Last week Pastor Wes taught us all about How Loving God Can Change Your Life. This was the first and most important commandment that Jesus taught about in Mark 12:28-31: …And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbour as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.” This teaching about loving our neighbour, which will be covered in future weeks, contains two words that are often overlooked: ‘as yourself.’
You must love yourself, not hate or downgrade yourself, if you want to be able to spread love in the world. Of course, we must not be self-centered and egotistical, but we must become confident in our God-given identity. Some of the greatest leaders in the Bible, for example Moses and Gideon, had to overcome a poor self-image before they could really help others. Actually, they really needed some convincing that they were the leaders that God said they were. But to love yourself is not always easy to do if you feel bad about yourself for some reason or people have put you down. By looking at some simple Bible-based teaching, we can discover how we can love ourselves as God intended.
1. You can love yourself by understanding that you are made in the image of God (Genesis 1:27; Jeremiah 1:5; Jeremiah 29:11; Ephesians 2:10)
2. You can love yourself when you discover how much you are loved by God
2.1. You can know the great love of God the Father (1 John 3:1)
2.2. You can receive God’s love because the Son gave His life for you (John 3:16; Hebrews 12:2)
2.3. You can experience God’s love through the work of the Holy Spirit (Romans 8:14-17)
3. You can love yourself when you receive a new identity in Christ (Isaiah 52:14; Isaiah 50:6; Matthew 26:67; 2 Corinthians 5:17)
Apply
Do you believe you are planned, purposed and made in God’s image? God made you in His image, meaning that men and women are in some senses like their eternal and powerful creator. We have been given creativity and authority to rule and to be fruitful. We are not born to fail but born to succeed. Every person is special to God. Everybody has a God-given purpose. You have been born with a unique make up and personality. Every individual is known to God, and before you were even born, God knew you (Jeremiah 1:5 and 29:11). Maybe you’ve been told that you’re a waste of space, you’re worthless, or that you’re a mistake. Well the Bible doesn’t see you like that at all. You can be confident that before you were born, God invested far more potential in you than you may have realised. No matter what bad circumstances or disadvantages you have experienced, you have a destiny to be a victor not a victim. God has got so many good things in store for your future. Your soul - and every soul - matters to God. You are not an accident. You are not a random product of evolutionary process. You are not just a statistic, or 1 in 8 billion. You are not a mistake (Ephesians 2:10). To be able to love yourself, and to be able to show that love to other people, means that first you know you are made in the image of God.
Have you discovered how much you are loved by God, your Heavenly Father? Do you think you have to earn God's love, or that He will stop loving you if you make a mistake? You can only truly love yourself as God intends you to when you receive a revelation of God's love for you. His love is not far off and distant - it’s a personal love that the Father wants to give to each person (1 John 3:1). God’s great love for each one of us was shown through Jesus’ death and resurrection at the Cross (John 3:16). Whilst we were far from God, separated by our mistakes and sin, God sent His only Son, Jesus Christ into the world to rescue us and to bring us into close relationship with Him. God’s love cannot be achieved, it can only be received. It is a gift. God’s love for you is infinite, unconditional, and available for you today and every day. It will never run out. Receiving God’s love does not depend on you being perfect, never having messed up, or any other circumstance of your life. It just depends on you accepting God’s great gift of love and eternal life, shown by Jesus’ death and resurrection for you at the Cross. The Holy Spirit will help you to know that through His great love, you are not only a child, but you are an heir of God and co-heir with Christ (Romans 8:14-17). You are not a slave to live in fear, rather you can know God and all the blessings of His love and a relationship with Him as His beloved son or daughter.
Do you love yourself? How do you see yourself? God’s original identity for humans has been disfigured by sin, that is our wrongdoings and independence from God. But at the Cross, the face of Jesus was terribly disfigured so that we can have our identity fully restored (Isaiah 52:14). Jesus’ face was beaten, spat at, and the beard ripped from His face (Isaiah 50:6 and Matthew 26:67). His image was marred so that yours could be made beautiful and so that you would see yourself as God sees you. When you have a revelation of what Jesus did at the Cross for you and experience the love of God, it will totally change how you see yourself. You can love yourself when you see yourself as God sees you, and when you understand where your true value comes from. Your value is not due to who you are, where you’ve come from, what you’ve achieved, or what material possessions you own: your value comes from being a beloved child of God. You are a person of great worth and potential made in the image of God. You are greatly loved by God and you can have a new and confident identity as a son and daughter of God. Today, stop focusing on past disappointments, failures or broken relationships that robbed your self-image. Today is the day to reject the hurtful words that have been spoken over you. Today is the day to start loving yourself. It’s time to get right with God and live a new and positive life (2 Corinthians 5:17).
