Thoughts on Self-Control

Isn't it funny how God speaks to us in our moments of deepest need, especially when we don’t realize we need help from Him?  I have experienced numerous moments like this.  In fact, while I was studying in Canterbury, God spoke to me about something very specific: self-control.  At the time, I didn't really consider myself to be someone lacking self-control.  But God used several different avenues to capture my attention.  Several different people spoke to me about self-control, all in the same day.  This is the spiritual equivalent of grabbing someone by the hair – it hurt, but it literally made me stop and wonder what the heck was going on. 

Although the people who confronted me about my self-control issue are extremely important to me, instead of recognizing them and how they confronted me, I would like to focus on specifically what these people said that helped me understand the issue.

Self-control ≠ self-help

God is not saying, “Get yourself sorted. Pull yourself together and have some control over yourself.”  He’s saying that, because of Christ’s incredible, life-transforming love, we should be seeing the world in a radically different way.  His love prompts us to love others.  This love enables us to cultivate a strong desire to honor God in love, which cannot be done in our selfishness. The issue becomes more about respect and love instead of literally controlling yourself.  It’s imitating Christ, which is precisely what it means to be a Christian.  Ephesians 4:22-24 says “…put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires, and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and to put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness” (emphasis mine). 

Self-help by definition relies on one’s own efforts and resources to achieve something – without relying on others.  Let’s be honest, friends.  If I were relying on just myself to have self-control, it would never happen.  Not only do we need God’s help, we need the help of other believers.  And that’s okay.  We are designed for community within the church (see Ephesians 2:19-22).  This cannot be done all by your lonesome. 

Self-control is not about controlling your own destiny.

God does that.  Let Him take care of it.  

If you Google "Self-Control" the results you get are really... well, depressing.  You will mainly see lots of weight loss ads and maybe some hard-core quotes like this one I found:

The world seems to view self-control in terms of  self-improvement.  The ability to determine what goes into one's mouth.  Or the ability to get up early every morning to work out.  Or the ability to starve oneself in order to lose weight.  Having personally dealt with all three of those issues, it is extremely comforting and refreshing for me to read in the Bible that God is 100% in control of my life.  And I am striving to please Him, not the world.  He wants me to improve myself according to His standards, not the world's.  If I possess self-control, it is a true sign that God is present in my life and He is leading my life. So I need to learn to give it up.  Give.  It.  Up.  My life is not my own anyway.  And I’m okay with that. 

Self-control is the heart of all the fruits of the spirit.

Remember those cute little Russian doll sets that all sit neatly inside of one another?  Think of self-control as the smallest doll in the set.  It is at the center of every other doll.  Love is the first fruit of the spirit mentioned, and it is also the biggest doll which holds all other dolls together.  Self-control is the last fruit of the spirit to be mentioned, but it is certainly not the least.  It fits inside all of the other fruits and it comes from the very core of your being.  See Galatians 5:22-24 for the entire list and the specific order Paul mentions them.  Order is key. 

We are going to screw up.  And that’s okay.

Imperfect creatures that we are, it’s okay to acknowledge the fact that we will never live perfectly.  God requires perfection; it’s literally impossible for us to be made right with Him without Jesus’ atoning sacrifice.  So take solace in that.  I am still learning to stop beating myself up over my many mistakes.  However, God’s infinite grace is not an excuse to live frivolously.  For “a person without self-control is like a city broken into and left without walls” (Proverbs 25:28). 

There is much for me to learn in the self-control department.  I've got to be on my guard at all times, yet I must learn that true self-control is born out of an understanding of God’s love, not just a set of rules that say “You can’t do this, this, and this.” 

“Make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; and to godliness, mutual affection; and to mutual affection, love. For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.”  2 Peter 1:5-8.