What role has low self-esteem and self-rejection played in your relationship to others and to God? This question forms the thesis of Brennan Manning's book titled "Abba's Child." In this book Manning explains faith as the courage to accept acceptance. It is the courage to come our of hiding, to share with raw honesty where you are and trust God in Christ Jesus accepts you in your brokenness.
Pascal wrote, "God made man in his own image and man returned the compliment."
If we feel hateful towards ourselves, we assume that God feels hateful toward us. But we cannot assume that He feels about us the way we feel about ourselves. After all, He is God. It takes a conversion of enormous proportions to accept that God is unrelenting in His love, tenderness and compassion towards us just as we are. God weeps over us when shame and self-hatred immobilize us.
The sorrow of God lies in our fear of Him, our fear of life and our fear of self. He anguishes over our self-absorption and self-sufficiency. Our skepticism and timidity keep us from belief and acceptance, however, we don't hate God, but we hate ourselves. Yet the spiritual life begins with the acceptance of our wounded self.
"Like runaway slaves, we either flee our own reality or manufacture a false self which is mostly admirable, mildly prepossessing, and superficially happy. We hide what we know or feel ourselves to be (assuming such thoughts and feelings are unacceptable and unlovable) behind some kind of appearance which we hope will be more pleasing."
Many people are defeated by the most psychological weapon that Satan uses against them. This weapon has the effectiveness of a deadly missile. The weapon is low self-esteem. It is a gut level feeling of inferiority, inadequacy and low self-worth. It shackles people in spite of a wonderful walk with Christ and experiences and knowledge that speak to them the truth which should be accepted but isn't.
"The greatest trap is not success, popularity or power but self-rejection. They are seductive but are the after effects of a self-rejection that is larger and greater. When we have come to believe in the voices that call us worthless and unlovable, then success, popularity and power are easily perceived as attractive alternatives to the problem of self-hatred. As soon as I am rejected, left alone or abandoned, I find myself thinking, 'Well, that proves once again that I am a nobody. I am no good and deserve to be pushed aside, forgotten, rejected and abandoned. Self-rejection is the greatest enemy of the spiritual life because it contradicts the true and sacred voice of God calling to us in love" (Henri Nouwen).
Whether in a small group or alone in your reading chair, you will find Manning's book a refreshing approach to self-discovery, and hopefully, a discovery of God's love for you.
