Rancho Bernardo Community Presbyterian Church

Matt. 16:13-17, Romans 12:2-3

Last month's Superbowl included an advertisement about an organization whose goal is to help girls develop positive self-esteem. The immediate response of the women at the Superbowl party we attended was quite positive. It made me realize how little we hear about self-esteem in recent years. About twenty years ago the psychology of self-esteem was highly visible. School systems were working on self-esteem curriculum to help children feel better about themselves. Churches sponsored self-esteem seminars. In fact, I recall a seminar I attended sponsored by the Lutheran church in Sitka, Alaska.

The first day of the seminar the psychologist leading it described symptoms of low self-esteem. We took notes on the various ways low self-esteem leads to unhealthy emotions and broken relationships. It can be a factor in social problems such as prejudice, drug addiction, and family violence. When we suffer from low self-esteem we often don't know how to have our needs met in appropriate, healthy ways. Those with low self-esteem may cover by acting arrogant. Most of us not only took notes, but could identify some of those aspects in our own lives.

The psychologist then explained that the most common cause of low self-esteem is the playing in our minds of internal negative tape messages. We carry these messages of criticism from our childhoods. "You are so stupid!" We picked up faulty messages in school when we were teased, "What's the matter with you?" We often don't even recognize how often these taped messages play.

I admit that I had trouble identifying with this portion of the presentation. I didn't think I had any such tapes in my mind. After all, I had grown up in a Christian home. My parents were volunteers who led the church's high school youth group. Our family was very active in the church. I took notes at that point in the seminar, but couldn't relate this to my own life.

On the way home that afternoon I was walking down the street when I tripped on a slightly raised portion of sidewalk. As I stumbled, I heard a voice in my mind say, "You are so stupid! Can't you even walk right?" I literally stopped and thought, "Where did that come from?" I had never realized the negative messages I was playing in my mind. Instead of laughing at myself for making a normal mistake on an uneven sidewalk, I had immediately put myself down. Do you have such a message in your mind?

The seminar leader taught us that one of the techniques used to help those with low self-esteem involves erasing old negative messages in order to replace them with positive affirming messages. Instead of "You are so stupid!" we can learn to hear a voice reminding us that life is good and occasional trips along the way are normal. Instead of putting ourselves down, we can refresh our minds with positive messages. The Bible doesn't deal much with how we feel about ourselves. It deals mostly with how we think. The Apostle Paul wrote to the followers of Jesus in Philippi to think about the things that are positive. Maybe if we learn to think of ourselves the way God does, it will help us feel better about ourselves as well. Let's explore between now and Easter how to replace the old negative tape messages in our minds with the truths that God says about us.

Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God‹what is good and acceptable and perfect.

For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think of yourself more highly than you ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned.

Romans 12:2-3

The airplane was on the runway in final preparations for lift-off when the message came over the loudspeakers. "We welcome our passengers today. You are sitting in a fully automated and computerized airplane; the best and latest technology has come together so that this plane doesn't need any crew to fly. There is no pilot, only a computer. There are no flight attendants since all the services are fully automated. Now lean back and enjoy your flight. Everything is under control, is under control, is under control."

Our older son was diagnosed years ago with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, OCD. This is a condition where the person's brain chemistry causes the mind to get stuck in replaying a message over and over. Our son would get stuck reading a sentence in a textbook and have to read it thirty or fifty times before he could move on. Before we were able to find a medication to help, I recall his many various rituals in order to perform some normal activity. He would touch his cheek a certain number of times and blink his eyes and then repeat it over and over until he could climb out of the car to go to school.

When he turned suicidal near the end of high school we discovered that his suicidal thoughts were stuck in repeat mode. "Life is hopeless," would be repeated a hundred times every morning. "I might as well give up," might become the mantra for weeks at time.

Years ago I preached a message about giving something for Lent. I commented that many psychologists suggest that we can break an old pattern and start a new pattern in the time frame of forty consecutive days. I suggested we give up something bad in order to develop something good in its place. A lady in the congregation told me after church that she wanted to break an old habit. Shortly after Easter she told me that it was working. She had pretty well broken the repeating of a negative tape she had played for years in her mind. She had stopped repeating to herself, "I wish I were dead."

While few of us have OCD or an equivalent debilitating depression, we can get stuck with negative messages. What negative messages you are repeating in your mind?

The Apostle Paul told the followers of Jesus in Rome to renew their minds. The goal was to discover how God sees them as opposed to how they tend to see themselves based on feedback from family and friends. It is possible to have too low a view of ourselves. We might even have too high a view of ourselves. God, however, knows us as we really are. So Paul invited them to have a sober, honest view. He wanted each of us to look honestly in the mirror and see what God sees‹no more, no less.

The Bible tells us some of the things that are true about each of us. We are created to enjoy a future eternity in love and relationship. The Bible says that we are created in the image of God. Jesus came to us "so that we might not perish, but have eternal life" (John 3:16). The Bible says we are valued and loved. "We love because he first loved us" (1 John 4:19). While we are created for joy and love, the truth is that we don't always live up to what could be. In other words, we fail to live perfectly in God's love. This is why the Bible reminds us that "all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God" (Romans 3:23). Even thought we fail, the Bible says God offers forgiveness and invites us to a fresh start. "If we confess our sins, he who is faithful and just will forgive our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness" (1 John 1:9). "For if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new!" (2 Corinthians 5:17).

When we renew our minds with these positive truths, we can begin to play new tapes in our minds. Our self-esteem will then be built on the truth of how God sees us. We don't need to think too poorly or too highly of ourselves. We can come to a place of humble honesty that celebrates our gifts while simultaneously recognizing our limitations.

This Lenten season I am inviting us to look deeply into our own hearts and see what faulty tapes we may be playing in our minds. Do we have too high or too low an opinion of ourselves? How does God see us?

Fred Craddock and his wife, while vacationing in Tennessee, stopped to eat at a restaurant, when an old man walked up to their table and struck up a friendly conversation. On discovering that Fred was a preacher, the man told his story of how he caught the infection of Christ's love.

He was born an illegitimate child in the days when bastard children were harshly judged for being born. He hated going shopping with his mom on Saturdays. People in the store would comment just loudly enough for him to hear. "I wonder who his daddy is." He became aware that many in the town studied his face to try and identify his unknown father.

The man recalled that in elementary school he hated to face the torment and teasing of others on the playground. He ate lunch alone and avoided others at recess. As a young teenager he became curious about a new preacher he'd heard about in the local Christian church.

For the first few weeks this young man slipped in late, sat through the sermon and then departed early. On about his sixth or seventh visit he was so captured by the message that he forgot to slip out during the closing hymn. Before he realized what was happening, the church crowd filled the middle aisle and he couldn't get away.

He was trying to press his way out when a large hand grabbed his shoulder. He looked up at the bearded preacher who was holding him and studying him. The preacher in a booming voice said, "Well boy, you are a child ofŠ" The boy was horrified. He was sure the preacher was going to kick him out of their church. There's no room for you here, bastard. But the preacher broke into a smile and repeated his sentence. "Boy, you are a child of God. Why I see a striking resemblance." Then he swatted him warmly on the rear and said, "Now, you go claim your inheritance."

When he finished his story, Fred Craddock asked his name. The man responded, "My name is Ben Hooper." Fred recalled hearing his dad talk about how the people of Tennessee had twice elected as their governor a bastard named Ben Hooper.

No, that's not what the people of Tennessee did. They elected as their governor a child of God.

What tape messages do you need to change in your mind between now and Easter?

What tape messages do you need to change in your mind between now and Easter?

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

1. Do you think you are basically likeable and capable? Why or why not?

2. Whose opinion would you respect if he or she was asked to give that assessment of you? Why?

3. We confess that as followers of Christ, we are both sinners and saints. How do these ideas fit together?

4. What "tapes" would you like to change?