Louie Giglio - The Best Self-Care in the World
This collection is about relationships, and oh my goodness, was anybody here last Sunday for the kickoff of this collection? Oh my word, it was the best talk on parenting I’ve ever heard. Shel and I were both listening to it, and we were thinking, «I’ve never heard anything better than this on parenting.» If you are looking for encouragement in raising kids, go and listen and re-listen to Dr. Crawford’s message from last week, «Shaping the Next Generation.» Can we just thank him for that phenomenal word, by the way? He has such a way, doesn’t he? He just eases in, and then he’s got all that force, and you’re pinned up against the wall going, «Okay, yes, I agree with that. The Holy Spirit’s working now, I believe it.» What a word. What a word.
Today we’re taking a different angle. We’re not necessarily going in any sequence through this series or collection, but we’re going to touch on lots of different kinds of relationships. Today, we’re talking about the most critical relationship you have apart from your relationship with God—the most vital relationship in your life apart from your relationship with God. It’s not your relationship with your spouse if you’re married. It’s not your relationship with your closest friend, your co-worker, or your parents. It’s not your relationship with your children, your workout partners, your business partners, or your pickleball partners. It’s not your relationship with your neighbor, your accountability partner, your counselor, your ex, your boo, your siblings, your ladies' group, your golfing buddies, your trainer, or your mentor. Hm. Who’s left? You. The most critical relationship in your life, apart from your relationship with God, is your relationship with yourself.
You may not believe this, but check this out: recent studies have shown that 100% of people spend 24 hours a day with themselves. That is a high percentage. You spend more time with yourself than with anyone else, and your brain feeds you 12,000 to 60,000 thoughts a day. Real research shows that 80% of those thoughts are negative in nature, and over 90% of those thoughts are repetitive, meaning they re-occur day after day. That is serious research because it indicates that the majority of your thoughts on a recurring basis, brought to you by yourself, are not positive. If this is true, how are you getting along with yourself? How are you coping with you? How are you dealing with selfishness? Amen. Just one laughter. The self-loathing, the self-hatred, the self-destructive behavior, the self-criticism, medicating self, coddling self, or the self-centeredness, self-promotion, self-serving nature, self-dependent spirit, or self-awareness in general. How are you coping with you? And why does it matter?
It matters because if you are not in a healthy relationship with yourself, it is unlikely that you are going to be in a healthy relationship with someone else. Secondly, it matters because God’s plan and purpose is for those around you to experience the transforming love of God through you. In other words, a very small percentage of the people around us are going to find the love of God through some mystical experience. They’re going to find the love of God through people. Therefore, it really matters how you’re coping with you because, number three, you are most likely to love others the way you love yourself. This is the axiom of the Christian faith.
In Matthew 22, hearing that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, the Pharisees got together, and one of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question. Thank you so much for this guy who thought, «You know what, I’m an expert in the law, and this is going to be amazing. I’ve got Jesus, and I’m going to really put him on the stand.» He says, «Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the law?» Now, almost everyone in the building today knows what Jesus is about to say. He replied, «Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.» This is the first and greatest commandment. The second is like it: «Love your neighbor as yourself.» All the law and the prophets hang on these two commandments.
I think it’s interesting that Jesus didn’t just stop with the first commandment because if he had simply said, «Love the Lord your God with all your heart, your soul, and your mind,» he could have been promoting a very internal, personal, intangible, and unobservable faith. «It’s just me and God, and I’m loving God with all my heart over here; don’t mind me, and I won’t mind you. I’m just over here loving the Lord; that’s the most important thing, right?» He said no, and there’s a second thing, which is as important as the first: «Love your neighbor as yourself.» In other words, Jesus wanted us to know that the love we have for God is to be demonstrated in the world. It must be visible and tangible in the world as we love our neighbor as ourselves.
In other words, our mission in life, hello, is to be the agents of the love of God to the world. Our mission in life is to love our neighbor as ourselves. This means our neighbors will know God’s love by the way we love them. Man, I love that moment right there. I’m just going to let it sit. That is what you call tension in a room. All of a sudden, we realize collectively in this moment that there is not some magical way that God changes the world, but that Jesus said it as clearly as you can. And you want to know what’s most important? Love God with everything you are. Oh, and there’s something just as important as that: love your neighbor the same way you love yourself. These two things sum up all the law and all the prophets.
In conclusion, the world is going to know God’s love by the way we love them. And at the end of the day, that kind of begs the question today: How will that go for our neighbor? Is it going to go well for our neighbor? I think there are two significant dangers here just right off the bat. The first one is that I could love my neighbor better than I love myself. Is anyone doing that today? I’m extending them grace, understanding, and a second chance. I’m extending them forgiveness while at the same time holding myself to this unattainable standard, beating myself up every time I fall short. I take cookies over to the neighbor and say, «Hang in there, man.» Then I get back in the house with myself and say, «You are so stupid. Why can’t you get it right?»
The second problem we might encounter is that we love our neighbor worse than ourselves. In other words, we receive, as we’ve discussed previously, the mercy of God with the shovel—like, you know, «Shovel it in. Thank you, Lord. Thank you, Jesus. This is amazing grace.» Then we dispense mercy to our neighbor with a teaspoon—"There you go; have just a tiny bit of mercy.» Thank you, Lord. Back it up. Beep, beep, beep, beep, beep, beep. Then when our neighbor messes up, we’re like, «The eye-dropper may drop one drop.»
We must get it right because we don’t want to love our neighbor better than ourselves, and we certainly don’t want to love our neighbor worse than ourselves. The goal is to love our neighbor as ourselves with a healthy, life-giving, grace-filled, truth-saturated, freeing, empowering, healing love. That’s the goal. For this to happen, we have to get the love-yourself part right. At this point, I feel like the culture wants to give a hearty amen. We’ve got to get the love-yourself part right. The culture says that’s what we’ve been trying to tell you.
Self-care is the way. Have you ever seen a buzzword take hold so fast as «self-care»? I did the research. No one ever used the term «self-care» before 1950, and that was in the medical community. It didn’t break out of the medical community until the '60s and '70s and didn’t even hit the radar until after 9/11. After 9/11, in a PTSD world, people were looking for self-care. But self-care really moved into the mainstream after the election in 2016. Interestingly, the words «self-care» were Googled two times more than in the years prior. Now, according to Inc. magazine, in 2023, self-care is a $1.5 trillion industry in America.
I think we’ve just gotten everyone’s attention when we say we’ve got to get this thing right, and we have to love ourselves. People are like, «Thank you very much for getting on board with that.» I want to know what’s going on in the self-care world. So, I did my research and went to Instagram to search #selfcare. Some of you may want to take a snapshot of this and frame it. It’s okay if you are overthinking things, if you made a mistake, if you don’t know what to do next, if you feel a little sad, or if you need to rest today. I thought that was interesting. I get it. I’m totally in all of this. Yes, I might be overthinking things, and I might have made a mistake. I might need to rest today, but I was like, «Yeah, but what if you have to go to work?» Anyway, that’s a secondary thought.
It’s okay if you have your own boundaries, if you don’t know the answer, if you’re struggling to stay positive, and if you feel insecure today—that’s okay. You might want to choose one of these from the self-care menu: You can stretch your body; it only takes 10 minutes. You can drink a glass of water; it only takes five minutes. That’s a slow drink, but hey, a large glass. Still got time. And I’m not making fun; honestly, I’m not. You’re looking at a guy who’s learned how to do breathing exercises for the last 10 years, so I get it. Step outside for some fresh air for 15 minutes. Listen to a relaxing song. Write in a journal. Practice gratitude—only for five minutes, though. Light a candle very briefly; they’re talking about lighting the candle, not enjoying the candle. It just took me a minute to light it, but that’s it. You’re done.
Make yourself a warm drink. Reflect on your goals. Listen to a podcast. Watch an episode of the show you’re watching. Cleanse your space. Create a vision board. Cook a delicious meal. Man, a couple of observations: one, there are many things you can do to care for yourself and get the love-yourself thing right so your neighbor can then benefit and know God. But the other observation I had was that this takes a lot of time. How, then, do you and how do I put self-care in a place where it really comes true?
Maybe let me ask the question a different way: What is the best self-care available? Jesus is giving us the answer. The best self-care—let me back up and say it one more time: take a warm bubble bath, put on some relaxing music, and light a candle for crying out loud. Take a break and walk outside. All these things are good, but I think Jesus was aiming at something slightly more transformational. What He was aiming at is this: I believe if we can unpack this for just a few minutes, the ultimate love of self is to find oneself in the love of God. Let me say that again: The ultimate love of self is to find oneself in the love of God.
Jesus said the most important commandment is this: «Love God with all your heart.» Now, if we’re honest today, that feels like a bit of pressure from the jump. «Okay, now I’ve got to figure out how to muster up enough love to give God.» But this is not necessarily the whole story because there’s a step before loving God that I believe is critical in loving God. We find that in 1 John, chapter 4: «Dear friends, let us love one another.» This is the whole idea we’re discussing today: «Let us love one another. Love your neighbor as yourself.»
«For love comes, say it with me, from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God because God is love.» You’re going to hear that quoted in many different ways from various voices. Here’s the context around that. God showed His love among us: He sent His one and only Son into the world that we might live through Him. This is love. This is the part I want us to see: This is love—not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.
And why does it matter? Because no one has ever seen God. But if we love one another, God lives in us, and His love is made complete in us. Your neighbor has never seen God, and neither have you. But your neighbor can see God by the way you love them. This will happen proportionately, I believe, to your ability to love yourself and find yourself in the love of God. So, you don’t have to start today with, «Oh my goodness, this new commandment: I’ve got to love God with all my heart, all my mind, and all my strength.» Jesus is reaching back to Deuteronomy for that phrase. It’s the Shema, the summation of faith to the Jewish mind, found in Deuteronomy 6: «Hear, O Israel: the Lord your God is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your mind and all your strength.»
Another place in the gospels adds another dimension as well: all your heart, all your mind, all your strength—everything about you in life, love God. But God is saying, «Yes, that is the greatest commandment,» and it’s possible when you realize that I first loved you. I think God wants us to understand today that to embrace this idea of self-love or self-care at its heart is two things.
Number one, it is to let God love you. It says that He loved us first by showing us a powerful love and giving His Son for us. But that was what God did, and it only matters in your life in terms of transformative power to the degree that you let God express that love to you and you receive it and believe it. When you can truly say «I am valued, I am wanted, I am prized, I am pursued, I am chosen, I am forgiven, I am delighted in, I am loved,» it matters that you know you are wanted so you can express to your neighbor how much God wants them.
I’ve shared this story a lot. My sister and I’s dad went through a terrible brain virus, surgeries, complications, strokes, and disabilities. Midway through that seven-year process, he had another brain surgery. We were sitting in the hospital at Piedmont Hospital together, and I was trying to share with my dad—a man who I believe had faith. I was told that he had faith, and when we were kids, he would come to church some, but that had stopped long ago. He was raised in one denomination and then married into another. I’m sitting there with my dad, trying to explain to him, share with him, and implore him about how valuable he is to us and to God.
My dad, toward the end of his life, a brilliant person whose fingerprints are all over this city—even at Cumberland where we have a gathering just down the street from Cumberland Mall, a place my dad designed the original logo for—looked at me sitting in this hospital room and said, «No one ever wanted me, and nobody ever loved me, and I don’t believe God wants me either.» Why? Because his parents didn’t want him. At least during that season and circumstance of life and his childhood, they couldn’t manage that. He was passed around from relative to relative, went to three different high schools in the same city, had an amazing wife, incredible friends, and a phenomenal career, yet he still couldn’t shake it. He had accolades coming out of his circumstances. He was extraordinarily successful, a graduate of Auburn University during a national championship year in football, yet he couldn’t shake it.
He couldn’t let God love him, even though God had shown him a love that transcended everything against him. If you and I are to truly care for ourselves, we must, by the grace of God, let God love us. We must come, by the grace of God, to the place where we say, «Out of the love of God, I am valued, I am wanted, I am prized, I am pursued, I am chosen, I am forgiven, I am delighted in, and I am loved.» We must break ties with the enemy, who says to us, «Oh, not you. Don’t get all high and mighty thinking these wonderful thoughts about yourself. That’s not humility. The way of Jesus is humility, so get down, get off, and shut up.»
I’ll tell you what humility is. Are you ready for this? Humility is agreeing with God. I pray today against the spirit of pride masquerading as humility. It’s the self-loathing that makes you think you’re humble, but really it’s just an affront, shoving it back in the face of the God who’s been loving you your entire life. The second thing, to ultimately find yourself in the love of God, is to center your whole being around Him.
You know, it’s interesting to think about our relationship with ourselves. Back in the Garden, God was there, but Adam and Eve were convinced in their hearts that they were at the center of the garden. This has to shift at the foot of the cross where we realize, «No, we’re in the garden. We’re in the presence of God. We can walk with Almighty God; we’re not the center of the garden.» Therefore, I want to love God with all my heart, all my soul, all my strength, and all my mind. I want to center my life on Him because I believe a healthy relationship with myself means reframing where I fit into the world. Amen.
As long as self-care places you at the center, it’s not much care. At the end of the day, as long as self-care puts you at the center, you’re missing out on the very thing your soul longs for, which is not a candle and not gentle music. It is a God who is central in everything and in you. That’s what your heart was made for. So what do we do?
Let me give you seven things, and I’ll do it really quickly. Number one: believe God’s love for you. I’ll say it again. Number two: accept your story. Some of your stories are beautiful, and some are terrible. Part of your struggle is your story. But you have a friend who was born of a virgin under a suspect situation, came to be in a cave in a trough, had no baby shower, and had to flee to Egypt with his family. He grew up completely misunderstood and eventually pursued a great call on his life. Though he did the most phenomenal things any human being has ever done on earth, he died the most agonizing death that anyone has ever died. The story was terrible in terms of the good old dream. Maybe that’s your story.
If you got off to a bad start, if you have twists and turns, betrayals, loss, or frustrations—things that don’t add up, abandonment—maybe you’ve cried out in your life, «My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?» At some point in the love of God, He wants to give you the grace to accept your story. «That’s my story.» How amazing that with that story, my declaration is: «I am loved by God.» Even with that story, I am loved by God, and I accept that story.
I’m not going to hide it. I will not minimize it. I will not sweep it into a closet. That’s my story, and I’m going to accept it. I know I’m loved, so I’m going to choose to love myself, even with all the scars, labels, stigmas, and shortcomings. The good, the bad, and the ugly—I’m going to choose to agree with God. If God Almighty loves me, then I love me. That is self-care—saying, «I love me in the love of God.»
Number four: forgive yourself as He has forgiven you. Number five: let His love shape you into the person He created you to be. It’s the love of God that shapes us. Number six: speak the truth to yourself in love. Ephesians 4 tells us to do that for our neighbor. Speak the truth to your neighbor in love. State the truth, yes, but say it in love. Represent what’s true and right, but do it in a loving way; that includes you.
Love yourself that way. Tell yourself the truth. Look in the mirror and say, «You know what? We can’t do that. You know what? That’s not going to work. You know what? We don’t accept that here in our household.» I told my neighbor that real strongly, but I need to come over here and tell myself too. «We don’t act like that in our neighborhood. We don’t act like that in our family. We don’t act like that in our city! We don’t act like that in a civilized world.» I told my neighbor that on his Instagram post, but I need to tell myself that.
«You’re a child of God. You don’t act that way. You’re a son of the King! You don’t talk like that. You’re royal and loved and valued and accepted.» We don’t act like that as children of God.
Then number seven gives me the opportunity to overflow into my neighbor, to see them—like the Robinsons over here probably in your mind, or maybe it’s the family that moved in, and you don’t know their name yet. Jesus was really talking about the people who lack any benefactor. They have no one thinking about their eternal well-being. They need an eternal benefactor.
«You know, everybody else at our company thinks about you and your performance. Everybody else thinks about you and your position. Everybody else thinks about you based on what you can do for them. Everybody else in our little group thinks about you because you’re funny. Everybody else thinks about you because you’re always there; but I’m thinking about you because you need an eternal benefactor. You need someone who thinks about your self-care and your finding yourself in the love of God.»
So, I’m going to see you; number one, I’m going to pray for you. I’m going to meet your needs. It’s like my friend Dave, who was driving his friend—whom he was trying to love in the same way God loved him—driving him an hour-plus consistently to get health care. «Hey, I’m going to miss the meeting today. I have to take my friend to another procedure.» Wow. That’s how you love your neighbor as yourself.
You realize someone drove you to health care—thank you, Lord! I’m going to drive my friend. That’s my mom taking Miss Jones home after church at First Baptist Atlanta, Peach Tree and Fifth. We lived in Smyrna; she lived way out on Concord Road in the boonies, which is now in town. I drive my bike out there to get a good bike ride in. Before that, Mrs. Jones lived way out on Concord Road. I’m telling you, we were churchgoers, and if you needed a ride, just ask Martha Jean.
So, it was a good 30 minutes going and coming for us to take Mrs. Jones home every Sunday until that wasn’t an option anymore. The best part of it was that Dr. Stanley’s birthday would come around youth camp time. Mrs. Jones would make him a red velvet cake every year. Andy and I would take it to youth camp and eat that thing every night for a whole week. I don’t know if Dr. Stanley ever got any red velvet cake, but Mrs. Jones is going to get credit in heaven, and the cake arrived in my mom’s car because that’s how you love your neighbor as yourself. You simply assess what they need, and then you do it.
It’s not complicated. You love them where they are and accept them where they are. You don’t have to agree with all their conclusions to love them where they are. Amen? You don’t have to agree with all their conclusions to accept them right where they are. Because, heads up, God loves you right where you are, and He doesn’t agree with all your conclusions right where you are today, but He loves you right where you are.
The way He wants to move you into the person He’s created you to be is by loving and accepting you right where you are so that you can know the love of God. Lastly, extend grace to them. Forgive them if necessary and encourage them with the hope and the vision that God has for their life. So, what is God wanting us to step into today? Believe God’s love for you. Accept your story. Love yourself. Forgive yourself. Let His love shape you into the person He created you to be. Speak truth to yourself in love, and let that overflow into your neighbor.
We close today with so much to reflect on, but I really had someone on my heart during worship earlier—just one person in this gathering today who has lived so much of your life with regret. I’m not a counselor, and I’m not an expert on anything except being a human being. I understand that we all make mistakes and that there are consequences to our choices. But regret is the negative lingering effect of the inability to receive the forgiveness of God. I think today there’s someone in this gathering that God is saying to you: not only do you need to be kind to yourself and forgive yourself, but you must forgive yourself out of the forgiveness that God has given you.
Forgive yourself and let the regret go today. Just admit it: «I can’t change it, but I can move on from it.» I can’t change it, but I can, by the grace of God, move on from it. Today, say out loud to yourself, «I don’t believe it’s God’s will for me to be paralyzed by regret for the rest of my life. I believe it’s God’s will for me to rise out of this regret and accept His forgiveness for my life and to move forward with God, loving Him, centered on Him with all my heart, my soul, and my mind, so that ultimately I can be His answer to my neighbor and can show people on this earth who He truly is.» There’s nothing more attractive to the world than someone at peace who has a healthy relationship with themselves.