I’m a very nice person. I like to be liked. I’ll bring you flowers when you are sad. I will bake you muffins when you are lonely. I will tell you I’m praying for you and truly will. I will send you a letter in the mail to encourage you. I’ll text you to tell you that you are doing a great job. I’ll play with your kids and really have a good time with them. If you ask me to hang out, just name the time and place. I'll be there.
When I was a 2nd grade teacher I used to love watching the popular cartoon, Recess. I liked the characters and how they represented elementary school. There was a particular episode that I’ll never forget. T.J, the main character and “hero” of the series was met with an unexpected challenge. He discovered that he was not liked by another kid on the playground, Gordy. He spent the entire 10 minutes of the episode stressing over how to get Gordy to like him. In the end, Gordy still didn’t like him.
I think I’m a lot like T.J. in this episode. I spend a lot of worry and exhaustion in my attempts to be liked. Even now I am struggling because I’m hoping you’ll like me more after you read this.
I have been rereading the book, Beyond Ourselves by Catherine Marshall. In her chapter devoted to ego slaying, she writes
“A misconception that many church people have is the theory that with Christ’s help we can become “nice people.” This teaches that the good in man can be separated from the bad, and the good developed. It says that education is the answer to most problems. It admonishes us to self-effort, human endeavor. Our lives are to be “man’s best with God’s help.”
I wonder. Have I stumbled on to this way of living? Am I trying to live my best with His help? Am I so consumed by becoming “nice people”? I was just told yesterday that I was so nice in comparison to the one giving the compliment. And in our conversation, I thought she might be right. I thrive off of these sort of comments, these compliments to my ego these desires to be admired. And then I find myself quick to criticize and in turn be so sensitive to criticism.
In C.S. Lewis’s book, Beyond Personality, here’s what Christ requires.
“Give me all. I don’t want so much of your money and so much of your work-I want you. I have not come to torment your natural self, but to kill it. No half-measures are any good. I don’t want to cut off a branch here and branch there, I want to have the whole tree down. I don’t want to drill the tooth, or crown it, or stop it, but to have it out. Hand over the whole natural self, all the desire which you think innocent, as well as the ones you think wicked-the whole outfit. I will give you a new self instead. In fact I will give you myself; my own will shall become yours.”
This sounds so severe. He doesn’t candy coat anything or try to make you feel better about the “good” you think you’ve done.
The problem is that I’ve found someone who doesn’t like me. And apparently it truly bothers me. It has kept me even from sleeping some and I’ve spent a good amount of prayer over her figuring out she should probably understand how great I am. I keep finding myself trying to win her approval. And like T.J. I have tried to trap her into nothing but to boost my own ego. These things I find so important to my life are getting me off track of what Christ is asking me to do. I have not bowed my knee to Him but unfortunately to myself.
To think that I am so good to be compared with the goodness of God is my pride. I am on the verge of seeing myself that way because I have an over-consumed mind with a wanting to be “liked” seeking to be “liked” and working to be “liked”.
I need to recognize the truth about who I am.
Psalm 8:3-9
When I consider your heavens,
the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars,
which you have set in place,
what is mankind that you are mindful of them,
human beings that you care for them?
You have made them a little lower than the angels
and crowned them with glory and honor.
You made them rulers over the works of your hands;
you put everything under their feet:
all flocks and herds,
and the animals of the wild,
the birds in the sky,
and the fish in the sea,
all that swim the paths of the seas.
Lord, our Lord,
how majestic is your name in all the earth!
Who am I that You are mindful of me?
The God of the universe who loves me.
My Creator who bends down to listen to me.
My Redeemer who provides for all my needs.
My Shepherd who leads me through the valleys and by quiet waters.
My Savior who forgives me and invites me to experience His presence.
And then in all His power and sovereignty, He humbled Himself and chose the weakness of the cross for me.
Though he was God,
he did not think of equality with God
as something to cling to.
Instead, he gave up his divine privileges;
he took the humble position of a slave
and was born as a human being.
When he appeared in human form,
he humbled himself in obedience to God
and died a criminal’s death on a cross. Philippians 2:6-8
Lord, please do your work in me. Kill me, bring it down, have it out, take the whole outfit.
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