Wouldn't it be great if all you really had to do is click on that link and *POOF!!!* there it is: a weblog that contains words of wisdom so deep, so profound, so extraordinary that your whole life is changed by an instant infusion of just a simple point and click?
At this point, I should probably say something extremely profound, and yet so simple, so that the reader might walk away from this blog thinking, "Wow. That guy said it all, man." And wouldn't it be just like what you would expect if I were to simply say, "Just be yourself"?
What if I didn't?
I mean...I'm sure it would be no skin off anyone's nose if I didn't, and anyone could just as well say, "Suit yourself, it's your blog." But what if I said something like you SHOULDN'T be yourself? I think there would be a great outcry of replies ranging from a nice pleasant, "Well, we'll agree to disagree, " to a rude, "You can go straight to the living hell because I like myself!" Maybe you do like yourself for who you are. Maybe you don't. Maybe you've struggled with self-esteem. Maybe you haven't (Read: struggle with it constantly and try to hide the fact you do). It's a universal problem, and one with which I'm quite familiar and to which I'm not immune.
But what if one has tried being oneself, only to find he or she just doesn't like what they see? What if one is a murderer? Should he just be himself? I bet I know what many of you are thinking, but I disagree. You are likely thinking, "If someone is a murderer, then they aren't being themselves." But this assumes an absolute, universal standard of what it means to be oneself. Then we are no longer individuals who can state who we are; we have to conform to a list of universal absolutes--the exact thing people quite often object to when they say, "Be yourself." So what of those who have "been themselves," only to feel like they are beside themselves?
I think of a young man just a year or two older than myself that I knew when I was in college. He was incarcerated at a maximum security prison for murder. He had some attending circumstances, but when it comes down to it, he killed a man--with his very bare hands. He told me that he simply held the guy under water until he could feel the man's very life slip away from him leaving nothing but a lifeless body. It was one of the creepiest feelings I've ever felt--to sit right there eye to eye with a man who had taken the life of another. And even though it was not me who committed the crime, I couldn't help but feel just a little dirty for having heard it. I can't even begin to imagine how he must have felt.
I guess that is why I would have a hard time counseling him with words like, "You need to realize that that is who you are and be happy with who you are. Be yourself."
This man began following Christ in the 90's. Having come to Christ and finding that Jesus not only takes your sins away, but gives you a NEW life has been the good news that I feel I could always counsel him with. He can walk a new life now, knowing that God, in Christ, has forgiven him. Even though he may never walk a free man in this life, somehow the promise that God has granted him a full pardon is his comfort; it is his hope. Now he spends his days more or less praising the God who set him free on the inside. Oh, yes, he struggles with the guilt of his past--much as we all do, but in the long-run, he can count on God's grace. And if God has forgiven him, then he can forgive himself.
Most of us, though, can't relate to his plight. He was, after all, a murderer. Most of us who read these weblogs are probably not ex-cons. We are likely people who have lived a fairly moral life-style--nothing any other red-blooded human wouldn't have done. Some of us might have been in trouble with the law--nothing more than a minor infraction, though--perhaps a misdemeanor. We seem to think we pretty much have it all together.
Can I shatter that illusion? I'm not sure I can. Not on a weblog, anyway. I'm quite sure that our jadedness to the problems that reside in our own hearts will only be drawn out as we get dirt honest with ourselves about ourselves. Hint: Pride is that which stands as the biggest roadblock to recognizing our problems.
When one comes to that point, though, of finding that self-esteem isn't fraught with all the comforts people so commonly taut, it is then that one can properly deny oneself. We can then see ourselves as God sees us. And if we could see ourselves as He intends and accept what he has said about us as we stand in Christ, then life takes on a whole new meaning--with a new beginning.
It turns out the life we've always wanted is not found in focusing on our own lives, but on losing them to gain the Life that comes from Him in Whom we live, move, and have our being.
Just be your God-intended self.
