Allison Park Leadership Podcast
A podcast where we have culture-creating conversations.
The world today is too complicated and messy for Christians to avoid tackling the difficult questions.
Hosted by Pastor Jeff Leake and his son Dave Leake, the Allison Park Leadership Podcast is a series of conversations designed to help Christians navigate challenging topics in our faith and culture today.
Allison Park Leadership Podcast
The Dangers of Self-Love, Therapy, and Self-Discovery
In this episode, Dave and Jeff delve into the culturally sensitive topic of self-love, therapy, and self-discovery.
They analyze how these concepts often intersect with Christianity and discuss the potential dangers to look out for and how to avoid them.
Through anecdotes, biblical references, and practical advice, they aim to provide listeners with a balanced, faith-based approach to these three areas.
Books mentioned in this episode:
- "The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self" by Carl Truman
- "Strange New World" also by Carl Truman
- "Telling Yourself the Truth" by William Baucus
- "Waking the Dead" by John Eldridge
LinkTree:
https://linktr.ee/AllisonParkLeadershipNetwork
Email:
Jeffl@allisonparkchurch.com
Davel@allisonparkchurch.com
Instagram:
@Jeffleake11
@Dave.Leake
Today we're talking about the dangers of self love, therapy and self discovery. Maybe those don't sound dangerous at all, and in a lot of ways, they're really good, but there are actually hidden traps that we have if we're not being careful about the role of those three things in our life. Today we're going to talk about where the dangers are, how to avoid them and how to step into all what God has for you. You want to hear more. Tune in. Hey everybody. Welcome to the Allison Park leadership podcast, where we have culture creating conversations. I'm one of your hosts, and my name is Dave. My
Jeff Leake:name is Jeff, and we're glad you joined us today. Of course, we're a father son, so this makes this podcast multi generational. We're both pastors on staff at Allison Park Church, and we're glad you've joined us for this podcast. Do we have any shout outs today to give to anybody? No new
Dave Leake:shout outs, but we would love to give you a shout out if you want to leave us a five star review, especially on Apple podcast, we'll see your name there. We'll and we'll. We would love to say thank you to you specifically. If you can do it in any platform, that's great, but unfortunately, we can only see the ones that the names are listed, which is Apple only, right now, yeah? Which is
Jeff Leake:basically gives the podcast a little bit of a profile. It might introduce it to people who've who might be interested in it, and you never know the impact that that could make. So you help us spread the word. We appreciate it.
Dave Leake:Yeah, all right. So today, we're going to be talking about the dangers of, wait a minute, I left my phone somewhere. Oh, here it is, okay. Let me tell you what the danger is about, as soon as I can read it, the dangers of self love therapy and self discovery, okay, dangers of self love therapy self discovery, or we talk about the limits. So we were having this conversation there. There are things in our culture that are these weird middle grounds because they intersect with Christianity. Middle ground, they're they're not evil, they're not necessarily good. They might look good.
Jeff Leake:Honestly, when you said the title self love, therapy and self discovery, all of those, for most people, would be positive, right?
Dave Leake:Right, right. Sorry, yeah, I'm not. So I'm trying to explain what I mean connected to dangers and so
Jeff Leake:people like, what like dangers of therapy? Like, what are you talking about? Is there something I don't know. So you're saying that those three self love, therapy and self discovery are in can be like a crossover. They're crossover spaces between Christianity and the popular culture. Yeah,
Dave Leake:exactly, exactly. And there are things in those three like, there are aspects of those that are really, really good, and then there are some that maybe are viewed as good, when I think we should give them more careful examination, as I guess, what I'm trying to say, here's the bottom line of the danger when we talk about specifics, is, I think if we just treat those like they're just all good, then we're putting ourselves in danger, because there are aspects of those we're all bad. Yeah? Well, yeah, we're and we're clearly not thinking they're all bad. Yeah, self love isn't all bad. That'd be kind of crazy. I guess therapy,
Jeff Leake:right? Exactly, because we teach a lot of these things exactly, yeah,
Dave Leake:yeah. So we live in a culture that that is, we've talked about this term a lot, but syncretistic, where it combines culture and Christianity, or, actually, you know, I'm noticing a lot of Buddhism, I think, is the main one that's actually infiltrating Christianity. That's actually, I think Nathan van Nokia talks about Christian Buddhists a lot, but it's people that talk about, it's the ideas of, like manifesting and inner peace and sort of Bucha. That was just New Age. Well, it might also be new age, but like Zen and those Eastern religion,
Jeff Leake:Eastern religion, that's, that's a better phrase, which is kind of encompasses a whole bunch of different things. Yeah, right. So I
Dave Leake:want to, I guess today, the conversation that I want to have is, what are the limits of those three? Self love, therapy, self discovery? Where are the dangers? Where do they perfectly mesh with Christianity. Where are there collision points that maybe are unseen or not talked about by culture? Because there really is a difference between what our culture in general says is good and right and well versus what the Bible says. And it's worth taking a second well. And
Jeff Leake:I think there's another piece of this too, which is not just the theological. Does this mesh with Christianity so we're aligned properly? It's also, do these approaches lead to real health? That's true. Do they lead us to the place where people are thriving and flourishing? Are they missing something? Are they in complete solutions? I think so. From a like, if someone's out there and they're hurting and you're trying to find an answer for what you're struggling through, or you're lacking purpose, and you want to discover yourself so that you can step into some kind of meaning. It might be possible that some of the things that we're talking about are incomplete answers, and might leave you. Wanting, and so we're actually trying to direct people to real, real, genuine hope, right, legitimate solutions, as well as theological orthodoxy. So
Dave Leake:talk about your message this past weekend. Yeah, so conversation you had after Okay,
Jeff Leake:so I, I preached out of the the Exodus, chapter 12 and the Passover. And I was, I was recounting some things that happened for me personally when I was going through this Seder meal celebration last March with Rabbi Jeff Kip who was a rabbi, Messianic Rabbi here in Pittsburgh, and he did something for our ministry School where he took us through the Seder meal. So he went through basically the whole Passover meal as it as he would celebrate it with his family. And he took us one step at a time, and then he unpacked the biblical meanings of each and one of the things that's mentioned in Exodus chapter 12, in verse eight, it says that you're supposed to take the matzah, the unleavened bread, and dip it in bitter herbs. And the bitter herbs remind reminded the people of Israel of their slavery season in Egypt. And so he kind of broadened it. And he said, as you dip the bread in the bitter herbs, I want you to think about some of the things in your life that have not been easy. And so the bitter herbs was horseradish. Horseradish has this pungent smell makes your eyes water. It has a nasty taste. And as I and as I ate that horseradish and smelled it and felt my eyes water, and I thought about the things in my life that weren't easy, I was unprepared for the sensory impact that it would have on me, like like the the tasting of it, and the smelling of it, and the tears coming out of my eyes was sort of a therapeutic. Can I say it like that moment, like it was cathartic for me to face it, and then you take the same matzo bread and you dip it in a sweet it's called harroset, a little mixture of apples and honey. And basically, in that second dipping and tasting, it's like God takes the bitter things in my life and he's able to bring sweet redemption out of it, like he's able to bring something sweet out of it. And so my point in the message was, sometimes you need more than counseling to be to be healthy. You actually need the rhythms of a healthy spiritual community where you and God unpack some things in a in the presence of other people who love and believe in you are willing to pray for you, and just sitting one on one in a counseling room doesn't reproduce the same dynamic of what God intended to be present in the Passover celebration or for us in communion, right? There's some things that God does when we get into His presence, that can't happen in any other place. Now, I guess you could be in a counseling setting, and you and your counselor could pray and have a moment with God, but there's a limit to what therapy can do, and and and there's a need. So not that therapy is bad, but it it only produces one piece of the puzzle for us in our healing process. I think some things only happen when we get honest with ourselves in the presence of God, in the presence of other people, and we process what's happening in our life in real time. And so I think I mentioned this to you, Dave, and this is when we started down this path, because we had talked about this before, about how we live in a therapeutic culture, and how that maybe gets a little too much emphasis, and it can create some hang ups and problems for people if they don't have other balanced contributions to their soul health. So yeah, so my premise, so the message was, if I'm going to be have a healthy soul, I need more than counseling. I need the rhythms, the healthy rhythms of a or the rhythms of a healthy spiritual community, which is what was, what's provided in Passover, and what, really, what should be in in every small group and every weekend church service, there should be some degree of healing that happens when you get in the presence of God, in the presence of other people. Yeah, other
Dave Leake:people, you had a conversation afterwards. Is it too sensitive to speak about that?
Jeff Leake:So I won't go into detail, but someone came up to me and they said someone either was a brand new believer or hadn't yet come to faith. And they said, I've been dealing with a lot. I've been thinking that at times I have suicidal thoughts, and I've been in therapy for a long time, and while it's helped me, it's it's never been enough for me to feel that I that I've gotten past all this. And so I'm wondering if this is what I'm missing, maybe I maybe I need God in my life. That was back the conclusion. And so I was like, Well, yeah, I said this doesn't discount the value of the therapy you've received, or maybe the medical inputs that you've gotten, but to make the picture complete for what you need in your life, you need not just God, you need other people who are godly and encouraging and are prayerful to surround you so that you can get to that place. So I recommend. Ended some next steps going to breakthrough, getting involved with, you know, an age specific community of believers that would help to form friendships, and it was a very vulnerable and honest but meaningful conversation that I think needs to be had across the board for people today. Because, again, if therapy is the singular answer, it's not enough. There needs to be other pieces
Dave Leake:that's good. Okay, so, so let's, let's, let's talk about this collision of where even this comes from. Because, so you're talking about therapy also, you know, self love, I think, and self discovery. So self love, treating yourself well, you know, not living like you're unworthy, not going through life like always just feeling awful. It's sort of like, you know, telling yourself what you need to hear. It's like self affirmations, or it's self care, and then self discovery, finding your real purpose, like who you're created to be and how you're made and and the path for you to take as a unique individual. I think all of these, in some ways, feel like they come from the same sort of thought process.
Jeff Leake:But when you say it like that, Dave, I say, all good, right? Is there all good? Like, Oh, that's good. I mean, but there's something that cannot be good about it. So let me ask you, maybe the one to provoke the So, where are the dangers with that? Let's, let's take them on at a time. Where are the dangers with self love?
Dave Leake:Well, you know, from a biblical perspective, I think the reason for self love is because we're made in the image of God, and because God says we're valuable,
Jeff Leake:yeah, and there's the opposite a problem, which is self loathing, right? Which a lot of people deal with. Self loathing. They they don't like themselves because the way they look. They don't like themselves because of maybe a lack of gifts or comparison somebody else, or maybe something someone said about them. They don't like themselves because of a habit they can't overcome, or a mistake that they've made, or maybe just because they look in the mirror and they don't like what they see. So self love, in some ways, is trying to cure self loathing, right, right? And so it's like say about yourself, like you're beautiful, or, you know you have purpose, and people love you. What I find about that, and I'm talking too much, sorry I asked you for me. I I don't turn to self love to solve the moments of guilt, shame and self loathing. Okay, you're
Dave Leake:going too far down. Okay, you're gonna, you're giving solutions. Yeah, I want to, okay, here's, here's, so here's, here's hanging from now, yeah, here's, here's part of what I like about these conversations, I think if we give answers and takes too quickly, it doesn't always paint the actual tension of why something is worth discussing, then it's just like, here's good stuff from Jeff podcast, which we are, we're gonna get that at some point. But hold on, you're going too fast for me. I'm trying to paint. Why is this a problem? Well, I think that one of the things that is true is that if we follow Jesus, we are worthy. And because we're man Jesus image, you know, we are valuable. But self love, when it gets focused in the way that, that it often does in our culture, becomes about how you're already enough and and you know, regardless as to what you're like, like, you are perfect in your own way, and you're unique. And all those things are like, they echo things that are biblical, but they come from a different standpoint. Okay, where do they come from. Okay? So, so they come from this, this viewpoint, this is at least one of the viewpoints they originated from, which is that humanity, in its natural state, is the the perfect version of humanity that's corrupted by culture and society. So the more pressure and restrictions and and judgment that people heap on you, they walk past you and they give you certain looks, or your your body should look this way. You should think like this. You should have these preferences. It makes us conform. So
Jeff Leake:now you're talking humanism, right? Is that humanism or progressivism, the idea that they're a little linked, you are good, but culture says you're bad. It's culture that's the problem,
Dave Leake:and what we're doing is we, are we? Instead of allowing other people to give us their negativity and make us feel bad about be your true self. Yeah, love yourself into what you feel that you are, kind of a thing. And I guess, like all of those, have echoes of Christianity, which is why I think it's a little confusing. See, the Christian perspective is while man was once perfect in the garden, or as perfect as I guess, God made us to be, like the fall made everybody guilty, and everybody, you know. So the problem is, in culture, it's sin. The problem is me, yeah. The problem is that I am inherently sinful, yeah. And I. I we use the word depravity, depraved. I am corrupted. I'm broken, I'm flawed, and so like, the reason why Christians would say I am worthy, I am valuable, is because of what Jesus did for us. And the focus of self love isn't self it's it's on love, like we love ourselves because we've been made, you know, new by Jesus, and it's,
Jeff Leake:and because God's created us, yeah, right, you're right. And, and he and he died for us, and He and He wants us, and, yeah, so, so it's, it's like, you know, there's this old, I don't know if it's fable about the emperor that had no clothes on, you know, that story, and he walked around naked. And everybody, everybody pretended that he was clothed, but he was really naked. No one wanted to tell him the truth. So the the king could say, culture requires me to wear clothing, but I'm being my true self. Either way, you're still naked, right? Either way, you're still exposed. So whatever, whatever sinful brokenness you carry around with you, doesn't matter whether culture accepts you or not. It that's still a problem. And when you let God breathe life into you and forgiveness into you and you, you see yourself now through his eyes, that you're now a new creation in Christ now you have a real sense of rootedness into something that can never be taken away from
Dave Leake:you. And okay, it's like there's this nuance all human life is valuable and it's valuable to God. All human life has worth. So those are true. But if you accept that, let's just call it humanistic viewpoint of this. When it comes to self, love or worth, it's like everybody, you're enough, you're you're already worthy. Don't change, but you are. And that is opposite of the what the Bible says, Okay, it's like what your Bible say? You're not enough on your own, you're a mess, you're broken, and that's why we need to come to Jesus. Yeah, it's not that you're valueless or you're worthless. Everybody has value, but you're broken. You're you're not, yeah, you're not. You're not complete. You're broken. And what makes us complete isn't by, you know, loving ourselves better for who we are. It's by a accepting Jesus and allowing his thoughts to transform us so that we become, yeah, who he and then
Jeff Leake:we start to align, right? So we say, you're you're not, you're broken. Your mind is all all over the place, and you let things live in your mind that shouldn't be there, but you but if you align your mind with truth, the truth will set you free right like in your you feel like you're not enough. You got an addictive habit. You need to be freed from that so that you can live a sober and clean and free life like there's there's some things that you're carrying around with you have hate in your heart like you, you need to get in alignment with the grace of God and forgive so that God can set you free and you don't walk around with us anymore. Like to say to someone who's bitter or addicted or tormented in their mind, you're okay, just like you are. Just love yourself more that doesn't make you free, that doesn't bring you life and healing and doesn't make you a better dad or husband or whatever. So you need Jesus to be changed from the inside out. So God says to you, I love you just like you are, and I know you're not there yet, and I love you and I accept you, and you're my son or daughter, and you're my family, but now I'm not going to let you stay this way. We're going to work together and making you to become who you need to be, because you're broken and damaged, and damaged, and you're never going to flourish in this condition. So you really need to step into the plan and purpose. So let's talk about why this matters too. Okay, because if we don't want to leave people in their condition of brokenness, well, not
Dave Leake:just that. If you already are enough, you don't need God. It's true. The whole
Jeff Leake:actually are. God, yes. And that's think about like I am enough. That's like a statement that you would make about the sovereign of the universe. Yeah, I mean,
Dave Leake:I mean, like humanism, New Age, these kind of faith systems, even if it's not a religion you practice actively, but it's a worldview we hold. It's like humanity is inherently good, and there are certain things that we can do to take off the mud and the restrictions and the stuff that have been caked on to us that we can be restored to our former glory. The Bible says, while there is former glory, you can't do anything to get close to restoring any of that without God's help. So it's like recognizing my own brokenness and saying, God, I need you, and then even the love that we have for ourselves. It is we should love ourselves, but it's like it is a love that should be reflective of Jesus. Does that make sense? Like he gets the glory for who I am? Like, it's not that I am enough. I'm enough because of what Jesus has done, well,
Jeff Leake:and honestly, the Gospel comes with this opposite challenge, deny yourself. Yeah. Deny yourself. Yeah. So, so, you know, Jesus said you should love your neighbor as you love yourself. And I think that that's one of the ways that that particular phrase gets been supplied. Because we think, see that's the thing, before I can love anybody else, have to love myself. I actually don't think that's what Jesus was trying to say, although I. Self loathing is not good, right? I think what he was trying to say is we all love and cater to ourselves constantly. The problem that we have is that we don't love ourselves enough. It's that we love ourselves too much, and that we need to deny our impulses and sinful desires and selfishness so that we can love God and love others, because if you self love, can get in the way of loving God and loving others. And so it's again, we're not saying loathe yourself, yeah, or have a bad perspective of yourself, but everybody has a tendency to love themselves, and that doesn't really need reinforced. What you need to do is you need to accept yourself on God's terms, yeah, and see yourself through God's eyes, so that you value yourself the way God does, and then deny your urges into your selfishness so that you can live like Christ. Yeah?
Dave Leake:Another way of putting it, I think, would be the that we are trying to align with the proper perspective, so it's like the only one who is able to tell, like a person, how much their worth they have, or why they are as their Creator, like the creator of an object, can actually give a value and meaning and purpose. And so it's like when we align ourselves with what God believes about us, we come into the real glory that God had for us. I think was it ironies that said the glory of God is man fully alive. You've heard that quote before. That's, that's what I mean. I probably have. That's one that John Eldridge uses in the book Waking the Dead, found in your office. And read it a little bit ago because I had heard and I was like, I want to check this out. I think that's a really good quote. But it's like, we, we, you know, when, when we fully step into who God made us to be, self denying, you know, loving people of virtue. You know what I mean, like real, true virtue, courage and humility and boldness and and respect and, well, I don't know, there's probably a generosity. I think we reflect God's nature, and we align with the perspective of how he created us to be, and find our value in that, because there's a glory in being the kind of man or woman God called us to be. The opposite perspective is we're like self generating our own value. And I have to tell myself I'm valuable, and everyone
Jeff Leake:else has to reflect what I think about myself, yeah, or else it makes me invalid somehow. And
Dave Leake:it's extremely threatening and dangerous when other people try to impose their thoughts about you on you. That's what the world says, right from this perspective, because if they make you feel that way, then you become that way, and you're seeing yourself as less than you should. So
Jeff Leake:the dangers of the self love movement is the projection that culture and society is the problem, or
Dave Leake:that, that you are the one that your value and worth and self fulfillment are rooted in, yeah? Like you have it there, you'd have to unpack it. That's actually the same thing with self discovery.
Jeff Leake:Yeah, I was going to get to this because self discovery doesn't sound as dangerous to me. What? Because what you just, like you said, you need to discover the man or woman that God's created you to be and live with courage and humility and purpose. And to me that sounds like self discovery. So how, in what way is self discovery dangerous? So how is it linked to the thing we just said about self love? All right, so there's
Dave Leake:a book we used to mention all the time. Still love it. It's called The Rise and triumph of the modern self, by Carl Truman, he wrote another by the
Jeff Leake:way, okay, so, Andrew, he's an evangelist from New York, Dave. And he said, I love your podcast. Andrew Rosenberger, I'm sorry, Andrew, if I got your name wrong. Okay, he works with will Hampton, yeah, I know Andrew. Andrew, great guy. And he said he was saying in jest that he I listened to podcast. He said, We, I have kind of a drinking game with it every time you mentioned John Mark comer. Oh yeah, I take a drink of my diet cook. I think we could probably with a rise and drop of
Dave Leake:the bar. Well, specifically in that one season we read it. That was like it just mind blowing the good book to me, he wrote another simpler version of this as a little less academic, more streamlined, called strange new world. Anyway, by Carl Truman. He talks about this concept he calls expressive individualism.
Jeff Leake:Okay, it's a deep here you are. You are always good for the book recommendations. Let's do it. Okay, so strange new world, or the rise and triumph of the modern, modern self. Carl Truman, who is, I think, a professor at Grove City, keep going, all right, so give me some deep thoughts. So
Dave Leake:I'm just reading an AI generated definition of expressive individualism, but it's probably close enough. Okay, it's a worldview that prioritizes self expression and self discovery, it emphasizes the importance of being true to oneself and following one's inner feelings. So key characteristics self determination, individuals are the highest authority and are responsible determining their own truth. Self expression, individuals express their inner identity through their own personal means, off. Authenticity, individuals should behave in a way that is consistent with their inner feelings. Self fulfillment, individuals should seek to find express their best selves and self definition, individuals are defined by their capacity to choose a future pathway.
Jeff Leake:So it just described the religious doctrine of our day. Yes, yeah, right, that is, that is the air that we breathe. That is the the theology of most television and movies. That's the the doctrinal statements of a lot of music. That's the way your friends reflect back to you about answers in life. Is that's the doctoral statement. So,
Dave Leake:so you broke it down. What? How does this actually sound to you when you hear this in culture? Yeah, so for
Jeff Leake:me, so I have it, it, it makes me disturbed inside. I know
Dave Leake:you'll know. Let me realize. What? How do you hear this being you're like, it's in movies, and it's in
Jeff Leake:songs, and so, you know you so so the universe will work it out for you. You know it, it's all going to come together. You need to just be true to yourself. You need to follow your heart. If you just follow your heart, you're going to be fine. Your heart knows the way, don't you can't let anybody put that on you. You need to be you need to be who you are, like you you're you only live once. You need to live the way that you want to live. Don't let anyone else tell you how you need to fit into any innovations or who you're going to be. You can't let society pressure you. You can't let anyone let you down like you got to be. You got to be who you are. That's not a very clumsy version of what you hear all the time. And
Dave Leake:the political version is there are all of these groups that are trying to force you to be who they want you to be to sustain their own power, but you need to throw them off of yourself, whether it's religion, right, patriarchy, patriot, institutional, whatever, not
Jeff Leake:to say that there aren't abuses from those spaces. Yes, those are,
Dave Leake:those are spaces where people have power, and many people have power, are abusing them, right? But
Jeff Leake:the powers of a culture, whatever power sources they are, are the problem, yes, and they're the reasons why you're not happy, right? Exactly. And if you could deal with those power structures, you would be, you would be, finally, you know, the person you're supposed to be, and you'd be happy and truly fulfilled. But because there's so many nasty power structures out there. We always got to fight the man. And
Dave Leake:the more progressive you go into this, you get into the intersectionality matrix, where, depending on the types of ways that power would push you down, you know women, minorities, racially, you know gender fluidity stuff. Or now you get people that are disabled, hot second topics right there? Well, but, but it's, it's ways that powers victimize you are incent they're making you more and more marginalized, which is, keep you from being who you really are, stress yourself, throwing off all of those things, because you should be the, the most true to you. Okay,
Jeff Leake:so maybe the simplest way to illustrate this is the Copernican revolution, right? Is this the simplest way to Well, here's what I mean. For years, most people believe that the universe revolves around the Earth, and Copernicus demonstrated that the universe, the Galaxy we're in, revolves around the sun, and he was persecuted for that. Okay, so the self love movement, self discovery movement says, I'm in the center. Everything revolves around me, and if I can make it revolve around me properly, I'll be truly happy. Christianity says we all revolve around God, and specifically Jesus, the Son of God. And our life finds meaning only in that it circles His purpose. And if I put myself in the center or on the throne, I'm always going to find a lack of fulfillment, a lack of purpose, a lack of value, because I'm not enough to be what I need myself to be. I'm deficient, I'm broken. But if I put Jesus in the center and I let my life revolve around him, everything else starts to make sense, by the way, that also brings peace in polarization, because instead of fighting power, we begin to align in a life that's submitted to Jesus and His Kingdom vision. And we're no longer, you know, out there trying to beat down the man we're we're now simply trying to serve the purpose of God, and that motivates us to bring value to everybody we see,
Dave Leake:and just people that are, that are, you know, being downtrodden upon my freedom for the captives. And, you know, because I think it's not, it's not just so we don't care about the man. We let the powers do whatever they want, even no matter how horrible they are. But the motivation is to serve
Jeff Leake:God's purpose exactly, rather than fight the power, right, right? So, so that wasn't, I thought that was, No, that was actually really good, yeah, so I didn't know where the thing was. What you need to decide, in a way, is, does the universe revolve around you, or do you revolve around Jesus? Okay, so as your life revolve around let me.
Dave Leake:Let me give more examples of how, how. Face of this is in our culture. How widespread now, let's be clear, being individualistic is not necessarily bad, trying to tap into who God's made me to be, and what am i What do I like? What do I dislike? What are my giftings? Those aren't necessarily bad. We live in an expressive, individualistic culture, which means that rather than being about tribes and being about family, lineage or even nationality, it's more about each individual person. So that's just, that's not necessarily a bad thing. I'm about me. Yeah, okay, so, so ways that we see this, all the different personality tests that have been huge for years, and I, like all
Jeff Leake:you, you, I know that better than anybody. Siblings, yeah, you could argue about that for days. Yes, yeah.
Dave Leake:I mean, in high school, I got really into the Myers, Briggs, and then Enneagram, yeah, disc eventually, Enneagram and some of those profiling tools are helpful. Working genius is sort of the latest one that's more of a working environment, one, and those show how individuals and their own, you know, unique design can can work together better, with people that can understand themselves better. And I think like the insight into seeing who I am and and what my unique strengths and weaknesses are, what my struggles are, what my motivations or my callings, some of those things are really helpful. But it's I'm trying to highlight. There's an underpinning in our culture like Hogwarts houses from Harry Potter, what house do you belong to? You know, there's all of these. We divide ourselves to try to find, how am I different than everybody else? How am I unique individual? And that's not bad, but this whole problem with self discovery and self love as it can quickly go from discovery for the purpose of aiding myself to becoming idolatry, where I worship myself. Yeah, I whatever I feel I bow down to. I need to do that. I need to be true to myself. I need to serve my needs. I need follow this urge, yeah, exactly. I need to. I need to be celebrated properly, right, right? Exactly, exactly. And I just think, is self love bad? No, definitely not. Is self discovery bad? No, but when they get out of order, is self love bad? I don't think necessarily you think it's bad.
Jeff Leake:That's self care is not bad, okay, self love is assumed, but it, how quickly does self love become selfish? I mean it. I don't know that. Other than the one statement Jesus made love your neighbor as you love yourself, that we ever see self love in the Bible?
Dave Leake:Uh huh, you mean, like as a command,
Jeff Leake:as anything affirmed? Well, okay, there
Dave Leake:is. This isn't necessarily care. Here's. So here's, here's one that is just an example that Paul used in Ephesians. 529, No one hates his own body, but feeds for it and cares for it, just as Christ cares for the church. So that's sort of
Jeff Leake:so it's assumed, right? You know, I personally don't have a problem with feeding my body like most people don't like unless you're caught into a self destructive loop. Your desire to cater to yourself and worship yourself is part of the sin nature, right? I think that's why Jesus says die to yourself, so that you can live for him. So self love going anything beyond what I would call soul care, so you could be healthy to serve God's purpose. Probably is idolatry.
Dave Leake:I understand what you mean by definition. When people colloquially say the word self love, the phrase self love, I think they're talking about, give yourself a break, have a little bit of soul care. Well, that's how you're defining it. Okay, Soul
Jeff Leake:care is making sure that I'm doing well, that I'm not just burning myself out, that I'm paying attention to the signals in my life, that I'm aware of my triggers, that I process my pain, that I deal with my bitterness, that I Okay. All that's good, all of that is biblical, but I do that by loving myself. That is using the doctrinal language of a destructive cult called humanism, which is consuming our culture in a massive way. And so I would just be very careful to use that term too freely. Okay, but here's so so it's like this therapy. So good therapy alone not going to get you there. Self love, okay? Except soul care. Accept it if you go too far with it. If you go too far leaning into self esteem or self love, or you're gonna, you're gonna so quickly shift in because it's, it's an insidious trap to make you the center of everything, yeah, and unless you are purposely rowing against the current of the culture and your own sin nature, which is always trying to put you in the center of everything, you're going to end up there quickly, and then you're going to be not just worshiping a false god to say it real direct, but you're going to end up unfulfilled and blaming the whole world for the fact that that you have problems. Yes, yeah. And so Christianity, when puts God in the center, realizes that Jesus is enough and he starts to heal you properly, then you don't blame the world. You start to serve the world. And that is a whole different paradigm that we have to get back into So, but I guess I'm not gonna die on that hill. Like
Dave Leake:if you some people use self love. Okay, let's say it's like a new mom, because we're a new parents meet. Well, not we have a two year old, but we also have
Jeff Leake:a newborn getting your butt kicked by two little babies. Oh, my You got you need to take care of yourself. Not just that. My generation would say, make sure you take care of yourself, but you say, make sure you love yourself. That to me, that's like, they wouldn't say
Dave Leake:like that. It would be okay. So it'd be like, it'd be like, a give yourself Grace would be an example of a self love type of a statement, because it's like, you have a newborn, you know, it's, you can't have everything perfect all the time. The house isn't always gonna look the way you wanted to. Like, don't hold yourself to this ridiculously high standard. Like you just you need to have some grace for yourself. That's, that's sort of vein of self love. But self love can become self worship, which is what you're talking about.
Jeff Leake:I it's, it's like a lot of words that become overused. I agree. I agree. I think it's probably the danger is that we throw self love around too easily, and we should just say it more plainly, give you grace to yourself, take care of yourself, pace yourself like okay, that's none of that's idolatry. That's action oriented, strategic steps. Love yourself. Now that sounds like we're moving into put yourself at the center of everything, and if you do everything's going to be good. I think that's the that's the danger point. So let's
Dave Leake:talk about therapy for a second. Yeah. Um, so how, what's your you were just talking about how good therapy is. Talk to me about your view, like, Where, where is the limit of therapy? Because you're like, it doesn't get you all the way there. Where does it help? Where is it limited?
Jeff Leake:Yeah, so, okay, I think it's good. I was actually thinking about this as I heard Dave, you told me what our podcast episode was going to be today that, you know, up until the turn of the 19th century, the 20th century, there wasn't therapy like so. So think about it, there are a lot of traumatized, hurting people who lived their lives without counseling, slash therapy, for what, five, 6000 years of human history, and then all of the sudden we see it as central to everything. Now, how do people cope back then? What do they do?
Dave Leake:My opinion? Yeah, I just think people didn't think about it. I think you just moved on. No, but if you
Jeff Leake:were lost a child at an early age, or you were divorced, or your husband died, you were traumatized, yeah, that's true. I think there was some things that were present. You had an extended family that typically lived near you. You worked hard, physically, you you may probably sat down with somebody in your life, a dad, a mom, a grandparent, a friend, and you got some wise counsel a lot of people, especially in some cultures, Western cultures, especially in the last couple centuries, they studied the Word of God and let God's word speak into their life, and they journaled and they sang hymns, and they were in church, and they and they worshiped, and they had spiritual communities they belonged to. I actually think that therapy added into that the word of God and hard work and physical discipline and and, you know, extended family, all of that together, you add therapy in which is this really targeted way to identify what your triggers are and how to think through some things and some soul exercises. To get therapy is amazing. It takes us all to a whole nother level of health. But it's interesting that in the last 120 years of history, we've had more emphasis on therapy and counseling and we have more mental health crisis. Yeah, exactly. How is that possible? You would think we would be the most mentally healthy generation that has ever lived, and we may be the most mentally unhealthy. So how is it that we have more resources available to us and less mental health? Though? It's not that the world has gotten more difficult. People live longer lives.
Dave Leake:Diseases are less common. People die, yes, yeah, right. Child
Jeff Leake:birth, child death rates are way, way lower in comparison to previous generation is less poor than we ever been. We are affluent. Yeah? So maybe the problem isn't the fact that there's therapy, which is a very good thing, yeah? Maybe the thing that was we lack all the other stuff that they had, extended family and spiritual community and hard work and discipline and mothers and fathers who speak into our life. Maybe we're isolated so much that we are always by ourselves, and we have a friend group that's only peers, and then we go to we go to a hired counselor to provide us with input, but we lack the framework of living. Yeah, that, and this is what the Passover illustration that I shared at the beginning was all about. You get together with your whole family, and you take multiple hours, and you have a spiritual experience, and you taste bitterness, and you taste sweetness, and you think about what God's brought you through. And you pray together, and you laugh together, and you feel like you belong to something, and you understand how God looks at you, and you know he has a plan for you, and your life is revolving around yourself. And then you have the rhythms of every seven days, you have a Sabbath, and you disconnect from life, and you reconnect with yourself and with the people who love you. It's, it's the rhythms of spiritual community that we are missing. Yeah, isolation is probably the cause of all the mental health issues. I should say, Oh, I think that many. I think there's more than that. Okay, go ahead.
Dave Leake:Okay, so I have a theory. I don't know this could be, yeah, at risk of looking stupid, but let me just tell you my theory. All right, but so maybe this is gonna be instantly proven wrong. But here's what I think. I think that when the younger generations, millennials and down, think of the older generations, they think of a lot of people before therapy or self awareness who didn't think about certain things. And so, like, one of the tropes of toxic masculinity is like they just bury everything. They bury their emotions. They're distant from everybody. You know what I mean? They they like shoulder the load, but they were never really happy, and they were mean people around them because they weren't self aware. They didn't do any digging, right? I think it's actually it's possible to be so unaware of yourself that you carry all kinds of stuff you never process, and it's not good for you. But I think that our culture has indexed so far into the introspective zone that is super unhelpful. We're
Jeff Leake:so aware of ourselves that we can't get out of ourselves. What though we're not even that
Dave Leake:awareness means actually truth though we're just looking inside and seeing things
Jeff Leake:we know our feelings. Yes, I may not necessarily know accurate things about us.
Dave Leake:Yeah, we might not have objective perspective on what's actually going on.
Jeff Leake:Let me preach now for a minute. Okay, here's the other factor. I just mentioned, the spiritual community component. So another part of the Passover celebration is that they, by the way, this this podcast should come out right about Passover season. So it's interesting. Anyway, the Feast of Unleavened Bread was designed for them to go through their houses and remove all the leaven. So I illustrated like this. They took the leader of the House, would take a candle, a dustpan and a little broom, and the children would hide the leaven around the house, which was symbolic of sin, and they would scoop it up in the pan, and they would throw it out. And it was like saying, we are purifying our home from anything that's sinful or selfish. Okay, here's the other thing, if you're living in habitual sin and you're out, you're not right with God, and you're in rebellion against Him, or you're carrying bitterness around, or you're in some you're you're like addicted to pornography or whatever you're you can go to counseling all day long until you get right with God, your soul will never be healthy. Yeah, I think we have a lot of people who are doubling down on their sin patterns and going to talk about it on a regular basis. But unless you repent and get your mind right and your heart light right and your life right, you're never going to find joy, because joy is it comes from the Holy Spirit, and peace comes from the Holy Spirit come peace comes from being right with God. So if you're a Christian living a double life, living in sin, and you're good with it, and you go to counseling to talk about it, well, of course, God is not at work in your life like he wants to be to make you whole. And so that's why I say we over emphasize therapy, unless your therapist tells you you're in sin. Get right with God, which some good therapist might Yeah, like your pornography addiction is stealing your soul. You better deal with that. Confess your sins to one another. Pray for one another. You can be healed. James 516 Yep. Okay, so you need community. You need the word of God. You need moms and dads in your life. Yeah, you need a pastor like you need a place to process your pain. Need to be honest with yourself. You need good physical conditioning. You need some hard work. You need to do something for something. So another thing is, if I live all the time on video games, and I only think about myself all the time because of self love, but I really never serve anybody else. Sometimes the best thing for my mental health is to get for me to get out of myself and go do something for somebody else,
Dave Leake:true. And so I have to put video games on blast like that, okay, but always video games, right? Producer, Matt,
Jeff Leake:always watching Netflix or whatever. Too much soccer. Tick tock. Yeah. Soccer, right? So, so listen, you, you, you can't substitute self discovery, yeah, self love and therapy for a life of repentance, yeah? Like, there is a certain level of you being right with God that is necessary for you to experience the life God designed for you to live. Yeah, and, and. And I think sometimes we just put like a film over top of our our mess of a life, and we say, well, I'm in counseling, but I got this crap going on in my soul. You have to deal with stuff in order for it. Now. Again, a good therapist, a good Christian counselor, will help you do that. Yeah, right. So I'm not saying all therapies, just to film on top. No, of course I'm saying real soul health involves the work of repentance. There's
Dave Leake:another trap, though, that I was trying to highlight that will go past just the repentance angle, and I think it's what we focus on. So okay, there. There definitely is. Are some things that, if we don't deal with them, they are and we just try to move on, move past their traumatic PTSD is a good example of those kind of symptoms that come from traumatic events, and they get worse when you bury them, like you need to process through them or whatever, but like when you live in such an introspective, individualistic culture, the base thought is like, I am Who I am primarily, like I am an inner person with an exterior body, but I need to know how I feel and what I desire and what's motivating me and what traumas I have. And, you know, the Freudian type psychology is a lot of stuff probably happened to you as a kid or as a young person, and a lot of the trauma and baggage you have originates there. So there's, there's this degree of, like, unpacking and going back to try to find the root causes and, like, I'm not saying that's not ever useful, but when that becomes all consuming as a focus, if it's an obsession, it's it, yeah, it's like, it's a never ending pit to dig down. Yeah, I
Jeff Leake:think what's coming into my mind, and this is maybe old guy get off my lawn kind of moment here. But I think of PTSD. I think of the people who lived in trenches in World War. Bombs are exploding everywhere, and people are losing their arms and their eyes, and you come out of that, and you for the rest of your life, when thunder strikes, you've want to run under a bed, sure. And then there's the PTSD, because I didn't get the job I wanted. Well, I mean, it's like, actual, I mean, maybe somebody has PTSD, because in the therapeutic culture, don't we refer to our disappointment sometimes as PTSD, like, probably you can elevate certain disappointments in life to being like, so traumatic when, but I meant real PTSD,
Dave Leake:yeah, real PTSD, yeah. Like, but like, somebody who is a policeman or a firefighter, or, let's just say, even somebody who went through a really traumatic event,
Jeff Leake:yeah, sure. Okay, so, so I don't want to, okay, now I again. So, wait, wait, you're jumping past my point. I'm clarifying. I'm saying I don't want to be the old guy saying, just suck it up and deal with it you don't need. Yeah, that's almost what it sounds like to me when I hear myself say that loud, just so, just so, you know, I go, I've gone to counseling. I would go to counseling. I refer people to counseling. I think it's very important, sure. I think having a good self, self, Soul care plan is essential to live a healthy life over a long period of time. So I'm pro pro pro Pro, pro pro therapy. I'm not in any way against it. What I'm against is sometimes the mindsets that surround the obsession with what I feel all the time.
Dave Leake:You know, the thing is, though it's not like all therapists share the same philosophy. Well,
Jeff Leake:that's the thing. Just like not all pastors preach equally, and not all doctors as good medically, it is important who you're getting advice from there's a there's a risk. Because someone has counselor on their door doesn't mean they're going to
Dave Leake:give you or a degree good, most prestigious, good. Yeah. So there's a you ever read the book telling yourself the truth? No, by William Baucus. He's a therapist. And his, his whole thing that he coined is this, this term misbelief therapy, okay? And his, his basic premise is we spend way too much time digging in the past. Not that that's never helpful, but that doesn't always solve the problems. What the problem is is, he says, like, what happens to us in life are facts, but we tell ourselves narratives about about what happened that gives color and meaning and emotion to those things. So, you know, your car gets totaled. You know, you one thing you could be like, is, like, Man, this always happens to me. I The worst stuff. Like, I it was, it wasn't even
Jeff Leake:my fault. Doesn't love me, and no one even cares. No one asked me about this. Yeah, or maybe,
Dave Leake:or you know, what's gonna happen next. Or you could be like, Wow, I got that injury free. Like, like, I have the best luck. I got into an accident. Nothing happened. And
Jeff Leake:my insurance is good. I have to pay for it, yeah? Because
Dave Leake:there's always, there's always a narrative and a story that, which is what
Jeff Leake:we teach from Romans 12, right? Don't be conformed any longer to the patterns of this world, but, yes, Be transformed by the renewing of our mind, right?
Dave Leake:So that is, that's his premise. Yeah, so he goes the misbelief therapy is identifying misbelief or lies that we believe and correcting them with biblical truth. He's a Christian counselor, and they've had a really high success rate with that, that type of school thinking, I think that that has a an end of the road. The end of the road is, what am I believe? Leaving like I'm feeling something, I'm being triggered. I'm dissecting this pain. I'm going through. What's the narrative I'm telling myself about these or are there any lies, let's correct them,
Jeff Leake:which is basically discipleship, yeah, yeah, yeah. It really is learning to think like Jesus about my life Exactly,
Dave Leake:yeah. So, so I think that there are great, great depths that can come from the right kind of therapy.
Jeff Leake:So if you're going to go to a therapist, you might want to interview them first and ask them what their therapeutic point of view is, right? Yeah, because whether you have Freudian and Jungian and there's other points of view, maybe even to interview, to say, before I get into this, I need to know where you're coming from. Like, are you a Christian? You know, do you believe in the truth of God's Word? We will, you know, I think that's especially important if you're a believer. What's the role of medication? Yeah, what's the role of medication? I think, I think knowing what your the point of view of your therapist is, is, is really important. I agree, because you could get advice from anybody and it could be hurtful to you. So, yeah, anyway, okay, so I
Dave Leake:got one more one more point. Yeah, okay, go for it. So we did self love therapy, self discovery, yeah, let's talk about the good side of self discovery, okay? Because I think we talked about, we can make yourself an idol. And, you know, expressive individualism, I think that they're the the aim of self discovery is a good thing.
Jeff Leake:So, so I just recently heard Craig Groeschel. I think it was Craig Groeschel said this might have been somewhat different, but they said the real question is not what is God's will for my life. It is really the question, what is God's will? And until you establish what is God's will in the world, you will always over focus on the last few phrases, what is God's will for my life? So the very first question you ask is, What is God's will in the world? What is God up to? And then, in the context of that, what is my place? Right? I have a gift, and I have an assignment, and I live in a particular generation, but I cannot divorce myself from the overall will of God in general. When I think about the will of God for me personal, and I think a lot of times we ask the question, as, if we're the center of the universe, what is God's will for my life? So God, you're circling around me, and you're orbiting around me. So tell me what purpose you have for me. Whereas when we are circling God, we're like God. You have a purpose in the world. I want to serve your purpose. And where do I fit in? Where do I fit in with your purpose right now, in my generation? And and that's where self discovery finds a meaning beyond you. Yeah. You know the
Dave Leake:question, where do I fit in? Is like a repulsive question to this generation and this culture. Why? Because the the whole thrust of culture is, don't fit in. Be yourself. Yeah, unique. Don't. Don't let God make you conform to conform to any pattern, godly or worldly or anything, be your own unique pattern, but, but the the idea of, like God, where do I fit into your plan? Like you have something, how do I come in line with what that's that's a that is a very anti cultural thought, yeah. But So here's, here's the but
Jeff Leake:Jesus says the greatest in the kingdom of heaven will be the servant You're right. So even if your role in God's economy for God's will is to be a servant like what does it say? I'd rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than, you know, to stand in the house of the house of the wicked or whatever. I'd rather just hold the door and be a part of your plan than to have my own plan without you, yeah? And that's the thing. My my meaning in life doesn't come because I have a purpose. My meaning in life is because I, I know the One who created it all, and I'm serving his purpose, yeah, so my life just as a reflection of his purpose in the world, and I have a place to fit into that. Okay,
Dave Leake:so, so we got a couple more minutes. I'm watching the clock, I promise. Okay. So, so the whole self discovery thing we're fitting in, here's what I was trying to, trying to get towards. Though. Think the aim of self discovery, of understanding ourselves well enough to start to discover who God made us to be, is not a bad name, and it doesn't, let's start with God's will first. Yeah, but I was having a conversation with somebody, I think, like the self, love, humanism, version of culture almost has this perspective, like we are a fossil, and it's like we're an archeologist uncovering the bone, and we're like, trying to dust it off and chip away at things, and like, who is the true version of ourselves were made to be? But I think, like, really, like the way that the Bible talks about it as, like, clay that's imperfect, that's being molded to become something that we're not. So even like James, one you know, he says, Dear Brothers and Sisters, when troubles of any kind come your way, consider. An opportunity for great joy. For you know that when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow, so let it grow, for when your endurance is fully developed, you'll be perfect and complete, needing nothing that verse is like when awful stuff happens, when things are really trying and challenging. It's a good thing because it's going to help in your self discovery process, right? Yeah, it's gonna shape you to become the first. It's not
Jeff Leake:necessarily meaning that the bad things are good. It means that something good can come out of the bad things, which is that you'll be shaped more into what God wants you to be.
Dave Leake:But so this, this insinuation is you're not fully developed. Yeah, you're not yet perfect and complete, and you need something. So
Jeff Leake:if you uncover yourself, you're gonna find an incomplete picture. Yes, and God wants to take that, mold it and shape it so that he can make you to be what you're supposed to
Dave Leake:be. So the idea of self discovery really should be being hammered in, blow by blow to the shape. That's most useful plan of God. That's good. That is a very, very different type of thought than humanism has. Yeah, that's very good, but it's like, okay, so whatever is going on in my life, it is just the hammer blows the Lord is using to make me into the man or woman that God's called me to be. And when
Jeff Leake:I look at him and I see that he's pleased with what I'm becoming, it's in that that I find true meaning and joy. I think that's profound. Yeah, that that is. And if I look at my life and I and I see value only is my eyes and my version of life, I only have what I can provide for myself, yeah. But if I center myself around God, I have, I have what he can provide for me. If I define my
Dave Leake:own value, somebody else can steal it from me. If they make me feel bad. That's why we need safe space. How sad that is, yeah? Because if it's an unsafe space, somebody steals my value, I now feel valueless, therefore my whole. But it's like, well, it's not based on how I feel about me, because I could feel because you're more about whatever
Jeff Leake:you want to do, but I know who I am in his eyes. Yeah, we're never going to shake me. Yeah. Sometimes I
Dave Leake:feel a lot of shame or rejection, but that doesn't shape my identity. Yeah, because God determines that from, yeah, that's, that's beautiful. So anyway, I just to me this feels like it's, it's an antidote for a confused generation, because I think we have our priority.
Jeff Leake:That should be the title for this, not anecdote. Anecdote for a confused generation,
Dave Leake:we'll let the smarter people that I figure out the title producer, Mackin, but anyway, any closing thoughts for you?
Jeff Leake:So I love the phrase. I was trying to look it up here, where it talks about, you know, even when our conscience condemns us, I think it's first John chapter three, it says we still have confidence, because God is greater than our heart. That's what you were just saying. Here's another verse. There is no fear in love, but perfect love drives out fear. So when we feel the perfect love of God in our life, not our own self love, but God's love toward us, that's the thing that makes us whole.
Dave Leake:I love that. I Yeah. So I guess all this to say all of these things, self love therapy Well, maybe not self love, depending on how you define it, therapy and self discovery can all be tools God can use to make you the person that you need to be with the kind of fulfilled life and joy and purpose and meaning that you've always desired. But it takes making sure we get the Copernican example, yeah, right, of putting God at the center and fitting into the plan that he has, as opposed to finding out how God has perfectly tailored the world just for me, right? Because that just isn't the world we live in. Unfortunately, we live in a God, God designed world, God centric world. You are not God, and neither am I. And that's a good thing. That's a good thing. So hey, well, we just want to say thanks again for joining us. We really appreciate you always being a part of the podcast again. If you wouldn't mind just taking a couple of minutes, you can help us out a number of ways. You can like and subscribe on YouTube, at the bell for notifications, you can comment to let us know your thoughts or your questions, concerns, topics you want for the future, you can like and share in social media, and as always, you can give us a five star review to help us boost the listenership that can find us. So we just want to say thanks again for joining us. We'll see you guys again next time, bye.