Committed to Setting the Captives Free, in the Fear of the Lord! (Luke 4:18, Is 49:8,9, Is 11:2)

 Dealing with poor Self Image

Thoughts and words lead to the formation of our image. The way we see ourselves, is determined by our upbringing, the way we are taught and more importantly the words that were spoken over our life, in the past and in the present

Words shape our past, our destiny and our future, words can continue to reinforce the wrong kind of image and result in low self esteem.

In order to form the right image of ourselves, we must first find out who we are.

Many people are looking for themselves, you regularly hear the phrase 'I am trying to find myself', or 'I am going away to such and such a place to find myself, as if our real identity were someplace else, or somehow to do with where we are living.

In truth we have our real self, the real you on the inside, is shaped and clouded by the person you think you are, shaped by pressures in society, parental pressures, peer pressures, the desire to conform or not to conform. These are all a product of our need to be accepted and loved by others.

In reality most people find that there is very little love in the world, more so today than in years gone by.

But even though many people are trying to find themselves, most people, if they dont know God, are as lost as a needle in a haystack.

What follows may be hard for you to understand and will seem like nonsense to you, unless you have a desire to know God, if you think that God does not exist, you owe it to yourself to read our section entitled, does God really exist?

If you would like to know who God is, Jesus says "you must be born again", the first and most important step to understanding is right here for you now, it will change your life forever!. Even so, please read on

We even hear Christians say 'I found Jesus'?E we need to understand that Jesus is not lost.

Jesus knows exactly where he is, seated at the right hand of the Father with all power and authority in heaven, in the earth and under the earth and he knows exactly who he is

In the natural man, our image of each other is formed from looking at outward appearances, fashion magazines, television, films and the media, all bring pressure to try to make us conform to their idea of the way we should look.

But God does not look at outward appearances, he looks at the inward image in our born again Heart or Spirit

The desire to find ourselves usually comes as a result of our dissatisfaction with our own image

To understand why this is, we need to look at the way the image is formed

Our image of our self is made up of thoughts like 'houses' in our mind and they are created as a result of the thoughts that we have allowed to take root and become 'houses' or strongholds in our mind

These houses of thoughts are our image of how we see ourselves. We hear the phrase that someone has a poor self image.

What does this mean?, usually that person thinks that they are not of any worth, They feel inferior to other people, or that other people are so much more capable than they are.

This image they have of themselves has been constructed over many years, built from the houses of thoughts that have been established in their mind, which in turn have become strongholds in their life.

If we are ever going to grow and develop in God, we need to obtain the image that God has already prepared for us

The bible talks about not conforming to an image that is influenced by man's way of doing and saying things

When we do not know God, we rely on our mind to lead us and guide us, but our mind does not contain our destiny and can never lead us into the fulfillment of something it knows nothing about. it can only lead us into futility

It also leads to the formation of an image on the inside of us, which is not Gods image, what kind of image are we working on, on the inside?

If we look at ourselves for a moment, our image of ourselves constructed by thoughts has been fed by whatever image we have allowed to develop

News media, television or other peoples opinions have all begun to shape our thinking

over a period of time, thoughts and words subtly and slowly begin to change our image of ourselves, to the point where we become, or conform to the image that we see, then we begin to say 'oh I can never see myself doing that, I can never see myself becoming that successful.'

We have to begin to develop and become the image that God has already put on the inside of us, the real you

When you are born again, the real you is inside you, in your born again spirit, but it is covered by layers of deception of who we think we are

The Word of God (the Bible), will remove these layers to reveal the real you, but the word needs to be obtained with the understanding to be able to walk in it in everyday life

So without understanding we are unable to carry out what the word is saying to us, so we forget what it is saying to us

We all know what it is like to read the word then forget all the scripture, just when we need them

as we get this word on the inside of us, this word is the image that God wants us to be transformed into

All scripture is already an image, but we are to get this image in us on the inside of us, then the manifestation (or the reality) of this image can be produced to the point where this image is now what we have become, we have a new image of ourselves.

We now no longer see ourselves as the world sees us, inferior, unworthy, average. we see ourselves as God sees us. we are looking at the reflection of the word in ourselves

Just like looking in that mirror when we get this word inside with understanding, we see the reflection of the word looking back

Words and thoughts produce image. what we hear, what we see and what we say, is all going to produce an image on the inside of us, good or bad

What is the image that God want us to see? His image is contained in our born again spirit

Now he wants our mind to be transformed into his image ?Ehow? by his Word, because the Word contains the image of God.

Renewing our mind to conform to the image of God, to God's way of doing things

The enemy is fighting this image with everything he has got. he does not want the people of God developing the image of this word

Because when we get the image of this word and we start to become the image of this word, his nightmare starts all over again

Now he has all these Jesus people walking around acting just like Jesus did

God wants the image to come to pass, but the image cannot come to pass until we get the word

There is only one way to get crystal clear hearing from God, we are going to have to spend time in the word.

If we don't spend time with gGod, we are not going to know his voice.

so many people think that they can come into intimacy with God through prayer without the word,

When in reality, without the word we are only able to speak to god about things we know about. god wants us to speak to him about things that he knows about, his word.

in other words speaking the word to god takes us out of our understanding into God’s understanding.

We cannot make progress and grow in God apart from the word.

our first step must be to make a quality decision and make the word final authority in our life. this then ends all argument and debate and God begins to move in our life