The Illusion of Self Esteem | Part 2
In a culture obsessed with image and affirmation, we’re taught to look inward for worth and outward for approval—but what if both directions leave us empty? In this thought-provoking second episode, we explore a radically different foundation for confidence—one that can’t be shaken by failure or fueled by pride. Prepare to be both challenged and comforted as you discover where true security and lasting identity are found.
Checkout these other Family Fortress Ministries Podcasts:
TIME FOR THREE daily couples devotional: https://time-for-three.captivate.fm/listen
FORTIFYING YOUR FAMILY: https://fortifying-your-family.captivate.fm/listen
Donate: https://familyfortress.org/donate
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: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, 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:God is saying that the cure for self esteem is God esteem.
Speaker B:God says that you're looking to find yourself in all of the wrong places.
Speaker B:God is saying that I am the only one who can give you an identity that is not tied in any way to your performance, to your wisdom, to your possessions, or to your might.
Speaker B:Only I, God says, can give you the applause, the acclaim that your heart so desires.
Speaker B:And it's not tied in any way to your performance.
Speaker B:God is saying that the cure for a low self esteem is not high self esteem, but God esteem.
Speaker B:And folks, we all desperately need God esteem.
Speaker B:It's no wonder that the apostle Paul loves to reference these several verses in the New Testament in several places.
Speaker B:One of those places is in 1st Corinthians chapter 4.
Speaker B:Hold your finger Jeremiah 9 and turn over to 1st Corinthians chapter 4 and look at verse 3.
Speaker B:And Paul takes these verses, he brings them into the New Testament and he references them this way.
Speaker B:First Corinthians, chapter four.
Speaker B:Look at verse three.
Speaker B:But with me it's a very small thing that I should be judged of you or of man's judgment.
Speaker B:Yea, I judge not mine own self.
Speaker B:You say, what is Paul saying there?
Speaker B:Paul's saying, on the one hand, I don't care how you judge me, I don't care what you think about me.
Speaker B:But on the other hand, Paul says, not only do I not care what you think about me, I don't even judge myself and I don't care what I think about me.
Speaker B:Wow.
Speaker B:You know, sometimes we tell other people, don't worry about what other people think about you, just think about what you think about you.
Speaker B:Paul says, I don't care what other people think about me.
Speaker B:I don't even care what I think about me.
Speaker B:Let me stop and ask you this question.
Speaker B:Is Paul a man with low self esteem?
Speaker B:Is the apostle Paul a man who has low self esteem or is he a man of God that has great confidence in God?
Speaker B:He's a man who has great confidence in God.
Speaker B:When I say that I think of the verse in Proverbs that says through the fear of the Lord is great confidence through the fear of the Lord.
Speaker B:It brings great confidence.
Speaker B:Now all through the New Testament the Apostle Paul is very confident.
Speaker B:So if Paul is not seeking man's praise or applause.
Speaker B:If Paul is not seeking self praise or applause, where is he getting this confidence from?
Speaker B:Look at verse four.
Speaker B:He tells us in verse four.
Speaker B:For I know nothing by myself, yet am I not hereby justified.
Speaker B:But he that judgeth me is the Lord.
Speaker B:Paul says in verse four, does it matter what you think about me?
Speaker B:It doesn't matter what I think about me.
Speaker B:All that matters is what God says about me.
Speaker B:Your opinion doesn't really matter.
Speaker B:My opinion doesn't really matter.
Speaker B:But God's opinion is all that matters.
Speaker B:Paul didn't have low self esteem.
Speaker B:Paul doesn't have high self esteem.
Speaker B:That would make him arrogant or prideful.
Speaker B:Paul has.
Speaker B:Listen folks, he has God esteem.
Speaker B:Now look back with me at verse 24 in Jeremiah once again and God says, but let him that glorieth glory in this, that he understandeth and knoweth me that I am the Lord which exercises loving kindness, judgment and righteousness in the earth.
Speaker B:For in these things I delight, saith the Lord.
Speaker B:God says, the first thing that we are to glory in, the first thing that we are to boast in is that we understand and know Him.
Speaker B:That we understand and that we know God.
Speaker B:Now God's not talking about an intellectual understanding about the things of God, but rather we are to boast, we're to glory in that we know God and have an intimate relationship with God.
Speaker B:That we are the children of God.
Speaker B:God is saying we need to repent of our self esteem.
Speaker B:Understand that we can have God esteem because he is the Lord who exercises loving kindness, judgment and righteousness.
Speaker B:Now notice that the very first adjective that God uses in this list of attributes that he gives us in verse 24 is the Hebrew word loving kindness.
Speaker B:It's a Hebrew word, Hesed I know I've mentioned that many times in my preaching from this pulpit.
Speaker B:And that word loving kindness or that Hebrew word hesed means God's unfailing love, his steadfast love, his covenantal love, his unconditional committed love to you and to me.
Speaker B:What God is saying is if you want to glory or boast about anything, boast in this that you have a God who exercises loving kindness, kindness, judgment and righteousness.
Speaker B:And folks, I'm so glad that he put loving kindness at the beginning of the list.
Speaker B:Because if God looked at me and he judged me and he based my acceptance by him on my performance, I'd be in trouble and you would be in trouble.
Speaker B:But the first adjective that God uses in that list, he says, I am a God of loving kindness.
Speaker B:He says, glory in these attributes because that's what I delight in.
Speaker B:Listen, God is saying that you can get your applause and you can get your approval apart.
Speaker B:Listen to me folks, this is so big apart from your performance or in spite of your performance.
Speaker B:Why?
Speaker B:Because I am the Lord who exercises loving kindness, judgment and righteousness.
Speaker B:Now Paul summarizes everything God is saying in verse 24.
Speaker B:In another place in the New Testament he go back and he rephrases this verse in Galatians chapter 6 and verse 14.
Speaker B:And he rephrases it with these familiar words in Galatians 6:14.
Speaker B:He says, But God forbid that I should glory save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Speaker B:God forbid that I should glory save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Speaker B:Paul says, there's only one thing that I'm going to boast in.
Speaker B:There's only one thing that I'm going to glory in.
Speaker B:I boast.
Speaker B:I glory in the cross of Jesus Christ.
Speaker B:Listen, the secular basis for self image is personal performance.
Speaker B:I feel good about myself because I am good or others think that I am good.
Speaker B:But the basis for a Christian's self esteem is simple.
Speaker B:God exercises loving kindness to us even in our fallen condition.
Speaker B:God does not love us because we are good.
Speaker B:But despite the fact that we are not good, this shifts the focus from self to God.
Speaker B:It shifts our confidence from our self and having self confidence to having good God confidence in our unredeemed state.
Speaker B:We are, the Bible says, the enemies of God.
Speaker B:But God loved us even when we deserve to be hated.
Speaker B:And if you're a Christian here today, you are eternally secure in the love of God.
Speaker B:And you are loved not because.
Speaker B:Listen, you are loved not because of your performance or because of any works or anything you have done, but because.
Speaker B:But Solely because of the loving kindness and the grace of God, we have nothing to boast in.
Speaker B:And the ultimate proof of God's loving kindness is that his son, Jesus Christ died in our place as our substitute to satisfy God's justice.
Speaker B:In other words, Christ got what we deserve and our pride.
Speaker B:Our self exaltation is so atrocious to God and so atrocious in his sight that it must be crucified.
Speaker B:And Jesus was stripped naked.
Speaker B:Jesus was humiliated.
Speaker B:And Jesus was slowly tormented on an old rugged cross.
Speaker B:People, the onlookers who saw him, jeered at him.
Speaker B:They mocked at him.
Speaker B:All this took place at a place called Golgotha, which was probably the city garbage dump.
Speaker B:Why?
Speaker B:Because that is the humbling that our pride deserves.
Speaker B:The cross speaks emphatically to us.
Speaker B:God hates pride.
Speaker B:It is extremely serious.
Speaker B:In God's sight.
Speaker B:The cross strips us of all grounds for boasting and convinces us to make Christ's substitutionary atonement our only boast.
Speaker B:In other words, because of the cross, I can boast in God's love despite the complete absence of my own personal performance.
Speaker B:My self image does not rest on my performance.
Speaker B:It rests on God's love for me.
Speaker B:Despite my failure to perform.
Speaker B:God designs salvation folks to deeply humble us, to crush our pride, and to transfer my grounds for positive self image from self to God and God alone.
Speaker B:The cure for low self image is a cross.
Speaker B:It proclaims both the judgment I deserve and the love of God.
Speaker B:That is my boast and that is my confidence.
Speaker B:And here's the irony as I close the more you boast about him, the more that you applaud our Savior.
Speaker B:The more you acclaim and praise him for what he did for you on the cross, the more that you'll see and understand how deeply he absolutely loves you.
Speaker B:We know as Christians that our old identity and our new identity coexist.
Speaker B:We still have this flesh.
Speaker B:One day we won't, but we do.
Speaker B:Right now we have to deal with this flesh.
Speaker B:But the more the cross becomes real to us, the more that we contemplate on the cross of Christ, the more we preach the gospel to ourselves, the more deeply and intimately that we know God.
Speaker B:Your new identity in Christ begins to overshadow and totally overshadow that old identity.
Speaker B:You move away from having a need, from self esteem, the praise and applause of man, to where your identity is in God and God alone.
Speaker B:And it's then you have God esteem.
Speaker B: This is: Speaker B:And may we all continually remind ourselves that we do not need this year a higher self esteem, but we all desperately need God esteem and that God esteem only comes through the cross of Christ.
Speaker B:God forbid that I should boast except in the cross of Christ.
Speaker A:Thank you for joining the Fortifying youg Family podcast 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 families 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.
