As I shared with you, Jesus wants us to know the truth about ourselves. He wants us to know our true selves. He is a lover of the truth.

Jesus points the way down the path of spiritual growth and self-discovery. He asks only that He can come along, for He knows that the way is dark and only He has enough Light to guide us unerringly on that road. This is one place where both Christianity and psychology meet and diverge. Just like     psychology, Jesus asks us to find our true selves. Unlike psychology, our true selves can only be found when we take Jesus into account. Jesus is God’s revelation about us and all humans. We are an unique union of both spiritual and physical, human and divine.

Self-discovery without Jesus’ guiding is introspection and it easily leads to self-centeredness, pride, confusion and error. Self-discovery with Jesus as guide is inner healing, and when we allow Him to guide every step, it leads to God-centeredness, hope, freedom and joy. This kind of spiritual growth is God’s will for us.

Jesus revealed that it spiritual growth requires that we die to ourselves. If we are to die to ourselves, it is our false selves to which we must die.

Our false selves are all those patterns of thinking, feeling and behaving that betray in us a false notion of who we are – selfishness, pride, lust, confusion and the like. Each of us is created by the hand of God as a person who can be actualized only by love in both affirmation and discipline. When we have not been able to find ourselves because we have not been loved, we are forced to identify ourselves with false notions of who we are. This identity process often   happens at an early age – before six – and this is the reason it is so important that little children are loved and told in word and action that they are lovable. We must share with children that they are made in the image and likeness of God, our Creator-Father. Also, when we grow into adulthood we must examine our identity and put aside any false ideas about ourselves.