What is? What is? What has been revealed for counseling? Vivical counseling will grow you from brokenness to wholers. I think what you just said made me look at those scenarios differently. God replaced all my job with a beautiful light. God's really been changing the way that parent, my children. The most amazing thing is the sufficiency of his word. This is Transform. And now your host, assistant professor of biblical counseling at the Masters University and certified biblical counselor, Dr. Greg Gifford. Okay, welcome to Transform. My name is Dr. Greg Gifford and today I actually have a special guest with me, Julie DeVore. Who is Julie? Let me try to get all of the credentials that you have. Former student of mine here at the Masters University, Bachelor of Arts in Biblical Counseling went on to do a Master of Arts in Biblical Counseling and be certified by the Association of Certified Biblical Counselors. So ACBC. She currently serves as a student life coordinator and guidance counselor for a private Christian school in the Antelope Valley. And you were an RD here at Masters for four years. Five years. Five years? Yeah, cool. So first of all, welcome to the show. Thank you. Thanks for having me. We are talking through self-love. And I know that's probably a tricky topic to grow an expertise in. Yes. Julie, the expert in self-love is here. It's like, wait, no, not like that. But you actually have been teaching on this subject. You've written on this subject. Your thesis was on this subject of self-love. And it's kind of a subject that's assumed it seems. Like if we were to say you have no self-love, there's a negative view or self-conceptualization. It's like, yeah, what's the matter with you, man? Like you got to think that through. So that's our topic today. We're actually going to break this down into multiple episodes. So listeners, it'll be today. And then we'll have one more episode released next week. So can you kind of get us going into what got you started interested in studying self-love? And where do you see it in society today? Yeah, I love that question. So I started studying self-love about three years back. Because I personally had questions, especially as like a woman. And I was working with college students and wrestling with my own thoughts of insecurity and worth. And asking like, how do I think about this? And I was seeing self-love everywhere. Like you go to Target and you literally cannot buy a stationary without saying love yourself. And then I was seeing like larger mannequins. And I was like, that's cool. But then it was like, I was only seeing larger mannequins. And then it was like, there was a self-love game. And then there were podcasts. And then it was coming up in the music that we listened to like Andy Grammar and Miley Cyrus. They all and so many others have music about loving yourself. And I remember thinking, I like it. I like this narrative. I want to love myself. Sure. I want to feel confident. And I would want that for my friends and for my family. But there was something in me that I was like, but how do I think about this as a Christian and no one's talking about it? We're just accepting self-love without using discernment. And so I was like, I want to do a deep dive on self-love and body positivity. It sounds interesting. And I want to know how to think about it personally. But then I want to help the other people in my life know how to think about it. Yeah. So I started like looking into books and podcasts and articles and researching both self-love and body positivity. And I actually started out studying body positivity. But there wasn't as much research on that. And then I realized body positivity is just one branch underneath the whole arc of self-love. So I'd love if it's okay to kind of like read some quotes that I found about self-love. Because I didn't realize how ingrained it was in like the self being divine. And then we can kind of break down how are we thinking about it? Because what I'm going to say it right now. What I don't want listeners to do is to turn the podcast off right now. Because they're like, oh, we're going to get to the end. And they're going to be like, you should hate yourself and load yourself. And Christians don't care about my feelings of insecurity. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you for that. Because sometimes I think total depravity leads us to say something like, I'm a worm. And I deserve death. And I'm a spider. And it's like, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, and it really is burdensome for some that are wrestling with like, how do I conceptualize myself? So I thank you for having that balance. Yeah. So please stay tuned to the end of this podcast episode and the ones coming forth. Because I think you'll actually find there is greater self worth when you know who God is and what he says about you, than you pursuing self-love. And so there is hope for your feelings of worthlessness. There's hope for your feelings of purposelessness. But self-love isn't that. So let's let's talk about self-love. Um, the brain and behavior research foundation, they define self-love as the following. I'm going to read a little more lengthy quote, but I think it's important. They say self-love is the state of appreciation for one's self that grows from the actions that support our physical, psychological and spiritual growth. Self-love means having a high regard for your own well-being and happiness. Self-love means taking care of your own needs and not sacrificing your well-being to please others. Self-love means not settling for less than you deserve. Self-love can mean something different for every person because we all have many different ways to take care of our self. End of quote. And then in the book, uh, self-love, the dynamic force of success by Robert Schuller, he says another really interesting thing about self-love. He writes that self-love is a crowning sense of self-worth. It's an enobling emotion of self-respect. It's a divine awareness of personal dignity. Keep that in mind. It is what the Greeks called reverence for the self. It is abiding faith in yourself. It is sincere belief in yourself. It comes through self-discovery, self-discipline, self-forgiveness, self-acceptance. It produces self-reliance, self-confidence, and an inner security calmness the night. Self-love is expressed in understood in many ways. End of quote. Okay, so there's a lot that goes into that because as you were reading those, I was thinking, "Me first, making sure I'm taking care of." I was also thinking of what, it's more like a relational psychological term, boundaries. You know, like, me first, you got to protect me, make sure no one hurts me. And then you have the body positivity stuff that goes into that. Right. What do you, any things you want to clarify that we're not saying out of that? You know, or how do you define self-love? Is there a way that you would say, "Yes, this is what they're saying, and this is what I think would be a helpful way to summarize that?" Yeah, so let's differentiate self-love with what popular society would say when we see self-love like on a t-shirt. They are saying, like, this is personal, divine dignity, and putting yourself before everyone else. Right? They literally said, "No sacrifice for others." You put yourself first, self-forgiveness, self-acceptance. What is the one word that was devoid in that, in both of those entire paragraphs? Yeah, right. God. There's no mention of God. And I think any type of worldly philosophy that can say two paragraphs and not mention God in the conversation of worth and purpose is entirely missing. Is Schuller the, like, crystal cathedral guy? Is that who he is? Wasn't he a Christian pastor? Yes. The love of your neighbor. Yes, so he's a Christian proponent of self-love, and which is why I was so fascinated when I started the study because I was like, there are Christians who are encouraging people to love themselves while also missing the entire purpose of man-god, of a man-mind, which is to glorify God and pursue a life that promotes his glory and not my own comfort. I think, like, in short, isn't it such a pathetic reason to live if the main purpose of your life is to love yourself and to like yourself? Like, God put me on earth for a better purpose than to feel good about myself. Yeah, right. And if that doesn't, like, that doesn't get me on a bed on a Tuesday morning. I think that's the challenge that we're all facing because it almost feels negative. And it's like saying, I smoke cigarettes. And like, when we say that in modern culture, people are like, gross. You hate your body. Like, who smokes cigarettes anymore? Like, when we say that, that's almost what it's like, yeah, self-love. I question self-love. People are like, oh, like, what's the matter with you? Right. And what it's doing is, so you feel unhealthy for not focusing on self-love and all of the subcategories that come with that. And I would say it would be unhealthy. Like, when I have someone come into my office and I do counseling, like, I don't, and a girl has low self-worth and tells me I hate my body. Like, that griefs me. But as a Christian and as a sister in Christ, like, something is wrong. But what's wrong is her view of God, which then affects her view of self. But you can't start at the view of self. If you reorient your perspective of God, the byproduct is that it will reorient your perspective of self. Money quote, I wish we could do a call out at this episode. It's shifting the focus. Both of those definitions are shifting the focus. So it's like Schuller said something to the effect of the divine, empowering us. And you're like, dude, I think the center of gravity is actually moving from God as the center point to man being the center point. And so back to the question you asked a few minutes ago, if like, you know, what is, what would, if we were to use the self-love in the term of, in like, Christian circles, I would say I want you to love who God made in you. But who, where's the emphasis in that sentence? God are you. And so, okay, let's pull out, let's get scripture into this conversation now. I love turning people to Saul 139 and Ephesians 1 in this conversation because those are the verses we throw around. I'm wonderfully made, Julie. Don't you take no joke. That's a girl's say to each other when we're like, I feel so ugly or like he broke up with me. It's like you're fearfully wonderfully made. God has a plan.
for you. Okay, do you know how that sentence starts in verse 14 of Psalm 39? I don't. Right. And most people don't. It says, I praise you. I praise you for I am fearfully and what's the emphasis? So what's self? Okay. So track. Tell me help me track with you. I guess self love shifts the emphasis from God to me. And then now come all of these subsets of body positivity, relationship, all of those manifestations. Exactly. Right. And it's I love it. Oh, Oh, and strand in his book, re-enchanting humanity. He hits that he says enlarged self awareness is the starts at the onset of the fall because when did Adam and Eve know they were naked. The first time they sent is when their eyes were then overly consumed with themselves. And then that's when they hit because they were ashamed and they were afraid. And when we get our eyes off of God and who he is. And in the next part, we're going to talk about identity and Christ because I don't want to just say like have a better identity and Christ and they're like, I'm trying. It's not working. But essentially all of our insecurity and purposelessness and feelings of worthlessness and let I don't feel beautiful or for a guy. I don't feel maybe like handsome. I don't know whatever you guys want to feel. That is a result of not understanding your purpose on earth and misplaced purpose leads to misunderstanding of yourself. And we'll be back with more from Dr. Gifford and his guest, Julie, in just a moment. They're talking about self-love today and if that's there is something in you good because you don't need another feel good slogan. What you need is steady biblical help that you can actually use. That's why Fortis Institute and Fortis Plus exists. Download it right now on your phone or on your smart TV. And when you get it downloaded, you're going to find stuff on anxiety. Shane, anger, regret, confusion, pressure at home. Look, this isn't therapy speak with Bible verses taped on its scripture. Also, my favorite part about Fortis Plus is that it's free. Not a free trial, not a free tear. No, absolutely everything is free. Just search for Fortis Plus in your app store right now and you hear me mention all the time biblical clarity because that's exactly what matters. And that's what the Master's University is committed to. That's where Dr. Gifford teaches. That's where Dr. Tyson teaches. T.M.U. is training the next generation of men and women to think biblically in every area of their life. Whether that's counseling, business, science, ministry. And so if you or someone you know is wrestling with what's next in their life, T.M.U. could be exactly the place they need to be. You're going to find professors who love the Lord, who love his word, and who push you to love Christ above all. You can find out more about it right now at masters.edu/transformed. 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And then if you have questions, you can find answers to those questions at fortisinstitute.org. All right, let's get back now to Dr. Gifford and his guest, Julie. This is Transform. Welcome back to Transform. The Bible informs us that difficult events or circumstances are not the cause of our bad decision making. Trump immediately reveals what is already in the heart. And now your host, Dr. Greg Gifford. Okay, welcome back. I'm here. We're back, honestly. And you're thinking like, wait a minute, there's another voice in the transformed room. There is Julie DeVoris here. She's helping teach us about self love and Julia's expertise in this area, certified biblical counselor, masters and biblical counseling and has worked a lot with young ladies, both as a resident director and also as a student life coordinator and guidance counselor. So we kind of framed last segment by saying, this is what self love is being called. Most people are expecting biblical counselors to just say, you have no importance. You're lame. That is why God saved you because you're a loser. And so can you kind of help us understand like what biblical elements go into reorienting self love? Yeah. And I'm so passionate about that because I know what it's like to feel those feelings of inferiority. And I've talked to so many girls that I was like in my own study of self love. I was like, I don't want to get to the end and not be able to give hope to the girl that's crying on my couch at 10 p.m. And I want to be able to give her hope. And so first we have to understand what is scripture say about self love? And that's something I spent a lot of time studying so that I knew then how can I give hope in the moment to people? And this was fascinating to me in the book, The Danger of Self Love by Brownback, Paul Brownback. He goes through scripture and he starts to look for anywhere self love could be mentioned. He's like, maybe scripture does talk about self love, right? Because there are Christians who are proponents of it. And he essentially looks up both words of love in scripture to see if agape or filio would be used in the context of self love. He long story short, he defines both and he says, if self love were to be mentioned in scripture, it would be the filio because it's the feelings of love and affection instead of the agape is more of the sacrificial will of love and we already know from the definitions that proponents of self love use that it's not a sacrificial thing. It's a feeling that you have towards yourself. So he says, let's look at all the uses of a filio in scripture and let's see if any of them encourage self love. If you have your Bibles turn to second Timothy 3, 1 through 5. In this passage, he finds one use of self love. And when I was studying and I found this passage, I think my jaw fell off. I'm actually going to read it here. So this is second Timothy 3 and I'm in the ESV translation. He says, but understand this in the last days, there will come times of difficulty for people will be lovers of self. Lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, heartless, unappeasable, slanderous, without self control, brutal, not loving good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having the appearance of godliness, but denying its power, avoid such people. Yeah, that first verse, the lovers of self or the verse to lovers of self. Yes. And then he goes through a list of so many other things that we would be like, yeah, that is bad. And then everything, including lovers of self, he says, A, it's a sign of the end times, B, it's devoid of godliness, but it looks godly. And then C, he says avoid such people. Do you know if that's the agape or phallel use? That is the phallel use. Really? It's indicative of end times, the phallel use. Oh, I didn't know that. And so like Christians who have been encouraging others to love themselves, how can you miss this? Verse that says avoid people who love themselves. It looks godly. It appears good. But what about the, I think it's right at the great command, Matthew 22. Oh, yeah, let's talk about it. Because usually people will say in order to love others, you have to love yourself first. And Jesus says, love others. As you love yourself, I forget the exact, yeah, is it as? Yeah. What's the, what's the critique clarification of it? Yeah, I'm so glad you brought that up because that is the passage that people use to say self love isn't scripture. Yeah, right. Okay. Do you know when you're hungry? Do you know when you're tired? Five times a day. Do you know when you've had a bad day? Do you know when you're discouraged? Do you have that level of awareness of care for your coworker? Do you have that level of awareness for your son when he comes home from school? This is a command to be sacrificial. And the level of thinking of yourself that you naturally have, you should have that level of intensity for thinking and loving others. Yeah. I don't know when my roommate's hungry. I don't know when my brother had his last meal. I don't know if he had breakfast this morning. I haven't texted him. I haven't asked. I should. If I really love him, the way I love myself. Because you want to know what? I know what I ate for breakfast this morning. And I'm already thinking about what I'm having for lunch. You know when you're tired, this evening. Yeah. And so that verse should literally cut you to the heart. It cuts me to the heart every time because I'm like, do I love and care and know others the way I know myself. So Jesus isn't saying once you love yourself better, then you'll be more effective. No. He's saying love others the way you love yourself. Already. He's saying you already do this. You already wake up and you have a natural understanding of whether you're hungry or not. You know, you wake up and you think I slept great or you think I slept terrible. Did anyone teach you to ask yourself in the morning if you were hungry? No, you just naturally do it. You get out of bed and you're like, I'm starving or you're like, I'm so full, couldn't eat till lunch. Still thinking about dinner last night. Yeah. Yeah. So that's like a very subtle clarification that has a lot of implications. Yeah. So if I take that and say, you know what, Greg Gifford needs to love himself, protect himself, eat well, exercise, all these things.
then I am legitimizing selfishness with a biblical text. - Yes, which is scary, and it's using scripture selfishly, which is what we do often, just like that's all Mothernanine passage from the last part, right? - On P.A.P.E.P.E. - You look at that. - Wonderful. - And you use it to make yourself feel better about yourself or what you're doing, instead of letting that passage reorient your perspective of God, which then reorient your perspective of yourself. And the same thing in Matthew 22 is like, do you know what the emphasis of that passage is? The first and the greatest commitment, which is to love the Lord your God with your whole heart, with your whole soul, with your whole mind, and to love your neighbor as yourself. So the other irony is, that's the second commitment. So even if it says something about loving yourself, what's the first commitment? - Stay focused on God. - Yeah, good, interesting. So any other verses that you would say, "Hey Greg, you really got to frame it this way." - Yeah. - So don't forget about this. - Okay, so we got a really quick turn to Colossians 2.8. This is important, anytime you're evaluating any type of worldly philosophy that's coming at you, I'm gonna read verse eight and then verse 23, really quick, 'cause it's important, the context of Colossians, he's telling them to not turn to legalistic tendencies to validate their faith. But so they're turning to their own form of worldly philosophy. And so we're using it in context, is all that I'm saying, is like, we're using it for the worldly philosophy of self love. And he's using it for the worldly philosophy that the Colossians were facing in that era. So look at 2.8, see to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty to see according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the world and not according to Christ. And we could keep reading if we were like a Bible study. But in short, he says, if it's tradition, that doesn't mean it's worth it. If it is according to the spirits of the world, if it sounds good, he's saying, if the philosophy that you are promoting is not according to Christ, you need to use discernment before a widely accepted. Just because it's a human tradition or according to elemental spirits, doesn't mean it's two thumbs up. It means no, is Christ mentioned? Is this pointing you towards Christ or away from Christ? And then he flushes that out, but look down at verse 23, he says, these indeed have an appearance of wisdom in promoting self-made religion and asceticism and severity to the body. That just means if you're kind of being like a monk and doing really like strict things so that you can please God. He says, they have no value in stopping the indulgence of the flesh. Self-love has no value in stopping the indulgence of the flesh, which is that desire to feel good about yourself for your glory and not God's glory, right? 'Cause I want you to feel good about yourself. - Yeah, sure. - To God's glory. But these have to be weighed through this philosophy of is this pointing me towards Christ or away? And we read those paragraphs and the one word that was missing was God. It wasn't pointing me towards God. It was pointing me toward myself. Self-acceptance, self-forgiveness. Like everything in self-love comes back to me and scripture tells me if it doesn't point me to Christ then it appears good, but it is of no value to faith. - Yeah. It's fascinating because the connection you're making here is this is a false worldview. Like this is something that needs a lot of discernment to come through because this subtle, it sounds on the surface to just say, yeah, of course you should have competence in yourself but that's not really what self-love is saying. It's saying put yourself first. And God is putting you first and all of these other things. So that is actually a transition from a Christ first, God first worldview to a me first worldview. - And let me just like encourage our listeners when you do put God first, which is his plan, you will feel the most sense of fulfillment and satisfaction and completion. And again, that's from Owen Strasbourg on reentending humanity. Oh no, that's from Richard Lins, identity and idolatry where he says when you live the way God created you which is to put God first, you will feel fulfillment, completion, worth and purposefulness. - So here's the cliffhanger and then we'll have to be done for today. Think of, I wonder and maybe this is part of the problem is that we have been encouraged to turn the lens inward. - Yeah. - And then now we see all of these psychological problems, self-worth problems, relational, social problems. And it's like, well, yeah, we've put ourself at the center of our own worldview. - Which is making the problems worse. - Right. And it's like this self-fulfilling prophecy. You're trying to feel better about yourself, but you feel worse because you're now focused on yourself and you feel legitimizing that. Okay, well, thank you for today. We have one more episode listeners. So make sure that you are paying attention next week. We will complete this thought with Julie DeVore. If you're listening to this and you would love to connect with Julie, email me at
[email protected] and I could pass along questions and some of you are inevitably thinking of speaking engagements, women's conferences, things like that. Send that my way and I'll make sure to connect you with Julie. Other than that, let me pray for us and we'll be done for today. Lord, thank you for the freedom that your word brings. And even this, what seems like a subtle clarification that self-love puts us first and the scripture calls us to put you first. But that is such an important clarification in helping us reinterpret this movement and this ideology. So give us clarity as Christians to love you well as we understand ourselves through the lens of scripture we pray in Jesus name. Amen. This has been transformed from Dr. Greg Gifford, a production of Fortis Institute. Our website is fortisinstitute.org and it is your central hub for all things fortis. If you've enjoyed Transform with Dr. Greg Gifford, would you please consider subscribing and sharing with your friends and church family. Also, would you prayerfully consider joining this labor of love by becoming an ongoing, monthly gospel partner. And until next time, go serve your king.
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