Love Others Even More
It is selfish to love yourself first before your neighbors.
In fact, it goes contrary to what the bible teaches. In other words, it is a sin.
We must love others and try to meet them in their wants and need.
What difference does it make then if we fail to help those in need?
How are we different from satan and sinners if we love only ourselves?
We must be like Christ and love everyone around us.
As much as we can, we must put others first and love them with our hearts.
The scripture says,
What Does It Mean To Love Oneself
Self-love is a state of appreciation for oneself that grows from 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.
Something To Try At Home
This may seem like a silly exercise, but it is more challenging than you think. Take a moment, when you are alone, to look in the mirror. Take a really good look and do not look away for thirty seconds. Say out loud, Your name, I love you several times.
Now ask yourself, was that uncomfortable? What feelings came up for you? Were you able to look into the mirror the entire time, or did your eyes glance another direction? I know, for some, it is much easier for them to tell other people that they love them, but to tell that to themselves seems foreign.
Try to tell yourself every day that you love yourself, and if you can, do so while looking in the mirror. You matter too and your life is just as important and precious as others. Give yourself the love that you freely give to others.
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God Doesnt Want You To Accept Your Sins
An unbiblical view of self-love not only leaves you unsatisfied it can leave you unsanctified. If we dismiss the convictions of conscience as simply lack of self-acceptance, we risk misidentifying gracious warnings from God as attacks from Satan. When we do this, we forget the crucial difference between Christs invitation to come as you are and the unbiblical invitation to stay as you are.
When Christ calls us, he genuinely loves and embraces us, having fulfilled all conditions himself for our full acceptance. But in the same act, he calls us to hate our old nature and lay it aside , to strive for renewal , and to deny ourselves . God does not want us to simply achieve a heightened acceptance of self he desires our sanctification .
Though we may not realize it, the call to just love yourself more, when it is offered in answer to feelings of guilt, can undermine this key truth. Neglect of biblical truth leaves the truly regenerate heart even more dissatisfied and confused.
Who Is Our Neighbor
A Pharisee once tried to test Jesus after asking Him what the greatest of the commandment was. The Pharisee asked, Who is my neighbor? Instead of giving a direct answer, Jesus Christ turned the question on the Pharisee by telling the parable of the Good Samaritan.
The parable of the Good Samaritan tells the story of a man who was attacked by robbers on the road to Jericho. He was stripped of his clothes, beaten, and was left for dead. Soon after, a priest was passing by the same road and when he saw the man, he went to the other side of the road and continued on his way. A Levite then passed by, and he too moved to the other side of the road when he saw the man. But a Samaritan came by and when he saw the man, he took pity on him, poured oil and wine on his wounds, carried him on his donkey and brought him to an inn and took care of him there. The following day he gave the innkeeper two denarii and asked him to look after the man, adding that when he returns, he will compensate the innkeeper for any extra expense he may have. After telling the story Jesus asked the Pharisee which he thought among the three was a neighbor to the man who was robbed to which the Pharisee replied, The man who showed mercy. Jesus then told the Pharisee to go and do likewise.
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What Does The Bible Say About Love Of Self
Matthew 22:37-40 KJV Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.
What Does It Mean To Love Yourself Before You Love Others
Loving yourself means making choices that are going to be good for your life. loving yourself before anyone else, which is something you must do. If you arent happy when youre single or alone, you wont ever be happy in a relationship. You have to love God and yourself and then youll be truly ready.
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Learn To Love Yourself With Your Flaws
We all have spots.
Even the most beautiful people on earth have their challenges.
What you see outwardly isnt always what it truly is.
We must learn to appreciate the works of God.
He has created us, but we have our challenges.
If you are black, there is no reason to feel inferior.
Likewise, if you are white, there is nothing wrong with you.
Or, if you have any form of disability, you must appreciate yourself the way you are.
God loves us so much and has given us life to serve him.
Our beauty and body will decay the moment we die.
All the fuss over how you look will disappear in a second God takes away our life.
So, whats the point of striving to look too beautiful or looking down on yourself?
God is our hope and strength. Love yourself and be contented.
You Are Perfectly Made
I grew up in a neighborhood where beauty matters a lot.
If you do not look good, you could easily be embarrassed by your friends.
I have come to realize that you are who you say you are.
If you do not love yourself and appreciate your inner beauty, others will make you feel less of yourself.
Thats why we must accept ourselves because we are beautifully made.
God has made us in his image and has given us life.
Our concern shouldnt be what others think about us.
We are perfectly made in Gods shape and form.
So, if anyone thinks you dont look good, be rest assured that he or she is ignorant.
Can he create even a single hair on your body?
Everything was made perfect and beautiful in his time.
So, dont look down on yourself.
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God Saw All That He Had Made And It Was Very Good And There Was Evening And There Was Morningthe Sixth Day
When God finished creating man and woman, he declared them very good. After every other piece of his creation God simply called it good. The distinction of very good shows humankind as the pinnacle of Gods creation.
You too are created and called very good by God. Yes, even with wrinkles and glasses and acne and love handles and all the things that you dont call good. Even with dyslexia or anxiety or disease or disability.
Your body is good and reflects Gods creativity and beauty.
Loving Your Neighbor Means Loving Ourselves As Well
To love your neighbor as yourself as commanded, you need to measure correctly. The measurement within this command isas yourself. To love your neighbor as yourself you need to love yourself. This is something that gets misunderstood in the body of Christ often. It gets mixed up with dying to self and denying self as if we need to destroy our self. This is not true.
Jesus died for each and every one of us. If Jesus valued us enough to go through what He went through, we owe it to Him to value what He values. We need to love what He loves us. The Bible even tells us that the Father loves us as much as He loves Jesus . How dare we not love what the Father loves. Learning to love ourselves prepares and helps us to love our neighbor.
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What Is Self Love According To The Bible
True selflove is: The commitment to objectively know myself as I am, to fully experience life as it comes to me, and to honor my potential by continually seeking ways to grow. Why is selflove so important? Another famous line from the Bible Love your neighbor as yourself also points to this truth.
Dont Try To Fit In With The Ungodly
3. Romans 12:2 Do not be conformed to this age, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may discern what is the good, pleasing, and perfect will of God.
4. 1 Peter 4:3 For you spent enough time in the past doing what the gentiles like to do, living in sensuality, sinful desires, drunkenness, wild celebrations, drinking parties, and detestable idolatry.
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What Does The Bible Say About Loving Yourself
Dear Roger,
I was reading about the Great Commandment in Matthew 22. Jesus said that we are to love God with all our heart soul and mind. Jesus said that we are to love our neighbors as ourselves. I got to thinking, This must be very difficult for some. Ive discovered that a lot of people dont love themselves well. It must be hard to love your neighbor as yourself when you dont love yourself very well. What do you think about that?
Sincerely, Sarah.
Dear Sarah,
Maybe Jesus should have said, Love your neighbor better than you love yourself.
I came across a study by the American Health Organization that commissioned a Gallup survey about self image: If you could change anything about yourself, what would it be?
They discovered that women would like a dress size two to four times smaller. They would like to be one inch taller weigh 11 pounds less have good muscle tone curly brown hair and a bronzed suntanned look.
Forty-eight percent would cover aging symptoms 37% would fix their teeth 34% desire better legs 18% desire smaller feet.
What would men change? Absolutely nothing! Men like themselves just the way they are! Just kidding!
The average man would like to be one inch taller weigh several pounds lighter and be more muscular.
Men want hairy chests because they think that women like men with hairy chestsand men are right! Twenty-eight percent would ask for less aging signs. Nineteen percent desire a smaller nose.
THE GREATEST COMMANDMENT
1. God is love.
Loving Your Neighbor Means Serving Them
Serving from the heart is kindness in action. Kindness is one of the attributes of love listed in 1 Corinthians 13. The funny thing about kindness, though, is you can do acts of kindness without kindness residing in your heart. If the kind thing is done out of duty then it isnt love.
Jesus said he came to serve . God, who is love, came to serve. Love serves. For you to love your neighbor as yourself, youll have a heart to serve them. Let them know youre there for them. If they need a ride somewhere, you drive them. If they need their dog or cat checked on while theyre out of town, you do that for them. Other examples are getting their mail for them or taking them a meal if theyre not well. Examples in a public setting are to let people in front of you in line at the store or in traffic.
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Do You Love Yourself Enough
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 Fathers love for Christs 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.
Do you love yourself enough to accept that?
How To Love Your Neighbor As Yourself
When Christ was asked what the greatest of all the commandments was, it was not asked in earnest by someone who sincerely wanted to know. Rather, it was asked by someone who considered himself to be an expert in the law of the prophets, who only wanted to test Jesus.
And so with Christs answer of his great commandments of love, we can truly see His infinite grace and wisdom, as well as Gods infinite mercy which is the key to our salvation. By loving our neighbor as ourselves, Christ has made it impossible for us to fail because we are very good at taking care of ourselves. We want what is best for us and by making our own selves as the benchmark of how we should love others, Christ has shown us how to truly love our neighbor.
Another important teaching in loving our neighbor as ourselves is that we realize that we should not wait for when we feel loved before we start to love others. We do not have to wait until we feel that we have a surplus of self-love before we give it away to our neighbors. The commandment made it perfectly clear: love your neighbor exactly as you love yourself. No more and no less.
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What Does As Yourself Mean
What does loving your neighbor as yourself mean? Its pretty straightforward. Throughout the Bible, it is assumed that we love ourselves. It is part of human nature, part of what it means to be a human being. Heres how Paul put it:
After all, no one ever hated his own body, but he feeds and cares for it, just as Christ does the church.
When Jesus said to love your neighbor as yourself, he simply was emphasizing how important it is to love your neighbor, to be genuinely concerned for others welfare. He was not adding a third commandment or a precondition to loving others
Lets look at another verse that helps us see this point. In his letter to the Ephesians, Paul wrote that each husband must love his wife as he loves himself . Was Paul saying a husband cant love his wife until he learns to love himself? Of course not. That would have nullified his forceful instructions to husbands to love their wives as Christ loved the church .
Take Care Of Your Body
We take care of the things we love, right? So take care of yourself. Eat like you love your body, move like you love your body, and rest like you love your body. Be a good steward of yourself. In doing so we model healthy self-care for others.
Do you struggle with seeing your body the way God describes it?
Use these Bible Verses about caring for yourself to help you adopt Gods perspective of your body and its purpose.
Yet you, Lord, are our Father. We are the clay, you are the potter we are all the work of your hand.Isaiah 64:8
For we are Gods handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.Ephesians 2:10
For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church.Ephesians 5:29
Do you not know that you are Gods temple and that Gods Spirit dwells in you?1 Corinthians 3:16
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How To Show Love To Your Neighbor
Five ways to show of our love for others
The Key Is To Enjoy Gods Love
If loving yourself is not the answer to a negative self-image, feelings of inferiority, or sense of failure, what is? Is self-hate the opposite of self-love? No. That clearly is not Gods desire.
The answer is to understand the depth of Gods love, mercy, forgiveness, and grace. He demonstrated this love in the most powerful way possible when he sacrificed Jesus on the cross to die for our sins.
For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.
But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions it is by grace you have been saved.
When we understand Gods love, when we deeply know he loves us, we dont need to focus on loving ourselves. The more we experience Gods forgiveness and love, the more we think of him and the less we think about ourselves. When we are excited and secure in his love for us, we dont need to try to find meaning by loving ourselves.
We can rejoice and say, I am loved.
Your love, O LORD, reaches to the heavens, your faithfulness to the skies.
But I am like an olive tree flourishing in the house of God I trust in Gods unfailing love for ever and ever.
The LORD appeared to us in the past, saying: I have loved you with an everlasting love I have drawn you with loving-kindness.
How priceless is your unfailing love! Both high and low among men find refuge in the shadow of your wings.
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