Self-Realization

Who am I? What defines my self? My family or friendships? My activities, like writing or painting? My thoughts, feelings, or body? Do psychological tests reveal my real self and give me clear life directions?  Or will externals like economics, circumstances like Covid-19 or realities like aging define me?  How do I find my true identity and realize my true self? And what does my faith in God say about  realizing, actualizing, finding and fulfilling my self?

Not long ago, a friend sent me this excerpt from Oswald Chambers,

The initiative of the saint is not towards self-realisation, but towards knowing Jesus Christ. The spiritual saint never believes circumstances to be haphazard, or thinks of his life as secular and sacred; he sees everything he is dumped down in as the means of securing the knowledge of Jesus Christ.
Oswald Chambers, My Utmost for His Highest, July 11

The idea wasn’t new. But it spoke to me —hard.

First, I don’t like my current circumstances. Recently, I’ve been falsely accused of wrong-doing. Chamber’s reminds me that lies and accusations are an opportunity to get to know more of Jesus.

Second, I want to defend, justify, and explain. I want to shake the lies out of my accuser and pour truth into him. Chambers points out that trying to realize my self  (my ideas, opinions, values, motivations and choices, even trying to realize my happiness and peace of mind) by using my own powers to force a truthful Godly relationship or resolution is fruitless. It will not change another person and won’t bring me closer to Jesus.

Third, in this situation, I’m struggling to deny self. I don’t want to deny my self. I want to protect myself from evil. I want to vindicate myself. I want to prove my self right.  I’m nothing like Jesus who trusted Himself to God. Who “emptied Himself of all but love”, even while He refused to compromise with lies and accusations.

Fourth, I don’t like change or conflict. I’m a flight person. I want to run away. But God’s word teaches me that faith in Him, resting in Him, is active, not passive. Trusting Jesus and doing His will is not abdication. I can’t run away. If I want to know Jesus, I must ask Him and the Holy Spirit for wisdom and strength to uphold truth and righteousness—not in self power but in the power of the Holy Spirit.

Fifth and finally, adding up the points above, if I want to know Jesus, I’ve got to die to my self. I’ve got to put myself and the situation into His hands. I must trust Him to vindicate me and establish truth.

Our culture is intoxicated with nurturing self, not dying to it.  Self-concern, self-love, self-actualization, self-care, self-denial, self-discipline, self-interest— the list of self-words fills dictionary columns. As a child of this age, I’ve tried to improve and actualize myself. I’ve done some neat things along the way, but every self-effort to realize my self has failed. Every attempt to build self-confidence has gone ka-put. Even self-determinations to die to self  have been failures too—empty ego trips.

Once, I desperately sought self-acceptance and self-confidence. Criticism and verbal abuse had left me insecure and uncertain. So, I sought identity and fulfillment through externals like work, church and friends. I sought acceptance by achievement and by identifying with people and causes who often used me to further their own vision. No success, no achievement, no praise was enough because it was motivated to establish myself.  Fortunately, through all my self-absorbed, self-seeking inner uncertainty, I kept on seeking God. Very few knew the loneliness or weaknesses hidden within me. During some seasons I was wretched— angry and depressed. During some seasons of my life, I looked good on the outside, very good.

The truth is that only Jesus is good; only Jesus is worthy. I am nothing, a sinful nothing. And He loves me just the way I am. Eventually, that truth brought freedom. I began to see that I didn’t need to realize myself, I needed to realize God and His love.

It was (and still is) hard to learn to that I, my-self, don’t have to do or achieve anything to win God’s love. He already loves me. I don’t need to hide my faults or look good because God knows all about me—and He’s got His own thoughts. And they don’t always agree with what I  or others might think about me. One thing for sure, His thoughts dethrone me. Another for sure thing is that I don’t need to compromise, run away or evade conflict with others because In HIM  is all my real truth, my strength, protection and identity.

Sometimes the issues of self are big, sometimes little. For example, sixty years ago, the family often gathered at my home for holiday meals. I’m was (and still am) a pretty good cook— I can follow recipes and tweak them creatively. I once soaked up praise from my “meat and potato” relatives and took pride in my reputation as the “best” cook in the family.

Then hardship came. I didn’t have space to seat or money to feast large family meals. A relative eagerly and hospitably took over cooking for our holiday gatherings. She’d been silent while I was queen of the kitchen, but after a couple of years, it came out that she wanted the title and applause. I cooked and baked from scratch with fresh ingredients. She bought bread and rolls and used canned and frozen ingredients. Some of her dishes lacked pizzaz, but she successfully established new traditions. Everyone looked forward to her Birds-eye frozen succotash—and laughed about it. By her words more than her cuisine, she let all know that she was best cook in the family.

Slowly, a bit of me died—I still loved to cook and turn out decent meals—but my reputation and identity as star cook was gone. It was a good thing. All my children became super good cooks with super humble attitudes about their skills.  One of my sons, once the protégé of a 5-star chef, humbly said, “Sure, I can make a great meal if I’ve got good ingredients, but Mom can make a great meal out of nothing.” My heart warmed, but didn’t puff up at his words— there was no self-realization in the thread of truth in his praise, because I’d died to self-gratification in cooking. Food prep was no longer an identity or a way to build up me but a gift from God for meeting needs and serving others.

I think it’s important for God-seeking-Christians to know that it’s not the talent, the skill, the gift or activity that needs to be denied. It’s the motive behind our expressions. Is it to build up self or to let the Holy Spirit shine through us as we are? Remember how Eric Liddell loved to run? He gave God glory for making him fast.  God doesn’t want us to kill or deny our natural interests and desires. God wants us to fully realize who we are.

For example, many years ago, I showed a manuscript of my first book to a pastor. He told me to burn it, to stop writing and to write only thank you notes, Bible verses and grocery lists.  He didn’t tell me why, but I obeyed him. He tried, in the name of religion, to kill my natural interests in writing. A few years later, as a Bible School student in another church, the teacher instructed the class to write a psalm. Words poured out of me like flood water pouring through a broken dam.  Why do I write? Because it’s in me, like it was in Eric Liddell to run. So, I write poetry;  it fulfills me and many readers see glimpses of God in some of my verses. At times my reason is self-expression. David’s Psalm’s and Jerimiah’s laments expressed themselves. But my motive is not to glorify myself or realize myself. It is to be myself—as I am. Through Scripture, circumstances, inner witness and the counsel of others, I know that God wants me to write—in expressing myself, I hope my words, the words of a very imperfect woman, will witness to Jesus.

But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us. 2 Corinthians 4:7

In my experience, the self-denials of following Jesus are not ever self-imposed. We deny ourselves by meeting our responsibilities to love others and by doing what the Holy Spirit asks, by surrendering to Him.

We do this first, by believing and doing His word. He tells us, “Do not lie.” If tempted to lie, we deny that temptation. He tells us, “Be anxious for nothing.”  When anxiety and fretfulness come upon us, we turn to Him and ask His help to trust and do our part to resolve the concern. Because He tells us to love Him and our neighbor, we train ourselves to deny covetousness, gossip, and all choices that might hurt our neighbors. We ask His help to align with His word.

Second, we deny ourselves by doing things He asks us personally.  Once He asks, He always helps; He always gives grace and capacity to deny self—to take up the cross and follow Him. Would you like a few personal examples?

When He asked me to stop watching television, my addiction to Hallmark movies was real. I couldn’t break the habit. I kept trying and kept asking Him to help me.  One day, His presence came, I canceled Direct TV and that was that.  It was about the same fifty years ago when He asked me to stop smoking. I couldn’t. I tried and tried, until He supernaturally helped.

When the Holy Spirit put it into my heart to go to Bible School, He knew I wasn’t ready for it, so He came to my help again. School was impossible.  I didn’t have money to buy milk for my children, let alone pay for tuition and books. I was also a proud, intellectually oriented liberal arts college grad— not at all ready for Bible School.

So, to file away my self- pride and feed my family, God gave me a night-shift job waiting on tables in a mediocre restaurant.  Ohh I’d thought that was beneath me. How wrong I was. Several of the women working there were in the same boat as mine—divorcees trying to feed their children on often meagre tips. Working nights, always difficult for me, was only one of the many self-denials needed to wait on noisy demanding tables of  raucous partying groups who filled the restaurant after the bars closed at night.  Through the kindness of my co-wait people and the bus boys, through a difficult boss, harried cooks, and by waiting on customers —both pleasant and patient regulars, who came in for a late supper five days a week and rude, impatient and demanding ones who never tipped, I learned about self-denial. Facets of my pride began to dissolve. Six months later, when the Lord suddenly provided enough money for our family’s food and my Bible school, I enrolled in Bible School not quite as prideful, not quite as full of self as I’d been six months before. I was humbler, more teachable, gratefully ready to serve.

My list of personal examples goes on and on— but more might be too much self. I hope from this smattering of reflections and illustrations you can catch hold of the idea that the key to self-denial, self-realization, self-fulfillment—to every question of self— is never found in ourselves. It is always found in following Jesus and the Holy Spirit. It is not ever in imposing religious disciplines—it is always in relationship to Him. And always, in following Him, in giving our self to Him, the self He created is ultimately (not always immediately) realized and fulfilled. At times gloriously—with great joy!  And He gives love beyond measure—far more than I’d ever imagine to find in my-self.

Prayer: Our Father in Heaven, fulfill us in Your love. Help us realize who we are in You.