The Illusion of Self Esteem | Part 1
In a world that prizes confidence and self-assurance, there’s a quiet danger we often overlook—the kind that subtly shifts our focus away from the One who gives true worth. In this opening episode, we explore a passage that turns the modern idea of self-esteem upside down.
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Transcript
Welcome to the Fortifying youg Family podcast.
Speaker A:It can be daunting to navigate through an anti marriage and family culture.
Speaker A:Our teacher will expound biblical principles to help fortify our families and keep these sacred institutions strong.
Speaker A:And now, here's this week's teaching from Sam wood.
Speaker B:Jeremiah, chapter 9, verse 20.
Speaker B:Through verse 24, the Bible says God's word says, yet hear the word of the Lord, O ye women, and let your ear receive the word of his mouth.
Speaker B:And teach your daughters wailing and every one her neighbor lamentation.
Speaker B:For death has come up into our windows and has entered into our palaces to cut off the children from without and the young men from the streets speak.
Speaker B:Thus saith the Lord, Even the carcasses of men shall fall as dung upon the open field and as a handful after the harvestman, and none shall gather them.
Speaker B:Thus saith the Lord.
Speaker B:Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, neither let the mighty man glory in his might.
Speaker B:Let not the rich man glory in his riches, but let him that glorieth glory in this, that he understandeth and knoweth me that I am the Lord which exercise loving kindness, judgment and righteousness in the earth.
Speaker B:For in these things I delight, saith the Lord.
Speaker B:Jeremiah is a prophet who is the mouthpiece of God, speaking the message of God to Judah, the southern kingdom of Israel.
Speaker B:And as we look at this, this passage, let me just pause at the beginning and remind you of something I think that we all need to be reminded of that's very, very important.
Speaker B:You say, brother Sam, what is that?
Speaker B:I want to remind you that throughout the history of the world, man has not changed.
Speaker B:What I'm saying is we're not today an enlightened man who is less depraved and less sinful than the people to whom this message was given to in Jeremiah, chapter 9.
Speaker B: en by Jeremiah to Judah about: Speaker B:But thank God that God is the same God of grace and loving kindness today that he was back then.
Speaker B:He is that same God the Israelites had sinned and rebelled against God.
Speaker B:And God through his prophet, Jeremiah is speaking of his coming judgment upon them.
Speaker B:In fact, in verses 20 through verse 22, Jeremiah is prophesying that their society is going to completely collapse.
Speaker B:He tells the mothers to teach their daughters how to wail, how to cry, and to teach them how to lament, because there's going to be so many dead bodies scattered across the fields like dung.
Speaker B:He says, in the fields that there won't be enough people left even bury the dead.
Speaker B:It's a very dire situation.
Speaker B:The prophecy of Jeremiah was not one that certainly the people wanted to hear.
Speaker B:But the obvious question after reading these words is why?
Speaker B:Why is this happening to them?
Speaker B:Why is God's judgment coming down upon them?
Speaker B:And in verse 23, God emphatically answers question.
Speaker B:In verse 23, Jeremiah begins by saying thus saith the Lord.
Speaker B:He's emphasizing that the words that are proceeding out of his mouth are not his words, but they are God's word.
Speaker B:Thus saith the Lord.
Speaker B:Anytime that God says thus saith the Lord, we better come to attention and we better listen very carefully to to what God has to say.
Speaker B:And this is what he says.
Speaker B:Look at verse 23.
Speaker B:Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom.
Speaker B:Neither let the mighty man glory in his might.
Speaker B:Let not the rich man glory in his riches.
Speaker B:Notice carefully that God says that this man is not glorying just his wisdom.
Speaker B:He's not glorying in just riches and just might.
Speaker B:But notice a little word if we don't carefully look at it.
Speaker B:His what?
Speaker B:His wisdom, his riches, his might.
Speaker B:God says, you're glorying in your wisdom, you're glorying in your riches, you're glory in your might.
Speaker B:What is God saying to them?
Speaker B:God is saying that their sin, the self confidence is self exaltation that they're putting in themselves.
Speaker B:And folks, ever since the fall of man into sin, man is attempted to live independent of God with self orientation and belief that he can solve all the problems himself independently of God.
Speaker B:That is that God.
Speaker B:Man does not need God.
Speaker B:Simply stated, God is saying to them that they are so puffed up in pride, they're so consumed with self that they have forgotten him, they have forgotten God.
Speaker B:And certainly God says in his word that he hates pride because pride dethrones God and enthrones man.
Speaker B:And most disturbingly, I believe that we live in a culture today that has given pride new and a much more acceptable label or a new and much more acceptable name.
Speaker B:We don't call it pride, we call it having high self esteem.
Speaker B:That's a much more acceptable name to give something that God says that he hates.
Speaker B:And unfortunately our culture assumes a self orientation, this self exaltation that having high self esteem, essential for good health and it's essential for personal well being.
Speaker B:Our culture says that man's problem is that he has low self esteem and the answer to his problem is to have a higher self esteem.
Speaker B:Ray Ortland Jr. Says this.
Speaker B:He says America is a self OCRACY the church is little different, he says.
Speaker B:We are more American than we think, we are less Christian than we think we are, and all too content with what we are.
Speaker B:He concludes with these words, self absorption is a mark of our age.
Speaker B:And I believe that Ray Ortland hit the nail right on the head.
Speaker B:I came across an ad then in the Strictly Personal section, the New York magazine that I believe summarizes the spirit of her age.
Speaker B:When this young lady put this ad in about herself, she said, strikingly beautiful, Ivy League graduate, playful, passionate, perceptive, elegant, bright, articulate, original in mind, unique in spirit.
Speaker B:I possess a rare balance of beauty and depth, sophistication and earthiness, seriousness and a love of fun.
Speaker B:You might be here sitting and thinking, I can't believe that somebody would post something in the paper about themself like that.
Speaker B:But let's be honest with ourselves.
Speaker B:Why is Facebook so popular around the world today?
Speaker B:Let's get to where the rubber meets a road.
Speaker B:Let's go bring it home.
Speaker B:Why is Facebook so popular in our world today?
Speaker B:Because we have the opportunity to feed our ego with posting something that we hope's going to get a whole lot of what Likes.
Speaker B:It's interesting that they call it likes, because we do.
Speaker B:We want people to what, like us.
Speaker B:And if I can post something, whatever that may be, it massages my ego after I post it, if I look several hours later or I look back from yesterday to yesterday and say, wow, I got a hundred likes.
Speaker B:Wow, I got 500 likes.
Speaker B:Y' all know what I'm talking about.
Speaker B:You say, how do you know about that?
Speaker B:Because I've done it myself.
Speaker B:So don't look like little angels setting out there.
Speaker B:This is where we live.
Speaker B:And to paraphrase Elizabeth Browning's words, how do I love me?
Speaker B:Not the how do I love me?
Speaker B:Let me count all the ways.
Speaker B:And really, that's where we are in our culture today.
Speaker B:It's all about self.
Speaker B:It's all about self.
Speaker B:Exaltation.
Speaker B:It's all about me.
Speaker B:Our culture is preoccupied with self, in love with self, concerned about self, and constantly massaging self.
Speaker B:Most Americans have a very low view of God, and they have a very high view of who, themselves.
Speaker B:It's very interesting that up until the 20th century that traditional cultures have always believed that having too high of a view of self is a root cause for most of the evil in the world.
Speaker B:This is still true in most cultures around the world today.
Speaker B:It's not true in America, but it's certainly true in most cultures still that most of the Crime.
Speaker B:Most of the violence, most of the abuse is because of man's pride or because that man has too high a view of himself.
Speaker B:However, the basis of our education, of the way in which we treat incarcerated prisoners today, the basis of a lot of our legislation in the United States of America and, and the basis of the majority of counseling is exactly the opposite of the consensus of all other societies that have ever lived.
Speaker B:Our belief today is people misbehave because of a lack of self esteem or because they have too low of a view of themselves.
Speaker B:And this belief is deeply rooted in everything that we do.
Speaker B:The reason husbands beat their wives, the reason why people are criminals, is because they have such a low self esteem.
Speaker B:But again, is this true?
Speaker B:Several years ago, Lauren Slater, who is a psychologist, wrote an article called the Trouble with Self Esteem.
Speaker B:In it, she says this last year alone there were three withering studies of self esteem released in the United States, all of which had the same central male message.
Speaker B:People with high self esteem pose a greater threat to those around them than people with low self esteem.
Speaker B:And feeling bad about yourself is not the cause of our country's biggest problem.
Speaker B:She says.
Speaker B:That's the prevalent thought in America.
Speaker B:But the truth of the matter is people feeling bad about themselves is not the biggest problem in America.
Speaker B:It's not what's causing the problems in America.
Speaker B:Low self esteem.
Speaker B:Now again, I know I'm saying something, I'm preaching something that's contrary to what most people think and most of what most of us have been raised with all of our life.
Speaker B:And that is we need to think highly of ourselves.
Speaker B:We need to have a good self image, we need to have a good self esteem.
Speaker B:And the only way we can have a good life, the only way that we can be healthy emotionally is to have a high self esteem.
Speaker B:It's important to understand that there are absolutely.
Speaker B:Now let me stop here and say this and I challenge you that there are absolutely no verses in the Bible.
Speaker B:There are no verses in the Word of God that exhort us to think more highly of ourselves or to build up our self esteem.
Speaker B:There are no verses there.
Speaker B:In fact, the Bible never says that having a low self esteem and is man's problem.
Speaker B:God declares even what secular social research confirms.
Speaker B:And that is man's problem is arrogance.
Speaker B:Man's problem is self orientation.
Speaker B:Man's problem is self exaltation and self deception at the deepest level about who that we really are.
Speaker B:Because of this God Word commands us.
Speaker B:Just remind many places, but I'll remind you of a few in James chapter 4 and verse 10 to humble ourselves before the Lord.
Speaker B:He commands us in First Peter, chapter 5 and verse 5 he says, clothe yourself humbly or with humility toward one another.
Speaker B:For God opposes the proud but gives grace to who?
Speaker B:The humble.
Speaker B:And in Romans 12 and verse 3 he says, God says not to think of ourselves more.
Speaker B:What?
Speaker B:You remember the verse highly than we ought to.
Speaker B:God says, don't think so high of yourself.
Speaker B:Don't be puffed up, don't be lifted up in pride.
Speaker B:This is the exact opposite of the message we get in our culture today.
Speaker B:This is why God says in verse 23, Thus saith the Lord, let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, neither let the mighty man glory in his might, or the rich man glory his riches.
Speaker B:Now that word glory is a very interesting Hebrew word.
Speaker B:It means to give praise to or to boast about.
Speaker B:So God is saying, don't try to get your praise from your wisdom.
Speaker B:Don't try to get your praise from your might.
Speaker B:Don't try to get your praise from your riches.
Speaker B:God is saying to us, stop trying to find.
Speaker B:Now listen to me church.
Speaker B:Stop trying to find your identity, your self esteem as we call it, from your performance, from what you do, from the applause of others and from the applause of self says stop doing.
Speaker B:God's telling these people, these people he's bringing judgment upon.
Speaker B:This is so serious to God.
Speaker B:He's saying, you are looking to yourself to get only what I can give you.
Speaker B:So God says, stop doing this.
Speaker B:He's saying I'm somebody.
Speaker B:Stop saying that I'm somebody because I'm so wise.
Speaker B:Stop saying that I'm somebody because I'm so rich.
Speaker B:Stop saying I'm somebody because I have all this power.
Speaker B:You might say, brother Sam, is God saying that it's something wrong with wisdom?
Speaker B:No, absolutely not.
Speaker B:God said to in James to you lack wisdom to do what?
Speaker B:Pray to him for it?
Speaker B:God is saying, he's not saying that wisdom is a bad thing.
Speaker B:God does not want us to be a bunch of ignoramuses.
Speaker B:He wants us to understand.
Speaker B:He wants us to think wisely.
Speaker B:There's nothing wrong with wisdom and there's nothing wrong with riches if riches don't have you.
Speaker B:There's nothing wrong with power.
Speaker B:There's nothing wrong with might if it's used for the glory of God and, and not for our own selfish exaltation and ambitions.
Speaker B:But there's something radically wrong.
Speaker B:Listen to me folks.
Speaker B:There's something radically wrong with worshiping our wisdom.
Speaker B:There's something radically wrong with worshiping riches.
Speaker B:There's something radically wrong with worshiping power or might.
Speaker B:There's something radically wrong with trying to find our identity or understanding of who we are from these things.
Speaker B:Listen, the way God created us, he made us to worship him and to worship him alone.
Speaker B:Back in Genesis chapter three, when man sinned against God, he lost communion with God.
Speaker B:And folks, it's like it left a big black hole within his heart that he's desperately trying to fill with something so that he'll feel loved and feel like he's somebody who once again.
Speaker B:And the way our sinful flesh tries to fill this big black hole is with the applause of man and with self applause.
Speaker B:We all desperately need to be sprinkled with praise by getting others to praise us.
Speaker B:And through self praise, we feel like that we are somebody once again.
Speaker B:And I think everybody knows exactly what I'm talking about.
Speaker B:You can relate to what I'm saying here this morning.
Speaker B:I mean, I can remember when I was a little boy playing little league baseball.
Speaker B:And when I would go to the park and I would stand at home plating, get ready to bat and hit the ball, I immediately, before I ever hit the ball, before the pitcher threw the ball, I looked where, I looked over in the stands.
Speaker B:I wanted to see if daddy was watching.
Speaker B:I wanted to see if my brothers were there.
Speaker B:I wanted to see if they were watching me when I got ready to hit that ball.
Speaker B:Because if I got to hit that ball, then it would bring about applause and praise to me.
Speaker B:I can remember when I played football in high school, I'd go out on the field and I'd be on defense, be a linebacker, and I'd look up in the stands.
Speaker B:Who was I looking for?
Speaker B:I was looking for my family.
Speaker B:I was looking for my friends.
Speaker B:Most importantly, I was looking for Debbie.
Speaker B:Because I wanted to make a good impression on her.
Speaker B:I wanted their praise.
Speaker B:I wanted their applause.
Speaker B:And if all of us are honest here this morning, we would all admit that we do yearn the applause of man and we do yearn self applause.
Speaker B:Every one of us in our innermost being has a need continually to be sprinkled with praise.
Speaker B:Every single human being is trying to find their identity, trying to build up their self esteem by finding some way to perform, by finding some way to get applause, the applause of man and the inner applause of self to make them feel like that they are really somebody.
Speaker B:But here's the problem.
Speaker B:Here's the problem with that.
Speaker B:Here's the problem with self esteem.
Speaker B:Every human heart is seeking Applause for a great performance.
Speaker B:But the problem is the verdict is never in because our performance is never over.
Speaker B:I hope you're getting this.
Speaker B:The verdict is never in because our performance is never over.
Speaker B:Yes, I might hit a home run as a Little League baseball player on this day, and I might get great applause.
Speaker B:But the next day, for me to feel good about myself, I got to do the same thing.
Speaker B:What?
Speaker B:All over again.
Speaker B:That applause fades away.
Speaker B:The applause of man, the self applause of myself, to myself fades away.
Speaker B:I have to perform the next day to keep myself feeling good about myself.
Speaker B:There's a very enlightening interview with Madonna in Vanity Fair in which she said these words.
Speaker B:Listen to them.
Speaker B:Very enlightening.
Speaker B:She said, I have, and I quote her, I have an iron will.
Speaker B:And all of my will has always been to conquer some horrible feeling of inadequacy.
Speaker B:I'm always struggling with that fear.
Speaker B:I push past one spell of it and discover myself as a special human being.
Speaker B:And then I get to another stage and think I'm mediocre and uninteresting.
Speaker B:I find a way to get myself out of that again and again.
Speaker B:My drive in life is from this horrible fear of being mediocre.
Speaker B:And that's always pushing me, pushing me, because even though I've become somebody, I still have to prove every day that I'm still somebody.
Speaker B:My struggle, she says, has never ended and it probably never will.
Speaker B:Madonna actually understands and is being more honest with herself than most of us are sometimes and most of the world around her.
Speaker B:She sees what this problem is.
Speaker B:She is saying that every time she gets filled up with the applause of man, every time she feels good about herself, that it's vain, that it's empty, that.
Speaker B:That it fades away and it's not there the next day, it's not there the next month.
Speaker B:She's got to get it once again to feel good again about herself.
Speaker B:She has to start her performance all over again.
Speaker B:During Christmas break, Debbie and I went to a musical movie called the greatest showman about P.T.
Speaker B:barnum.
Speaker B:And there was a song, there was one song in this musical that the movie character Jenny Lind sang that really caught my attention.
Speaker B:And the name of the song is Never Enough.
Speaker B:And the words go like this.
Speaker B:All the shine of a thousand spotlights all the stars we steal from the night sky Will never be enough Never be enough Towers of gold are still too little these hands could hold the world but it will never be enough it will never be enough Listen.
Speaker B:When we are trying to find out who we are based on our performance and the applause of man and self.
Speaker B:Applause.
Speaker B:It will never listen, folks.
Speaker B:It will never be enough.
Speaker B:What God is saying in verse 23 in our text is that because our hearts were so lifted up, because they were so self oriented, so self exalted, that he must bring judgment upon them.
Speaker B:So he says, stop doing this.
Speaker B:Let not, do not glory in your wisdom, do not glory.
Speaker B:God says to these people, in your riches, don't glory in your might.
Speaker B:Stop doing that.
Speaker B:God says.
Speaker B:They were looking again at themselves and saying, I'm wise, look at me, I'm rich, look at me, I'm powerful, look at me.
Speaker B:The Danish philosopher Sren Kierkegaard said this.
Speaker B:He gives us a very interesting definition of sin.
Speaker B:I think it goes right along with what I'm saying here this morning.
Speaker B:He says sin, listen to the words.
Speaker B:Sin is trying to become a self without God.
Speaker B:And when you do that, your identity is like a king without a country or one who has subjects who could desert him at any moment.
Speaker B:That's very enlightening.
Speaker B:What he's saying is, he's saying if you build your identity, if you build your self esteem on anything other than God, you are sinning against God and the end result will be a radically unstable self esteem, identity, a radically unstable life.
Speaker B:If you try to get your applause, if you try to get your praise, if you try to build up your self esteem from anything besides God, your identity will always be hanging by a thread.
Speaker B:That's exactly what God is saying here in verse 23.
Speaker B:So you say, what is the cure then for self esteem?
Speaker B:What is the cure that God gives to these people that have been lifted up in pride and self exaltation?
Speaker B:What does God say to them?
Speaker B:What is his cure?
Speaker B:He gives it to us in verse 24.
Speaker B:Listen very carefully.
Speaker B:You have listened to the first part of a two part message by evangelist Sam Wood.
Speaker A:Thank you for joining the fortifying your family podcast.
Speaker A:And if you feel encouraged by today's teaching, give us a follow so we can invite you back and share us on your socials so more marriages and family can be strengthened and fortified through the truths of God's word.
Speaker A:Remember, fortifying your family starts with a strong belief in God's Word.
