Walking with God & Our Self-esteem

Boosting self-esteem is big business, even in churches. The default assumption is that God wants us to feel good about ourselves. That theory would have seemed incredible to previous generations. John Newton (best known for the hymn “Amazing Grace”) did not agree with the “positive self-image” advocates. Newton wrote, “Depend upon it, if you walk closely with God forty years, you will at the end of that time have a much lower opinion of yourself than you have now.”

My brother is not only older, he is also larger than I. He is at least three inches taller, and for much of our lives he was at least 100 pounds heavier. When he was around me, I am sure he felt big. But one day on his paper route he rang a doorbell and a real, live NBA star answered the door. At 6’5” John Havlicek towered over my brother more than my brother did over me. My brother did not feel so big when he stood beside John Havlicek.

If walking with God boosts your self-esteem, let me suggest that you have another look at this god with whom you are walking. The false gods of our own imaginations may boost our self-esteem; but an encounter with the real God would lead us to cry, “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts!” (Isa 6:5, ESV)

John Newton found grace to be amazing only because he understood that this grace was offered to “a wretch like me.” If he had, like so many today, considered himself deserving, then nothing would have been amazing about it. As Randy Alcorn put it, “When sin seems small to us, grace is taken for granted. When sin seems scandalous to us, grace becomes amazing.”

Newton was right, a long walk with God will cure us of our silly illusion of being good. But it will not discourage us. While meeting John Havlicek cured my brother of feeling big, having John on our team would have given us great confidence had we put together a little playground basketball game. We would have known that we personally were no good at basketball; but we would also have known that we would win the game.

Walking with God is not about thinking ourselves right. It is about knowing that we are not right and knowing that we do not have to be, as long as we stick with Him.