Fighting Selfishness

The Bible teaches us to refrain from being self-centered, to love others as ourselves (Mk 12:31), to look not just to our own interests, but also the interests of others (Php 2:4). But strangely, the world increasingly thinks it is ok for us to be selfish, to engage in self-care, to love ourselves above other people and things. It thinks that it is nothing wrong for people to be selfish. However, Jesus did not call us to live for ourselves. Instead, He tells us to deny ourselves. (Mk 8:34-36) Then he called the crowd to him along with his disciples and said: “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me and for the gospel will save it. What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? It is clear from these words that there is something to gain when we deny ourselves.

It is in our self-interest to deny our “self”.

Art Lindsley once wrote, “It is not in our self-interest to be selfish. Rather, self-denial is in our self-interest.” Just as the verses we read earlier, when we deny ourselves and lose our lives for the Lord and gospel, we save our lives instead. Yet, many a times our selfish heart tells us that if we get our way then we will be happy and satisfied. But how many times have we been deceived by this? How many times have this been proven untrue? So often, after we got what we want, we are still not content and happy enough. New desires and dissatisfaction quickly set in. This is what happens when we try to find satisfaction apart from the only God who can satisfy us. 

The battle of all battles is to fight the love of self.

Fallen humans tend to love ourselves most. We all have a certain bias in favour of ourselves, our needs and our wants; we give extra lenient excuses for our own sins and difficulties, and when we find ourselves stuck in the same problems that others face as well, we feel we are more pitiful than them. Being selfish, humans tend to think about themselves first. For example, when a close friend gets married, instead of being fully happy for her, we may be more concerned about her spending less time with us in future or we may be caught up in self-pity for still being single. If a colleague has to take time off to settle some family problems, we may worry more about who to cover his duty than being concerned about his family situation. If a Sunday School child got sick with an infectious disease, instead of being concerned about the child’s wellbeing and recovery, we may worry first about whether that child had spread the virus to our own children. Because the self is so important to us, it is easy to tolerate and pardon the sin of selfishness. Yet, when we are too self-absorbed, we can be oblivious to God’s work on people around us as well as to the needs of others.

Only God’s selfless love can subdue our selfish love.

(1 Jn 4:19) tells us, “We love because he first loved us.” So only God’s love can turn our love for self into the love for God and others. We must be inspired by the most unselfish Person on earth who showed us what love is. Jesus not just selflessly sacrificed Himself on the cross to redeem sinners, but even in His most painful final moments before His death, He was still more concerned about others than Himself. Thus, in (Jn 19:26–27), we see Jesus instructing John His disciple to take care of His mother. Out of love for Father God and His people, Jesus also obeyed God’s will rather than His own (Lk 22:42), and obeyed even to the point of death (Php 2:8). This is just as (1 Co 13:5, ESV) tells us, “love does not insist on its own way”.

Indeed, the opposite of love is selfishness, which stubbornly demands to have one’s own way. The Bible already told us and we can also observe from our own experience too that insisting on our own selfish desires causes fights and quarrels between people (Jas 4:1). Our selfishness frustrates others when they keep having to give in to us or endure our tantrums whenever we don’t get our way. It easily leads them to pent-up anger and bitterness. Thus, the next time we want to insist on our own preferences, we should pause to consider what God’s preference is, and how our selfish preferences may hurt others, stumble them, or dishonour God. No doubt, when we have to give up our preferences, we may feel we got a bad deal and have been short-changed, but it is still better to suffer for doing good than doing evil (stumbling others) (1 Pe 3:17). Besides, will God really let us be short-changed? Will God not take care of our needs too when we seek others’ interests?

Thus, we must learn to “get out of” our own way rather than “insist on” our own way. Love means going out of our way, our comfort zone, our convenience, to bless others. Otherwise, if we remain selfish, how can we hope to be an effective witness of Christ’s gospel? 

Though it is hard to go against our selfish flesh, do not give up the fight.

Yes, it is hard and tiring to battle with our flesh and go against our natural fallen preferences. Yet the Bible encourages us:

(Gal 6:9) Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.

(1 Co 15:58) Therefore, my dear brothers and sisters, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain.

In other words, there will be a reward. Naturally, we won’t find joy in self-denial, but self-denial brings us rewards from God. Our labour in the Lord, including our fight with our selfishness, will not be in vain. Ultimately, we will find that the reward for self-denial is more fulfilling than the reward for self-gratification. So let’s all pray to be free from the bondage to our “self”. May God help us in this fight against selfishness!