Self Love
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Hearing that as a sermon title sends shivers down the spine of all God fearing Christians.
The reason is quite simple:
1 But realize this, that in the last days difficult times will come.
2 For people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, slanderers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy,
We are clearly told that in the last days there will be a rise in false teachings, unholy behavior, ungrateful people - all because people will be lovers of self.
So you expect this kind of garbage from progressives, but definitely not from conservatives.
Yet, this is the title of today's sermon.
So has Pst Rudy lost the plot?
No, at least i don't think so.
Self love is a biblical concept, but the meanings and understanding have changed.
Biblical love and popular love are NOT the same.
And even biblical self and popular self are also NOT the same.
Husbands are commanded by God to love their wives.
25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her,
Thats simple, but whats more difficult is how that love looks like, how that loves behaves - so to avoid confusion God tells husbands not just to love their wives but actually HOW to love their wives:
25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her,
So before i can love my wife, I first need to know how Christ loves the church.
Then i model my love for Kim on how Christ loves the church.
In the same way: Wives are commanded by God to submit to their husbands:
22 Wives, subject yourselves to your own husbands, as to the Lord.
Again that's simple. What is more difficult is how that submission looks like, how its motivated, how it works.
AGAIN to avoid confusion God tells wives not just to submit but actually HOW to submit:
22 Wives, subject yourselves to your own husbands, as to the Lord.
24 But as the church is subject to Christ, so also the wives ought to be to their husbands in everything.
So for a wives to submit to her husband, she first needs to know how the church submits to Christ and then model her submission on that example.
So husbands are commanded to love their wives in a way that reflects Christs love for the church.
Wives are commanded to submit to their husbands in a way that reflects the church submitting to Christ.
In each case the HOW is based off the model of something else.
Everyone with me?
Now let us get both more general and more specific.
Each and every one of us as Christians is given a divine command to love each other:
28 One of the scribes came up and heard them arguing, and recognizing that He had answered them well, asked Him, “What commandment is the foremost of all?”
29 Jesus answered, “The foremost is, ‘hear, israel! the lord is our God, the lord is one;
30 and you shall love the lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.’
31 The second is this: ‘you shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.”
Love your neighbor.
Simple, as simple as love your wives and submit to your husband.
But just like those commands, God wants to avoid any confusion - so again God tells us HOW to love each other:
31 The second is this: ‘you shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.”
Notice that God wants us to love one another in the same way that we love ourselves.
So for us to fulfill the second greatest command we need to first see how we aught to love ourselves and then model our love for others on the love we have for ourselves.
What is biblical Self Love?
What is biblical Self Love?
First lets understand the word love.
The Greek word here is the famous AGAPE.
Love has changed its meaning.
In today's culture “love” is interchangeable with “affirmation”.
Loving someone today means affirming that person - affirming their beliefs, affirming their identity, affirming their choices.
Let me state this as clearly as possible: Affirmation love is NOT AGAPE love.
What is AGAPE love?
What is AGAPE love?
16 “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him will not perish, but have eternal life.
Agape love is not affirming its sacrificing.
God so loved the world: He did not affirm us IN our sin, he sacrificed himself FOR our sin.
Love, therefore, means being willing to sacrifice for those you love.
sacrifice feelings, sacrifice pleasure, sacrifice your reputation even sacrifice the relationship.
What is this “self” then that we love?
What is this “self” then that we love?
Self is not that which we think we are, wish we are or even believe we are.
Those are just perceptions of our self.
Biblical self is that which God says we are.
And what does God say we are?
We are His image bearers.
Humanity, men and woman are created in God’s image.
Its our nature as image bearers that gives human life, both yours and your neighbors, value.
I must love and cultivate that new life within me that reflects God’s goodness.
BUT loving myself also means crucifying the parts of you that dim or lesson God’s goodness.
This is were the sacrificial understanding of love comes in to self love.
Jesus put it like this:
9 And if your eye is causing you to sin, tear it out and throw it away from you. It is better for you to enter life with one eye, than to have two eyes and be thrown into the fiery hell.
Another example, just to steer this back to our primary, of self love is seen in:
29 for no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ also does the church,
Notice how, according to God, self love manifests:
You Nourish and you cherish.
Nourish is “Ek-traf-o” and it means to raise and train.
Cherish is “Thal-po” and it means literally to “brood” as in to harm and hatch an egg.
Biblical self love is about Nourishing yourself which means learning new things, challenging ourselves through training and failing at life’s various avenues.
Biblical self love is also about Cherishing yourself which means in the word brood that self love is also recognizing our frailty and looking after the one body God has blessed us with for life n earth.
Notice then that biblical self love loves both the mind and the body.
If you love yourself biblicaly you will both be training your mind to become more articulate, more rational and more God focused AND you will be fortifying your mind to become more resilient, more disciplined and you will seek to heal any hurt thoughts.
If you love yourself Biblicaly you will also be looking after your body. You will not put junk and poison in it. You will not neglect it, you will not abuse it AND you will mend it if something goes wrong.
This is biblical self love.
And here is where the problem lies:
This is HOW God has commanded that we love one another “As you love yourself”.
And so here is the even BIGGER problem:
And so here is the even BIGGER problem:
Most people do not love themselves and thus they do not nourish themselves, they do not cherish themselves and as a consequence the manner in which they love others reflects NOT godly self love, but rather they “love” others in the same neglectful, shameful, self loathing way that they do “love” themselves.
Let me drop a truth on you:
20 If someone says, “I love God,” and yet he hates his brother or sister, he is a liar; for the one who does not love his brother and sister whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen.
21 And this commandment we have from Him, that the one who loves God must also love his brother and sister.
Often our love for one think is determined by our love for another thing.
You cannot love another person, be it your wife, husband, children, friend, neighbor MORE than you love yourself - because you can only love them AS you love yourself.
Why Not????? PARENTS!!!!!
Because you can only be as effective as you are capable.
And what you are capable of is determined by your own well being.
Last week I would have loved to preach to you; but I chose not to.
Why? Because my preaching would not have been very effective.
Why? Because I was not capable of preaching effectively.
Why? My own well being or in last weeks case: Lack of well being prevented it.
So lets bring this to its conclusion:
So lets bring this to its conclusion:
31 The second is this: ‘you shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.”
Before you can love someone as you love yourself, you first need to ask “What would i need from someone if I was in this persons situation”?
Jesus put it like this:
12 “In everything, therefore, treat people the same way you want them to treat you, for this is the Law and the Prophets.
So ask yourself these questions:
Do i want people to lie to me or to withhold information from me? - Then don't do it to others.
Do I want people to make assumptions about me? - Then Don’t do it to other people.
Do I want people to make judgments about me based on external characteristics? Then don’t do it to others.
Or how able these questions:
Do I want people to give me the benefit of the doubt in a situation where they don't know all the facts?
Then do that for others.
Do I want people to understand that I am doing my best and that I need grace to help me?
Then do that for others.
Here is one:
Do I want people to be mature enough to understand that I have bad days, where my patience is tried, my energy is low and that my actions or careless words do not represent the real me?
Then give others that same love.