What is my estimate of myself? What is your estimate of yourself? Is it high? Is it low? How can I both see myself as lowly and not become the person who is self-destructive?
In Luke 7, Jesus was traveling to heal a centurion’s servant. The Jews who knew the centurion told Jesus that this man was worthy to have Jesus do this for him, because the man had given much to the Jews. But as Jesus drew near, the centurion sent word to Jesus saying, “Lord, do not trouble yourself, for I am not worthy to have you come under my roof” (Luke 7:6b). . Whose estimation of the centurion was right?
Later in the same chapter, a known sinful woman comes to Jesus with tears and worship. The religious leaders around Jesus think he should not allow himself to be touched by such a sinner. But Jesus reminds these men in verse 48 that the one forgiven much is the one who loves much; the one forgiven little loves little.
I wonder if we might learn and grow from the accounts that bookend this chapter about our own view of self. In the one case, we see a man thought to be worthy by others who knows himself not to be all that special. In the other, we see that the one who is forgiven much by Jesus loves Jesus much. Perhaps if we tie those together, we will have a safe place to stand when we think of our own esteem.
In our lives, we want to demonstrate the love of the lord toward others. That love should in fact be helpful to those around us. People around us should think that we are kind people, because kindness is a fruit of the Spirit. We should be caring, giving, and helpful. But sweetness from us toward others should not raise our esteem of ourselves to the place where we start thinking of ourselves as pretty special. Instead, as the centurion said, we should realize that we are still not worthy of Jesus.
But does this mean that we become people who are self-haters and depressed? Not at all. The forgiven woman knew where she stood before Jesus. She loved Jesus much and freely approached him. But she did not do so out of some sort of faulty self-regard. Instead, she approached Jesus out of gratitude, rejoicing in the forgiveness she had received. Her value was found, not in her goodness or badness, but in the fact that she was forgiven and welcomed by Jesus.
How do we have a properly low regard about ourselves without breaking ourselves? We remember both our sin and our Savior. We remember that, in the face of a holy God, we have fallen infinitely short. This is true whether we are the sinful woman of the end of the chapter or the seemingly sweet centurion at the beginning. We have earned by our failure nothing but justice from God—an infinite punishment to match the infinite offense of dishonoring an infinitely holy God. But, thanks be to Jesus, when we see our lowly estate, we can rejoice in grace. Jesus, the infinitely worthy one, died and paid the price for our sin and grants us his record of perfection so that we might be forgiven and adopted as children of God. When we get a glimpse of just how huge this mercy is, we will see self rightly. We will declare ourselves unworthy as did the centurion. We will weep tears of joy as we embrace the gift of grace in the Savior. Our worth will not be in our goodness or our accomplishments. Instead, our worth will be found in the gift of the Savior’s grace. Forgiven much, we will love much.
Pastor Travis Peterson 