Tag: self-improvement

Someone That I Used to Know

Do You Ever Wonder Who You Were Meant To Be?

“There is nothing noble in being superior to your fellow man; true nobility is being superior to your former self.” ― Ernest Hemingway

When we experience hard times in our life, it gets difficult to imagine that we are truly becoming who we are meant to be. I often think with regret about bad decisions I’ve made. Don’t we all? I have friends who can’t seem to move on from terrible events that have struck them off course. Moving on and becoming our real self is a steep mountain to climb at times.

“How should we be able to forget those ancient myths that are at the beginning of all peoples, the myths about dragons that at the last moment turn into princesses; perhaps all the dragons of our lives are princesses who are only waiting to see us once beautiful and brave. Perhaps everything terrible is in its deepest being something helpless that wants help from us.

So you must not be frightened if a sadness rises up before you larger than any you have ever seen; if a restiveness, like light and cloudshadows, passes over your hands and over all you do. You must think that something is happening with you, that life has not forgotten you, that it holds you in its hand; it will not let you fall. Why do you want to shut out of your life any uneasiness, any miseries, or any depressions? For after all, you do not know what work these conditions are doing inside you.” ― Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet

I’m a sociologist who studies religion. One of the significant areas of American religion is our booming self-help industry. This ties in to religion because so many of these groups approach self improvement using religious language and spiritualistic methodologies.

Many point to America as the birth place of self improvement. Our early history is filled with stories of people who came here to start over again. As our economy cranked up we got even better at “selling” not just new and innovative products, but even ourselves – selves that were constantly improving.

Since America is a nation of religious choices – it’s not surprising to see a wide variety of religious beliefs lining the shelves like boxes of cereal at the grocery store. There’s almost everything you could imagine when it comes to religion here in our country.

When obstacles or difficulties arise, the positive thinker takes them as creative opportunities. He welcomes the challenge of a tough problem and looks for ways to turn it to advantage. – Norman Vincent Peale

Peale himself is one of the “fathers” of American religious self-improvement with his positive thinking theology. Maybe you’re familiar with his most famous successor, Robert Schuller who arrived just in time to use the television for his Hour of Power weekly worship service filled with positive inspiration from sunny California.

Here in Houston where I live we are home to the largest church in America, Lakewood Church. Its pastor, Joel Osteen, is a world famous speaker and author who is thought of by most as a proponent of the prosperity gospel – another American invention. In a nutshell this very popular Christian belief promotes the idea that if one has enough faith (usually demonstrated in giving donations), one can experience God’s earthly blessings (healing and wealth).

These two phenomenon: (1) a wide variety of religious choice and (2) the eager desire for self-improvement, have created a special slice of culture that is unique but sometimes harmful to genuine, meaningful and lasting growth.

  • Americans are trained to be pragmatic – we tend to want self-improvement now
  • As we work hard at building our own redemption, sometimes we can accidently leave God out of the picture
  • When we don’t find what we are looking for at one religious “shop” it’s often too convenient to move on to the next one, and never really address our real problems
  • As we try and fail on the latest self-improvement fad, we can grow cynical about those aimed at helping us with our spiritual identity

Eternal self improvement, is it something to accomplish, working hard at spirituality or is it someone to know, someone to know even more each day?

Christianity doesn’t teach self-improvement, instead it teaches becoming more like the one we follow, Jesus. It sounds more like a relationship than a list of accomplishments (to earn God’s love).

For it’s by God’s grace that you have been saved. You receive it through faith. It was not our plan or our effort. It is God’s gift, pure and simple. You didn’t earn it, not one of us did, so don’t go around bragging that you must have done something amazing. (Ephesians 2:8-9, The Voice)

The person you were meant to be was a person who is friends with God.

  • It’s difficult to keep a relationship going if you never talk
  • Friendships work best when you’re open and honest, right?
  • Our best of friends make us want to sacrifice and be better people – they challenge us
  • Friendship is a process not an event, it takes time
  • It’s always worth it to keep working at relationships that matter, they do bear fruit if you’ll stick with it and maybe pull some weeds

You were meant to be friends with God who never leaves you, never forgets you, no matter what you do, say or think.

You were meant to walk with God in this kind of personal relationship each day.

You were meant to be a person who reflects to others the transformation that’s taking place in your own life.

 

“The only person you are destined to become is the person you decide to be.” 

― Ralph Waldo Emerson

 

 

Walking in Favor

“The Return of the Prodigal Son,” unknown artist, at the Museum of Biblical Art in New York City Jan.. 17, 2008. (CNS photo/Bob Roller)

The parable of the Prodigal Son teaches us about the great joy that filled the house when a son who had run away returned to be reunited with his father and brother.  “For your brother was dead and has come back to life! He was lost, but now he is found!’” (Luke 15:32).

This son that had run out on his true life and was living another life – one he he believed to be right. Sooner or later, he came to his senses and realized he was living in a nightmare. For him, it was never too late to come home. The story also teaches us something important about our status as Children of God. No matter what we do, or don’t do, we are always his.

I hesitate to use the term “favor” here. It’s also used by some Christians to designate those who have sent in their check, gotten their names on the list and are paid up members in the health and wealth club. These Christians have been taught that “favor” is a status that must be constantly earned and can subsequently be lost. The Christian life is one of losing and finding favor with God. A glorious treasure hunt, chasing after a mysterious Santa Claus.

This isn’t what I mean when I write about “favor” and I don’t think it’s what Jesus taught when he described the way that God wanted to relate to us who believed in Him.

  1. Favor with God is a state that we enter into when first we believe. God showed how much he loved us by sending his one and only Son into the world so that we might have eternal life through him. This is real love—not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as a sacrifice to take away our sins. (1 John 4:9-10)
  2. Walking in God’s favor means to remain in His love. We obey Him and follow Him as disciples because we love him (because He first loved us).  “I have loved you even as the Father has loved me. Remain in my love. When you obey my commandments, you remain in my love, just as I obey my Father’s commandments and remain in his love.”  (John 15:9-10)
  3. As God’s creation, we always have our free will. We choose each day to follow as disciples, deny ourselves and carry our cross. Or, like the Prodigal Son, we makes choices that lead us away into our own pits of disaster. Those who belong to Christ Jesus have nailed the passions and desires of their sinful nature to his cross and crucified them there. Since we are living by the Spirit, let us follow the Spirit’s leading in every part of our lives. (Galatians 5:24-25)

When I am walking in God’s favor, that means that I am no longer living a prodigal life but am instead back home at His side, right where I belong.

Walking in God’s favor means that I am decreasing and He is increasing (John 3:30). This is exactly the opposite advice that the self-help culture we now live in is teaching us. Work harder, find the next trick, manage yourself better.

I experience God’s favor when I am near to Him, not away on my own. His favor makes me more like Him, not a better version of myself.

Each day that I walk in God’s favor is another day closer to His great purpose for me and everyone else.  Since you have heard about Jesus and have learned the truth that comes from him, throw off your old sinful nature and your former way of life, which is corrupted by lust and deception. Instead, let the Spirit renew your thoughts and attitudes. Put on your new nature, created to be like God—truly righteous and holy.  (Ephesians 4:21-24)

Slopping pigs doesn’t always seem like a bad thing. I understand they have a great retirement package. There are friends to text and nowhere else to go but up. It is your own journey after all. You make all your own decisions, except when you get hungry or need somewhere to live. Pig keeping may not be where you started out, but it’s where you end up.  It’s where all our own fears one day take us.

“How often have I lain beneath rain on a strange roof, thinking of home.”  ― William Faulkner

The story of the Prodigal Son reminds us that the only way to walk in favor is to go back home.