08 February 2010
Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. Romans 8:1
In a day when self-esteem has been raised almost to the level of religious worship, it’s hard to keep a sense of balance. There are times in life when you feel less than a worm. You lose your job at the very time in life that you expected things to be going well for you. The company called it “down-sizing” but you call it “lousy luck”! At the very time in life you rather expected to sit back and put your tired feet on the desk, the boss orders you to clear out your desk drawers and you are history with that company.
About the time that you thought your last youngster would be in school, and you could begin to do something other than change diapers and wipe runny noses, you discover that you are expecting again. “Will I ever be anything more than a baby factory?” you ask yourself.
In the past decade we’ve heard that knowing who you are—having a healthy sense of self-esteem—is the key to preventing juvenile delinquency, getting a handle on job advancement, and generally feeling good about life. On the other hand, there is the “worm mentality,” the position that says the importance of self-esteem has been grossly exaggerated. After all, even Paul said, “I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature…” (Romans 7:18).
You are caught in the middle, not knowing what to think. You just know that you hurt, and that you feel pretty worthless, incapable of breaking out of the depression that has taken you captive. Instead of getting up in the morning with a “let’s go out there and get ‘em” mentality, you wake up wanting to stay in bed or crawl into the nearest hole.
Where is God when you feel completely worthless? Would He say, “I agree with you; remember, you’re just the dust of the earth”?
Okay, let’s go back to some basics. Have you ever had the experience of walking across a log which spans a stream when the wind is blowing? Keeping your balance in the wind just is not an easy task. You get tossed one way, then the other. You’re just off balance enough that you are uncertain, hesitant, even fearful. That’s the way it is when the winds of life are gusting and you feel at the mercy of circumstances which you feel have been unfair, unkind, and devastating to you.
In understanding how God views your life, and how you should view it as well, you’ve got to go back to what happened on Good Friday outside the city of Jerusalem. You remember, of course, that on that infamous day Jesus was crucified at the hands of Roman soldiers. Sure, that’s so much history. But the issue involves the question, Why? Why was He there? And did His being there have anything to do with my worth as a person?
The only reason that God allowed Him to come to our earth and die was that God the father considered you to be a person worth saving. He made you in His own image, but sin took us far from the kind of a relationship which God intended. The cross is the balance between the overly inflated opinion that some have of themselves and the “worm” mentality that says you are less than nothing.
I concede that my old sinful nature destroyed the image of God in my life, but I also recognize that being spiritually reborn makes me a child of the Father and lets me know I am not an orphan in the world, estranged, depending on luck or good fortune to get ahead in life.
Knowing that all of us as God’s children go through trials, times of testing, and sometimes dark valleys helps me realize I am not a worm but a son, and because I am a son I can trust the promises of the Father to walk with me and sustain me.
There are times when you’ve got to tell your emotions where to get off, and refuse to believe what your feelings tell you. That’s how you move from uncertainty to faith and move on with your life.
Resource reading: Romans 7:21-8:4