“Esteem” is mentioned one place in the Bible, “Forasmuch then as we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Godhead is like unto gold, or silver, or stone, graven by art and man's device” (Act 17:29). It is not plainly there in English, yet it is there. It comes from the Vulgate (common Latin and the word used is “aestimare”). The meaning is not only “think” but an “estimation of oneself.” Hence, the psychological trait, “self-esteem” is an estimation of one’s own value. Psychology teaches that one’s self-estimate should be that he or she has high value, not to God, but to themselves.
People should not estimate their self-worth highly. In the
verse above, the idea is not to estimate God according to our own devices of
which the metrics are given by the gold standard, the silver standard, the
stone standard, or even by the arts. God should not be estimated by any standard
but His own! God’s “worth’ is to be estimated by things unseen. As such “glorification”
of God is the standard that must be used. “Glorification” is perfection,
purity, truth, and eternal among other things. (Sinners are none of those
things.) Not even the gold standard is one of them, although gold does represent
God’s Kingship.
God’s “worth” should be estimated highly. How much is God
worth? He paid the price of the sins of all mankind of all time. He paid by His
very life. God came in the Flesh as Jesus to redeem sinners with His own blood.
How much is God worth? More than all his creatures ever to exist combined. And
you, the highly esteemed one, did not do that; Jesus did!
God experienced death, but He will never die. What will
satisfy Satan? That God be diminished. There are many ways to diminish the
value of God and Satan has tried them all. In all cases, sinners are the “useful
fools” who do the diminishing for him.
The first case of diminishing God is listening to the voice
of Satan coming from the Serpent. God had said, “Do not eat or you will die.”
Satan said, “No you won’t.” Adam and Eve believed Satan over God and all
mankind would die thereafter, if not for one thing — the grace of God. He knew
that Adam and Eve’s futile attempt at redemption would fail, and he discarded
their aprons of fig leaves and replaced them with coats from the skins of lambs.
Those coats would keep them safe in the world until the God would give
His own Flesh for their ultimate protection. By placing an animal over their
flesh, they were humbled and their esteem of themselves was diminished.
The Serpent understood the dilemma. If they ate, Adam and
Eve would perceive themselves as Gods, not false gods but as Elohim, God’s
in the plural sense. Suddenly with the first sin, God was diminished and the
two themselves elevated.
Their self-estimation (Latin; aestimare) had changed.
Before the two were creatures of God and afterward, God became their creature
to serve them handsome food, beauty, and pleasure. Although sex was for
procreation alone, I have heard many people say that sex cannot be wrong
because God made the genders and ordained their intercourse. That “fruit” is readily
consumed because it is twisted fruit from the Tree of the Limb of the Tree of False
Knowledge.
The intent, after original sin, is for people to humble themselves,
as is written, “Because thine heart was tender, and thou hast humbled thyself
before the Lord… and wept before me; I also have heard thee, saith the Lord” (2
King 22:19). God does not hear the arrogant or proud. He hears the humble. He
hears those who have a right estimation of themselves. Just what should
sinners think? I have diminished God by sinning, and I deserve death. How
is that done? By estimating one’s own value over God, or better said, to think
not that, “Every way of a man is right in his own eyes” (Prov 21:2). Rewritten
that is, Every way of a man is how he estimates himself. Eve estimated
herself above Satan’s delusions and Adam, knowing the Law, estimated his
version more than God.
What did Adam and Eve gain by their wrong estimation?
A fig. They satisfied their egos with a mere fig! Egos? Yes, they became the “I
AM” (God) in His face. As the Face of God (John 1), Adam became “Jesus” in his
own eyes. I know Jesus, and Adam was no Jesus, to paraphrase Loyd Benton’s
remark about John Kennedy.
However, Adam was an antitype to Jesus:
11 And not only so, but we also joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have now received the atonement. 12 Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned: 13 (For until the law sin was in the world: but sin is not imputed when there is no law. 14 Nevertheless death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression, who is the figure of him that was to come. (Rom 5:11-14)
Adam was not God. Jesus was. Again, the younger Son would inherit the
identity of God rather than the older as would be the case with primogeniture.
Adam would have been esteemed over God by being the “first born” but had to
submit himself to his younger “brother.” Primogeniture in ancient times made the
eldest son superior to the younger. Throughout the Bible, Jesus diminished the
elder brother in favor of the younger as with Isaac and Ishmael and Jacob and Esau.
God diminishes those who are esteemed more highly, and in the case of primogeniture
it would be by natural selection, not God’s election! God put the esteemed in
their right place as He humbled them.
The humble do not esteem themselves; they esteem God and others. How much?
Greater than their estimation of themselves! Moses failed to esteem himself,
and God elevated him. If he had been proud of that, and he was not, then Aaron,
who was three years older, would have been the patriarch of the Jews. Aaron was
humbled when he was made to serve Moses, and his children, as priests, to serve
the Lord and the other Hebrews.
The reader should get the point; that God diminishes those who estimate
their value too highly. In fact, Lucifer’s problem was self-inflicted: “How art
thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! how art thou cut down
to the ground, which didst weaken the nations! For thou hast said in thine
heart, I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of
God: I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the
north” (Isa 14:12-13). Lucifer esteemed himself so highly and God cut him down.
Lucifer, as Satan, cares little whether others esteem him or not, because of
his great self-esteem.
Could Lucifer have been redeemed? Not with all that self-worth. God cut
down Lucifer from his self-esteem, and look what James said, “Be afflicted, and
mourn, and weep: let your laughter be turned to mourning, and your joy to
heaviness. Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he shall lift you up”
(Jas 4:9-10). To “humble” means to have a modest opinion, or to assign oneself
a lower rank (Merriam-Webster). Humbleness means to have an accurate perception
of oneself. The attitude of a Christian is servant to God and others. That is
lowering their own value. Why would a Christian need to do that? To elevate God
by diminishing themselves. What should have Adam said? “I am dresser and keeper
of God in service to God” (Gen 2:15). Jesus was a carpenter. Adam was a vinekeeper.
He should have estimated his value to what he was. Instead he made himself the “Carpenter”
in that the Hebrew meaning for “create” means “cut wood” (Strong’s Dict.).
Adam did not cut wood or create anything, but he estimated his authority higher
than it was! The Devil did not make him do it, but Adam did so with eyes wide
open. He assumed authority over God and estimated his importance beyond God’s
will for him. Thus, he followed the law of sin and the doctrine of Satan. The point is that the concept of “low
self-esteem” is not mankind’s problem, it is too high an estimation of themselves.
People do not even own their own bodies. They belong to God to use as His
House. Jesus asked, “Know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost,
which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own?” (1 Cor 6:19). Christians
do not know that they are that low! They think of themselves as royalty — priests
of the royal priesthood (1 Pet 2:9), not knowing that royal priests’ roles were
to serve the common man!
The concept has invaded the Christian Church. Mankind’s problem is high self-esteem.
The answer to that is to crucify their own flesh and esteem Jesus; to not worry
about their own high positions as the disciples did, but focus on Christ-esteem.
The modern Church with the new doctrine of self-esteem has become the Antichurch
because it teaches Satan’s will while ignoring God’s Will.
Below I show a Hindu woman esteeming herself unto self-actualization
(picture credit: amazon.com)
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