“I’m Good Enough, I’m Smart Enough, and Doggone It, People Like Me!”
That’s how the famous line from Saturday Night Live’s Stuart Smally would go. After you listen to it enough the creepiness of Stuart Smally gives way to the eerily recognizable concept that lies beneath that phrase. We think so highly of ourselves that we’ve actually tricked ourselves into thinking we ARE good enough, smart enough and that people’s affections for us are the measurement by which we find our worth.
You may be thinking “Wait a second! We really are quite good and worthwhile people.” Before we get too far into the controversy, I’m betting you probably also have memories of all those years in school when the primary learning objective was our own self-worth and self-esteem. Still today, many schools wouldn’t dare of holding a competition that would result in any child not recieving a reward for even the most minuscule contribution.
I’m not saying that there’s anything wrong with a little encouragement when thoughtfully delivered. God obviously has thought enough of us to send His own son to die for us so that we can be reconciled to Him. What I am saying is that we don’t need additional training to think more highly of ourselves than we ought. In fact, in America today, there is a great destruction of people that is occurring because we think of ourselves as the center of our universe. We have become what is most valuable to ourselves and we lift our desires over even those of our closest friends and family and God. Our thoughts are more valuable and our goals more important than anything else we can think of. We have begun to love ourselves so much, that we destroy ourselves in the process.
It’s not hard to see the separation and isolation that results from this kind of thinking. Stiff-necked people are bound to eventually get what they want, a life that is so centered on themselves that it alienates all those around them. It’s a process toward isolation and lonliness really. People stream in and out of our lives as they become the next fatalities of our own self-attraction. When others dont think as highly of us as we do, we cast them aside with the rest. It seems we are headed for certain destruction.
In His grace, God is extending love to us that can’t match our own love for ourselves. He’s rescuing us from ourselves. Despite setting ourselves up as our own idols and throwing God aside with all the others who don’t think highly enough of us, He persues us in a love that is unequal…even above our love of self. He loves us through those we know well, who will not feed our overblown egos, but will instead speak truth in love. Through opening our eyes to see the depths of our own self-centered thoughts and actions. Through showing us that what we love most is not the God who created us for a life centered on Him and His worth, but that we truly love ourselves as the center of our desires and world. We have worshipped the created thing over and above the Creator. We’ve taken God from His rightful rule and reign in our lives and substituted Him with the idol of ourselves. If we are really honest, we make terrible gods of our own worlds.
Don’t be fooled into believing that your are good enough. There is One who is good. Don’t settle for the fading worth of self-admiration. Seek humility in being restored to a worship of the truly valuable Christ. Hear the ones you know, respect and love calling you back from the edge of self destruction. Heed their cries and pleas to persue Jesus, who is of ultimate worth and value. Then, be willing and ready to let go of yourself and all your greatness and self-centered desires and persuits. Find true fulfillment in the One who doesn’t need convincing. Jesus IS good enough, smart enough, and doggone it, you might just find you like Him…love Him…more than you love your own life.
“…God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.” – Romans 1:24,25
“He must increase, but I must decrease.” – John The Baptist
“He who is often reproved, yet stiffens his neck, will suddenly be broken beyond healing.” – Proverbs 29:1
Wes Stecker 