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“Work is often used as the basis for our self-esteem.”

A thought by H. Norman Wright DMin. from his book, Discovering Who You Are And How God Sees You (p.15). Baker Publishing Group (Click on the book title to go to Amazon.com to buy the book.)

That can be so true, can’t it?

Norman says, “Self-esteem increases when we feel good about what we accomplish on the job. It is part of the performance basis for identity. Work becomes more than a source of income, even though some people will cling to the belief that money is really the main motivating factor of a job. But what happens if you are in a job that involves long-term projects with few visible indicators of how you are doing? What if you are in a sales job and each month you start over, having to meet your quota and compete against all the other salespeople? Situations such as these put the self-esteem of some people on a roller-coaster ride every month, offering little stability for their identity.”

He goes on, “We are people who tend toward idolatry. We create idols and build our lives around them. For many, the body and how it looks is an idol. For some, wealth and possessions are idols. For numerous mothers, the calling to be a mother becomes an idol. And for many, whether they realize it or not, work is an idol. When something becomes everything to us, that is idolatry.

“Let’s consider work again but this time from God’s perspective. Our work is meant to be an expression of who we are as God’s handiwork. Because of who God is and how he sees us, as evidenced in the gift of his Son, Jesus Christ, we must be worth something. We have value, worth, dignity, and adequacy because God has declared that we have them. Instead of our work giving us a sense of value, worth, dignity, and adequacy as Christians, it is the other way around.

“The way we do our job is an expression of the high-value God has ascribed in us.

“The proficiency of the level of our work is an expression of the high-value God has ascribed to us.

“We bring dignity to our work because God has given us a sense of dignity. As believers, we have the opportunity to do a job out of the sense of adequacy we have because of God’s declaration that we are adequate. We should not work to make us feel adequate. If we search the Scriptures, we discover that we are special and worthwhile only because of God.

“What would happen to you and the quality of your work if your attitude was this: My work is an expression of me and the presence of God in my life! It would be the beginning of feeling good about yourself, in spite of what may be going on at your job.”

And that is what we want, isn’t it?

Yes, yes!
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