very much. The important thing is absolute surrender to God. You can do anything He wants you to do if you are walking in the light of full surrender.” [8]
We need to let go of all we get our life from in order to truly follow God in our serving. Fenelon goes on to write, “Living in this blessed way involves a continual death which is known to very few, but it is in this position that you can be really effective for God. A single word spoken to another person from this restful, abandoned position will do more to change circumstances than all our most eager and carefully planned schemes. You see, when you speak from this position of abandonment to God, it is the Spirit of God who is then speaking, and the word you speak out of context loses not of its force and authority. Only one word perhaps- but it enlightens, persuades, blesses, and moves to action.”[9]
Brother Lawrence is someone who learned this type of serving that flowed out of his relationship with God. Everything he did was motivated by his love for God. His deepest heart desire was not to accomplish some great feat, but to simply be entirely lost in the love of God. He thought it was a shame that some people pursued certain activities mistakenly as a means for the end. He noted that one does not need to change their activities so much as the reason they are doing them – for God rather than themselves. [10]
“I want you to be my one consuming passion... Be my magnificent obsession” sings in the background.
Brother Lawrence wrote, “What I wanted was simply to belong totally to God. So I decided to give everything I could give in order to attain the greatest blessing in return, knowing Him. I gave myself completely to God, accepting His forgiveness of my sins, after which I renounced everything that would offend Him. I began to live as if there were no one but God and myself in the world.” [11]
As it is often said, 'you will eventually get what you pursue. ' Because Brother Lawrence pursued a relationship with God over any activities or benefits that God could give Him, this is what He obtained – an incredible relationship with God that has inspired Christians for many generations.
Brother Lawrence wrote, “The soul learns which activities bring God's presence nearer. It remains in His presence by practicing those activities.” Brother Lawrence moved towards those things that gave him life spiritually and moved away from those activities which distracted him from God.[12] He truly sold all his worldly riches to follow Jesus.
“Turn your gaze to heaven and raise a joyous noise” sings.
Like with the rich young ruler, it may seem overwhelmingly impossible to let go of all those things we hold onto in the world, forsaking all to follow Him. However, Jesus promises, “The things which are impossible with man are possible with God.” (Luke 18:27)
What can be our greatest hindrance to, like Mary, sitting at His feet and enjoying fellowship with Him is not that we are bad people or have bad intentions. We have a need for significance and will naturally try to get this need met. Brene Brown writes that love and belonging are essential to the human experience. [13]
It is how we go about get this need met that causes us problems. When we struggle with believing we are worthy of love and belonging, we will naturally work to earn our value with God and others by our performance. We will strive to obtain what we need, performing to earn approval, rather than surrendering to God. And it is this very thing that will get in the way of choosing the 'good part' -being with God.
Brene Brown writes that she realized when she was conducting interview that one thing separated men and women who felt a deep sense of love and belonging from those who seemed to struggle for it – their belief that they are worthy of love and belonging. [14]
She writes, “When we can let go of what other people think and own our story, we gain access to our worthiness – the feeling that we are enough just as we are and that we are worthy of love and belonging. When we spend a lifetime trying to distance ourselves from the parts of our lives that don't fit with those who we think we're supposed to be, we stand outside of our story and hustle for our worthiness by constantly performing, perfecting, pleasing and proving. Our sense of worthiness -that critically important piece that gives us access to love and belonging -lives inside of our story. [15]
As Brene Brown mentions, our greatest challenge for most of us is believing that we are worthy right now just as we are -without prerequisites. She writes, “Here's what is truly at the heart of Wholeheartedness: Worthy now. Not if. Not when. We are worthy of love and belonging now. Right this minute. As is.” [16]
Could it be that the rich young ruler did not walk away from Jesus because of greed, but because he could not get beyond seeing his own value by what he owned? Perhaps what is so hard for those who have worldly riches is not necessary letting go of greed, but letting go of getting their life from what they have and what they do. Perhaps if the rich young ruler could truly believe he was worthy of love and full acceptance, he could have let go of the riches.
I struggled for many years with believing that I was worthy of love. What I found is that after some time as a Christian, I just found new ways to strive for love and acceptance. I began to discover a new way to earn my approval -through serving. I began to serve to gain God and others approval and appreciation. I could not believe I was worthy of love or belonging so I tried to earn it by being helpful.
Once as I was sitting in the prayer room at the International House of Prayer, I saw a picture of this person wearing a ragged and tattered lion outfit. They were running and running but not getting anywhere. What I felt God speak to me was that this was me. I was doing tons of stuff for God, putting on a false righteousness, but not getting anywhere. I was just becoming more exhausted. It made me realize that I needed to learn another way.
Ironically, when I first became saved and then later healed from depression, before I was involved in serving, I had became very good at practicing the presence of God. His presence rested on me and gave me comfort and peace fairly continuous. When I started striving to earn God's approval by serving Him, I became much less aware of His presence and felt less connected to Him. I had replaced being with Him for doing things for Him.
When you feel unworthy of love and belonging, you naturally move towards trying to gain love and acceptance by God and others. When you enter a room, your thoughts are about being accepted by others around you. You feel out of place and can never feel at ease anywhere unless you know you are accepted and approved of.
On the other hand, when you already know you are deeply loved and belong to God, you no longer need to earn or gain this from others. You can enter a room with the freedom to ask, 'What may God be inviting me into here?'[a]
Brene Brown writes that many of us believe that belonging and fitting in are the same thing, when in fact, “fitting in gets in the way of belonging.” She writes, “Fitting in is about assessing a situation and becoming who you need to be to be accepted. She notes that we often try to fit in and seek approval as substitutes for belonging. [17]
Belonging, on the other hand, doesn't require us to change who we are; it requires us to be who we are.” She defines belonging as “the innate human desire to be part of something larger.”[18] And it is only as we know that we are loved and can accept ourselves that we can truly feel like we belong.
As Brene Brown notes, it is very difficult to cultivate self-acceptance in our perfectionist society. She writes, “From gangs to gossiping, we'll do what it takes to fit in if we believe it will meet our need for belonging. But it doesn't. We can only belong when we offer our most authentic selves and when we're embraced for who we are.” [19]
Brene Brown suggests that practicing love begins with how we treat ourselves and the idea that we cannot love others more than we love ourselves.
Once when I was a fairly new Christian and someone was praying for me they told me that I needed to repent for my self talk. I had believed that there was something wrong and defective with me so this is what I was speaking to myself and how I treated myself . When others rejected me, it just confirmed for me what I believed about myself. I was continually looking for others approval and acceptance. When I failed to receive it, it was incredibly painful because it validated what I believed – I was unlovable and there was something wrong with me.
When I stopped to repent for speaking this way about myself, I felt God speak to me to look in the mirror and begin to speak that I was worthwhile. I'll never forget the first time I did this. I felt silly standing in front of a mirror talking to myself. But when I spoke those words and looked in the mirror, I began to sob uncontrollably. It was the beginning of what has been many years of letting God's light in to heal me.
“So, I'm just fine, I see a smile from Heaven, My Father is proud and I know that I am simply fearfully and wonderfully made in You. You make it beautiful somehow” sings.
Lord, You are truly the pearl of great price that is worth everything we have to offer You. We long to be those who sell everything and give it away so that we might come follow You. Would You show us how? Help us to live surrendered to You at rest in Your love. Would you strengthen us to give You all and no less, just as the song sings in the background.
a. This question came from a sermon sometime ago by Jen Lindwall, Pastor at Church of the Open Door, Maple Grove, MN.
1, 5. Kempis, Thomas a. The Imitation of Christ. Dover Publications, Inc. Mineola, New York. 2003.
2, 3, 7. Maxwell, John. The Maxwell Leadership Bible, Second Edition. NKJV. Lessons in Leadership from the Word of God. Thomas Nelson. Nashville, Tennessee. 2007.
4. Radmacher, Earl D. ; Allen, Ronald Barclay ; House, H. Wayne: The Nelson Study Bible : New King James Version. Nashville : T. Nelson Publishers, 1997, S. Lk 18:24
6. Strong, James: The Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible : Showing Every Word of the Text of the Common English Version of the Canonical Books, and Every Occurrence of Each Word in Regular Order. electronic ed. Ontario : Woodside Bible Fellowship., 1996
8-9. Fenelon. Let Go. Whitaker House, New Kensington, PA. 1973.
10-12. Brother Lawrence. The Practice of the Presence of God. Whitaker House, Kensington, PA. 1982.
13-19. Brown, Bene, Ph.D., L.M.S.W., The Gifts of Imperfection: Let Go of Who You Think Your're Supposed to Be and Embrace Who You Are. Hazelden. Center City, MN. 2010.
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