Do you love yourself enough to stop denying that your sins, your faults, your inadequacies are as real as

your virtues? Do you love yourself enough to stop scraping together self-worth from broken, sinful pieces
of self, and instead to embrace the free gift of the Father’s love for Christ’s sake?

If the world really cared about helping us love ourselves, it would simply preach the gospel. Only the good
news of Christ offers true hope. The message of the gospel is a message of freedom from efforts to love
our broken selves by providing a worth that comes from outside of our brokenness — a worth that comes
from Christ.

Unfortunately, many of us have a problem. We have trouble even liking ourselves. If we don’t like
ourselves, then it is rather difficult to love our neighbor as we love ourselves.

Loving ourselves better means improving our self-image in a way that increases self-esteem.

We know better than to attack our neighbors with words like: “You are not pretty . . . You are fat . . . stupid
. . . no good . . . defective . . . I have my mother’s thighs!”

Why would we treat ourselves like this? It depends on whether we have a good self image or a poor one.

WHAT IS A SELF-IMAGE?

Our self-image is the picture we have in our minds of ourselves.

Our idealized-self is what we think we ought to be.

Our self-esteem is how we feel about ourselves: good or bad.

In 1 Corinthians 15:10 Paul had all three concepts in mind when he wrote: “By the grace of God I am what
I am.”

WHERE DOES OUR SELF-IMAGE COME FROM?

Our self-image is developed mainly from the images of ourselves which are reflected back to us by other
people, our culture, and our God!

1 Corinthians 13:12: Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I
know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

The house of mirrors at the amusement park makes twisted images of ourselves. Some mirrors reflect us
tall and skinny, short and fat, curved, all sorts of combinations.
My father mirrored back to me a great sense of worth: “Roger, you can succeed at anything you try. I see
you loving people, building relationships and working hard. I am so proud of you.”

On the other hand, too often mirrors reflect to us poor images of ourselves: “You are always in the way.
You will never amount to anything. You’re not worth my time. You’re lazy. I don’t know what I am going to
do with you. You’re the devil’s child.”

Culture and society say that if we have beauty, we are a step up on others. If we’re not pretty or
handsome, we can be brushed aside. Many feel forced to nip and tuck in an attempt to raise self-image.

Some base their identity on what they possess. They have an insatiable need to acquire things. When
they don’t feel good about themselves they head for the mall.

Of course, we have reflections from our own hand mirrors of expectations, improper thinking, and faulty
analysis of the people and events around us (Romans 12:3; Genesis 2:25, and 3:7)

Children pick up on all the imperfections around them, and, because of this basic bent toward wrong, they
proceed to misinterpret what they take in, and this affects their self-image.