How Is Your Relationship with 'You'?

Newsletter Article

Bob Bodenhamer, D.Min.
 

“How Is Your Relationship with ‘You’?”

Since the birth of the “me” generation in the 60’s, much has been written and said about our “self-image” or our “self-esteem”.  Oft times we hear that someone has low “self-esteem” and that in turn is used to excuse some ungodly behavior.  Maybe we should ask them how low their self-esteem is. Is it down to their knees?  Is it down to their ankles? Maybe it is on the floor – really low. 

Forgive my absurdity but I do wish to make a point for our so called “self-image” or “self-esteem” isn’t some “thing” that we can put in the back of our pick-up truck.  “Self-image” is indeed about the image or the movie that we run in our minds that we reference in identifying how we view ourselves. “Self-esteem” is, likewise, not a “thing” for it will not fit in the trunk of your car; “self-esteem” is a product of how we “esteem” ourselves – it isn’t a noun; it is a verb.

When we function off the “Bitter Roots” of the past by running a movie inside our head of those childhood hurtful memories and then identify with them, we will of course have a poor “self-image” and we will “esteem “ourselves poorly.

But wait a minute – who we are is not about us. Who we are is about the Christ who lives within us. I encourage you to start relating to and identifying with the Christ in you and not from those experiences of hurt and trauma from your childhood. We will then esteem ourselves as did Paul who writing from a prison cell said, “I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me.”  (Phil. 4:13). Paul’s “self-image", Paul’s “self-esteem” came from Christ and not from the Bitter Roots of his past (such as persecuting the Church).



©2006 Bobby G. Bodenhamer, D. Min. All rights reserved.