Dying to Self

Mother Teresa

Posted on by Kath Walden

When I was hungry, you gave me food to eat.
When I was thirsty, you gave me your cup to drink.
Whatsoever you do to the least of these of my children, that you do unto me.
Now enter the house of my Father.
When I was homeless, you opened your doors.
When I was naked, you gave me your coat.
When I was weary, you helped me find rest.
When I was anxious, you calmed my fears.
When I was little, you taught me to read.
When I was lonely, you gave me your love.
When I was in prison, you came to my cell.
When on a sick bed, you cared for my needs.
In a strange country, you made me at home.
Seeking employment, you found me a job.
Hurt in a battle, you bound up my wounds.
Searching for kindness, you held out your hand.
When I was a Negro or Chinese or White,
Mocked and insulted you carried my cross.
When I was aged, you bothered to smile.
When I was restless, you listened and cared.
You saw me covered with spittle and blood,
You knew my features, though grimy with sweat.
When I was laughed at, you stood by my side.
When I was happy, you shared in my joy.

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Watchman Nee

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God’s means of delivering us from sin is not by making us stronger and stronger, but by making us weaker and weaker. That is surely rather a peculiar way of victory, you say; but it is the divine way. God sets us free from the dominion of sin, not by strengthening our old man but by crucifying him; not by helping him to do anything, but by removing him from the scene of action.

Hannah Whitall Smith

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The greatest burden we have to carry in life is self. The most difficult thing we have to manage is self. Our own daily living, our frames and feelings, our especial weaknesses and temptations, and our peculiar temperaments, – our inward affairs of every kind, – these are the things that perplex and worry us more than anything else, and that bring us oftenest into bondage and darkness.In laying off your burdens, therefore, the first one you must get rid of is yourself. You must hand yourself and all your inward experiences, your temptations, your temperament, your frames and reelings, all over into the care and keeping of your God, and leave them there. He made you and therefore He understands you, and knows how to manage you, and you must trust Him to do it.

Francis Frangipane

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None of us are there yet, but if we each have this attitude, we will put to death our reactions to criticisms and offenses. And though we may still stumble, we will learn that carrying the cross is not merely dying to self; it is embracing the love of Christ that forgives the very ones who have crucified us, that the battle that comes against us has actually driven us into the embrace of God.

John R. W. Stott

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If worship is right because God is worthy of it, it is also the best of all antidotes to our own self-centredness, the most effective way to “disinfect us of egotism,” as one writer put it long ago. In true worship we turn the searchlight of our mind and heart upon God and temporarily forget about our troublesome and usually intrusive selves. We marvel at the beauties and intricacies of God’s creation. We “survey the wondrous cross on which the Prince of glory died.” We are taken up with God, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit…Because we are normally so turned in on ourselves, we will not find this easy. But we have to persevere, since nothing is more right or more important.

Alexander MacLaren

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The one misery of man is self-will, the one secret of blessedness is the conquest over our own wills. To yield them up to God is rest and peace. What disturbs us in this world is not “trouble,” but our opposition to trouble. The true source of all that frets and irritates, and wears away our lives, is not in external things, but in the esistance of our wills to the will of God expressed by external things.