Steve Simms's Blog, page 117

Self-love & speaking in tongues

The Bible’s “love chapter” says that love isn’t boastful, proud, or self-seeking. A self-love focus seems to contradict that. Self-love can make us forget about our neighbor.

That love, care, and concern you’ve been giving to yourself; give it to your neighbor. I believe that’s why God gave the Second Greatest Commandment. You can “love your neighbor as yourself,” but to “love your enemies” you have to go beyond self-love to God’s supernatural love

Self-love doesn’t like and usually tries to avoid the low place of humility, brokenness, and being “poor in spirit.” Speaking in tongues takes us beyond self-love by sweeping away self-focus and fixing our attention on the risen Jesus.

It’s much more powerful to focus on adoring and obeying the living Jesus than to spend time and effort trying to love yourself. When I speak in tongues, I lose my self-concern as rivers of living water flow out of my innermost being and focus me on Jesus. The more I speak in tongues the more I’m aware of Jesus’ presence and love and the less need I feel to love myself.

When I pray in tongues it’s like I’m spiritually hang-gliding. Jesus is hanging on to me and causing me to gloriously soar with Him.

I believe that every Christian can pray in tongues, but many don’t receive that gift because of reasons like misunderstanding, fear, unbelief, or pride. (I don’t think any person alive on the planet is 100% free of the sins of fear, unbelief, and pride.)

Speaking in tongues is like opening a faucet deep inside you that releases a surging flow of God’s presence as unknown words spontaneously pour out of your mouth. When I speak in tongues, I sense God’s presence and love as if I was in an amazingly anointed agape gathering.

Often, when I wake up in the night, I lay peacefully in bed and pray in tongues silently in my mind. That breaks my self-love-focus and before long I’m asleep.

In 1 Corinthians Paul says “I would you all speak in tongues . . .” He goes on to say he would rather that we prophesy, but that doesn’t negate that he wants all to speak in tongues. Speaking in tongues is like walking on water. In both cases we of our own accord take the action. We walk in faith and God keeps us from sinking. We move our lips in faith and do the speaking and God releases tongues the moment we begin to speak (not before). If Peter had passively waited in the boat until he saw the water become solid, he would have never walked on water.

The most powerful tools in my Christian life are: 1) Hearing and obeying God’s inner promptings, 2) Daily Bible reading with an open heart, 3) Frequently praying in tongues, 4) Praying and basking in the Spirit with other people, and 5) Being quick to confess, turn away from, and avoid sin.

According to the Bible’s “love chapter” I’m not very good at love. I need to rely on God’s supernatural love, not on my self-love. Self-love makes us want to hide our sins like Adam and Eve did. God’s love empowers us to confess, turn away from and avoid sins.

According to the dictionary you can’t have a love relationship with yourself. A relationship is ‘the way in which two or more concepts, objects, or people are connected.'”

If you feel like you’re overgrown with emotional, mental, and spiritual weeds, you’ve been ignoring your soul’s soil. If Christians sought the spiritual fruit of self-control as much as we try to love ourselves, we’d experience more inner healing.

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The New Testament agape gathering called ekklesia

O that Christ’s people
Would regularly
Come together
In agape gatherings
And let God’s love
Freely flow from
Their innermost being
To pour out on Jesus
And on each another
Until the whole world
Says in astonishment,
“Look how they love
One another!”
(That’s ekklesia!)

On Monday morning
Sunday’s gone
And church has faded
From the rear-view mirror.
That’s the time to move
To the passenger seat
And let the living Jesus
Drive you to all
The destinations
That He has planned
For you during the week.

Any gathering that doesn’t lavishly overflow with God’s agape love falls far short of the New Testament ekklesia. Ekklesia sets Christianity free from religious organization and control! People who respond to sincere criticism of church with denial or defensiveness are on the wrong side of history’s Reformation.

Church isn’t the primary time or place to focus on Jesus. Daily life is! Throughout the day let the risen continually saturate your mind and your heart with His presence, power, and love. Let “Christ in you” gloriously surge in and through you in all you say and do.

To pastor is to train and empower people to follow and obey the alive Jesus with God’s agape love. It’s not about giving them lots of religious lectures.

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The central weakness of organized Christianity

E. Stanley Jones who was an American Methodist missionary to India wrote: “This is the central weakness of organized Christianity—it preaches salvation through Christ, but not salvation in Christ.” He also wrote that it is an amazing discovery that people “. . . may have Jesus without the system that has been built up around Him in the West.”

Organized Christianity and Spirit-led Christian rarely work together. Organized Christianity tends to hinder the freedom of the Holy Spirit. I believe that Jesus wants to set Christianity free from the domination of human organization.

Organized Christianity,
Like a closed retail store,
Keeps people
Stuck at the door.
It doesn’t train them
To enter in
And to begin
To actively adore
And fully surrender
To the risen Jesus
24/7/365.

Life’s a trip
That will trip
You up.
Don’t stay down.
Let Jesus
Lift you up.

We can’t
Plead the fifth
And receive
God’s mercy
At the same time.
Mercy begins
When we confess
Our sins.

Have appreciation
For God’s creation
And adoration
For the Creator.

Jesus is the vine.
We are the branches.
It’s time to thrive
And be really alive
Hang with Jesus
24/7/365.

Self-forgiveness and self-love are based on things that you try to do. God’s forgiveness and God’s love are based on what God has done for you. Rely on God working in you, not on your own self-effort.

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She couldn’t forgive herself . . .

An older woman who was in love with Jesus confessed something to me that she had been trying to forgive herself for over many decades. She wept as she told me how as a young adult, she had helped a boyfriend sink the body of a man who he had murdered. I was weeping with her. Suddenly I found myself saying in a bold, firm voice, something like: “You’re forgiven! The blood of Jesus has washed you clean.” I repeated it several times. Her mouth fell open and in a moment of revelation her tears changed from great remorse to great relief. The great sin that she couldn’t forgive herself for was washed away by faith in the blood and finished work of Jesus.

Too many people are using self-effort trying to forgive themselves and failing over and over again, when all they need is to accept, receive, and truly rely on Christ’s forgiveness. If you have confessed any sin with sincere remorse and repentance, I say unto you: “You are forgiven! The blood of Jesus has washed you clean!”

Your being loved and forgiven can’t be based on your feelings and self-effort. Self-love and self-forgiveness are built on the shaky foundation self, not on the solid rock of the risen Jesus. Don’t focus on whether you feel forgiven and loved. Focus on the fact that you are forgiven and loved!

Still having trouble forgiving and/or loving yourself? Apostle Paul’s statement, “I consider my life worth nothing to me,” sounds like he wasn’t good at it either. However, awe-fully basking in God’s love and forgiveness for you is so fulfilling that it will relieve any need you feel to love and forgive yourself.

Self-love and self-forgiveness are like trying to use your own power and effort to remove a logjam one log at a time. However, it’s much more effective to open wide the floodgates of your heart and let God’s love and forgiveness come roaring in and wash your logjam away in an instant.

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Follow God’s heart not your own self-love . . .

Self-focus,
Whether proud
Or disdainful,
Winds up
Being painful.

Self-love
Makes it easier
To believe
Things that deceive.

Self-love is confined and is limited to one solitary individual–you. Neighbor-love is expansive and can reach the whole world. If you get your thoughts, emotions, and desires off of yourself you’ll feel better.

It’s as dangerous to think too high of yourself as it is to think too low of yourself. It’s often more important to say no to yourself than it is to know yourself. Instead of sitting and thinking about yourself, get up and encourage someone else.

“Humble yourself.” Humility is the absence of self-focus. Self-love wants to impress people and/or get their approval. Humility shifts us away from self-focus and into serving people.

The Second Greatest Commandment commands neighbor-love while assuming self-love. If you minimize your thoughts about yourself, you’ll maximize your happiness. My happiest moments are when I’m not thinking about myself.

If criticism bothers you, it’s a sign of self-focus and pride. Follow God’s heart. Humility comes from self-forgetfulness and focusing on God’s forgiveness and mercy, not from self-criticism. Our concept of greatness is an illusion of fame but Jesus said that the greatest shall be the least.

Self-love makes it difficult to fully embrace painful truth. Self-love makes us think that we are competent to run our own life and only need God as an occasional back-up. When you feel bad about yourself that’s an invitation to surrender yourself to the living Jesus.

Try focusing on Jesus instead of yourself. Jesus commands us to love other people, not to compare ourselves to them.

Self-forgetfulness frees you to experience the joy of caring about and serving others. Self-consciousness shuts down joy and peace. Being continually conscious of the presence of Jesus ignites them.

The less you think about yourself, the more you can think about Jesus and other people. The more you forget about yourself and focus on the risen Jesus the more insecurity and self-consciousness fade away. The more we learn to be aware of and care about the needs and troubles of other people the more we forget our own.

Like the Pharisee’s prayer, self-love tends to look for people to look down on so it can feel better about itself.

Loving others,
Focusing on their desires
And feelings,
Requires
That you set aside
Your own.
Be someone who inspires,
Not someone
Who stays stuck
In your own desires.

Love yourself?
“Humble yourself.”
“Turn the other cheek.”
“Take the lowest place.”
“Bless those who curse you.”
“Blessed are the poor in spirit.”
“Blessed are those who mourn.”
“Seek first the kingdom of God.”
“No one is good–except God alone.”
“Hunger and thirst for righteousness.”
“Whoever wants to save their life will lose it.”
“Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow Me.”

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Is “You’re very self-loving,” a compliment?

It’s not a compliment to tell someone, “You are very self-loving.” When you tell someone, “I love you,” you wouldn’t want them to say, “I love me, too.” Your hope is that they will express love back to you. I think God feels the say way. What Christians call “self-love” is too often a subtle form of ego-gratification.

Self-love wants to avoid sacrifice. Love for God embraces it. Jesus commanded us to “Love your enemies.” He never commanded us to “Love yourself.”

When people love a sports team, they set aside their self-focus and adore the team. Surely Christians can do the same for God. Trying to increase your self-love is frustrating, but every openhearted look at the living Jesus will grow your love for Him.

Jesus never said, “Go into all the world and love yourself.” He said, “Go into all the world and make disciples (sold-out Christ-followers).

“Have the same mindset as Christ Jesus.” –Philippians 2:5. Jesus’ mindset was self-sacrifice, not self-love.

Self-love asks the question, “How am I feeling?” A better question is: “How can I open up my life more fully to God’s will?”

Philippians chapter 2 shows how Jesus laid down His life for others. He didn’t cling to His life or try to pamper or protect Himself. Instead, He hung on the cross, suffered, died, and as the Apostles Creed says, “descended into Hell,” giving it all in acts of self-sacrificing love. For me, suffering leads me to freedom from self-consciousness. In my pain, my focus is drawn to God. Instead of trying to love myself, my will, and my desires, I’m compelled to let them go and I cry out to God for mercy, healing, and deliverance thus finding ever-growing dependence on the risen Jesus.

Trying to love myself traps me in painful self-focus. Surrendering to God’s love for me frees me from self-consciousness.

2 Timothy 3 lists the sins of the last days. The first one listed is: “People will be lovers of themselves.” Self-love is a trap.

The human problem isn’t a lack of self-love. It’s self obsession. Many times, the New Testament commands us to “love one another” but it only refers to self-love the few times when it quotes the 2nd Greatest Commandment from the Old Testament (which assumes that we humans already love and prioritize ourselves). “Love one another,” is a command but loving yourself is human nature.

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Self-forgetfulness is powerful. Try it.

My will and God’s will
Are often in conflict
And then I must choose
Who’s will to restrict.
And who’s will to pick.
The more I love my will,
The harder it is to say,
“Not my will,
But Yours be done.”

Self-focus
Blurs reality
And makes me forget
That it’s all
Not about me.

My self-will
Tells me
That it’s a thrill.
Instead, it’s usually
A poison pill
That tries to spill
My inner peace.

Step out of
Your self-will
And you will
Be able to see
Life more clearly.

Think about when you were the happiest. Then you will remember the joy of self-forgetfulness. Self-focus crowds out happiness.

Neither self-loving nor self-loathing brings inner peace but self-surrender to the living Jesus does! When we lay down our will by setting aside our pride and forgetting our self-focus, we can let God take control, Then He makes all things work together for our good like a beautiful mosaic.

The more I forget about myself and concentrate on Jesus the happier I am and the freer I am to love other people. The more I care about and focus on my needs and desires, the less inner peace I have.

Without self-forgetfulness it’s very hard to focus on other people and their needs. When offense rises up inside of you, don’t take it! Instead, choose “speaking the truth in love.”

Without self-focus it’s hard to take offense at what other people say and do. Instead, we can have mercy and compassion for them. Pride is quickly offended; humility rarely is.

Self-focus is a huge obstacle to inner peace. Self-focus is nerve wracking. Christ-focus is comforting.

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God’s love can’t hatch when we’re self-attached.

If you deny yourself
And let God’s love hatch
Deep within your heart
It will strike a match
That will set you ablaze
In the haze
Of this world
And loose the latch
Of self-love
That holds you in bondage.

Ego and pride
Try to hide
In the shell
Of self-love.

The human heart tends to harden like a hard-boiled egg. Self-love is the shell that keeps it closed down. We’ll never be able to fly in God’s Spirit as long as we stay in the shell of self-love. Let God crack your self-love!

Self-love identifies with and defends our desires, emotions, and opinions. It deceptively resists fully surrendering to God. The egg of self-love must break before God’s life can freely emerge in us.

Self-love leads to self-obsession. “Humble yourself.” Step out of your self-spotlight and into God’s glorious light. The shell of self-love blocks God’s light.

Loving yourself is like giving yourself money. If you try to be both the subject and the object of your love, you’re just recycling it. Being self-attached and denying yourself are opposites. We are compelled to choose one or the other. The Cross is all about self-denial, not about self-love. Paul said, “I am crucified with Christ.” John the Baptist said, “I must decrease, and He must increase.”

Self-love turns into self-protection and often causes us to quench God’s Spirit before His promptings have the opportunity to hatch in our heart. To be led by the Spirit is to surrender yourself to God’s control.

Self-love battens down the hatch and keeps us from hearing and obeying God’s voice when He corrects us. God’s love can’t hatch in our heart when we’re self-attached.

Self-love is the shell
That makes us believe
That we’re too good
To go to Hell.

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If you didn’t already love yourself, you wouldn’t . . .

Humans love themselves but we’re not so good at loving God and our neighbors. You love yourself because if you didn’t you wouldn’t:

Want and/or insist on your way.Try to protect yourself.Do self-destructive behaviors hoping they will ease your pain.Care if you were unhappy.Become offended when you’re insultedWant to be healed when you’re sick.Care if you were treated unjustly.Worry about yourself and your health.Feel ashamed when you know you’ve done wrong.Trust your own opinion.Want to fulfil your feelings, your desires, your dreams, and your needs.Physically hurt yourself to attempt to distract yourself from emotional suffering.Want to be praised and appreciated.Take medicine when you are sick.Feel proud of and/or boast about your accomplishments.Work hard to get other people’s approval.Feed, clothe, and bathe yourself.

Self-love is no stronger than we are, but God’s love is as powerful as He is. Self-love is weak and unable to heal our deep wounds and hurts but experiencing the reality of God’s love brings about amazing freedom and inner transformation. Experiencing God’s love for me causes me to forget about myself and concentrate on Him. It doesn’t focus my attention on me.

Experiencing God’s love for even one moment is far more powerful than a lifetime of attempted self-love. God’s love will not only heal you, but if you will get self out of the way it will freely flow through you to others. If we would seek to surrender to God’s love as much as we focus on self-love, we’d live a miraculous life of awe and wonder.

Self-love makes self-surrender difficult, but self-denial facilitates it. Perhaps as humans we need self-denial and self-surrender more than self-love. It’s easy to love yourself, but hard to deny yourself.

Self-love is weak and unable to heal our deep wounds and hurts, but God’s love brings about freedom and inner transformation. Understanding that God loves people is nice, but continually experiencing God’s love for me as an individual is indescribable.

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Church members matter . . .

Church members matter.
They’re not ornaments
In an audience.
They should meet to be
Part of Christ’s body
Directed by Him,
Led by Gods Spirit,
Hearing what He says
And then doing it.

Let’s forget about self and comfort. Let’s focus instead on letting Christ live in and through us. Then instead of sitting through services we can let Him begin to fulfill the two greatest commandments from deep within us.

I hear Jesus commanding two attachments, not three in the two greatest commandments. An attachment to self is presumed by Jesus when He says, “Love your neighbor as yourself.” He’s assuming that you already love yourself, not commanding you to do so. In fact, In the Gospels Jesus tells you to deny yourself, not to love yourself. He wants you and me to surrender our attachment to self so He can replace it with supernatural attachment to God and to our neighbor in our inmost being. We can’t freely lay down our life if we are attached to it. However, detachment from yourself prepares the “narrow way” for the living Jesus to give you His powerful heart, soul, and mind attachment to God and to your neighbor.

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