Now more than ever, we are investing our time and money in things such as workout regimens, Botox, massages, manicures, pedicures, diet pills, athletic attire, therapy, life coaching, and all kinds of wellness apps on our phones. We do this all in an effort to improve the love we have for ourselves, right? Self-care is a fancy way of saying to put yourself first or love yourself by caring for yourself first.
If you google how to love yourself, you will find endless articles on this topic. Google searches for self-care and self-care products have increased 250% since 2017. Self-care has become a 450 billion dollar market, whereas less than a decade ago, it only had an estimated value of $10 billion. The internet and social media play a massive part in this.
The world may promote us loving ourselves as there is a lot of emphasis on always caring for ourselves first and foremost. But as Christians, we must ask whether the Bible actually says anything about self-care.
The Second Greatest Commandment in the Bible
While the Bible itself doesn't have the words "self-care" in it, it does emphasize loving yourself. In fact, Jesus spoke about this when a Pharisee asked him what the greatest commandment of all was in the passages of Matthew 22:34-40. Jesus replied to him, saying, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.'
Loving God first, then our neighbors. But we often overlook the last few words of this passage, and that's to love your neighbor as yourself. In order to love our neighbor, we must first love ourselves, which is an emphasis on self-care. But in order to obey this second greatest commandment to love yourself, you need to first love God, which is the first commandment. The first is impossible without the second, and the second could not stand without the first. We cannot love ourselves or our neighbors if we don't love God first and foremost.
The Only Way to Love Yourself Biblically Is to Know the Unconditional Love Christ Has for You
As a Christian, you grow up being told that "Jesus loves you." The one hymn I remember learning in Sunday school class was the song with the lyrics that some of you may remember: "Yes, Jesus loves me, Yes, Jesus loves me, Yes, Jesus loves me, the Bible tells me so."
Perhaps you learned the idea that Jesus loves you as a young child or in early adulthood, or perhaps you are new to your faith, so this idea is new and foreign to you. As someone who was told at a young age that Jesus loved me, it was still hard for me to grasp the love Christ had for me unconditionally. Because, after all, it was me that you're referring to – someone who is completely unlovable and unforgivable (or at least that's what I once believed). Or should I say, the devil told me as he has been whispering lies to me since I can remember. Remember, "he is the father of lies, and there is not truth in him." (John 8:44). Regardless of when and from whom the lies came from, I never truly believed I was loveable. Me, Alisha, a sinner. And if God knew the things that I have done, how could He possibly love me?
But that's the beauty in our Creator. He loves me anyway, and He loves you, too. God's love for us is so big and so vast for us that it cannot be measured. It's so big that we can't fully comprehend it. Ephesians 3:18-19, Paul talks about this mystery of the love of God, and his hope for us is "that you may have the power to understand as all God's people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep God's love it. May you experience the love of Christ, though it is too great to understand fully. Then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God."
In order to practice true self-care of loving ourselves to the fullest, we must learn to love ourselves the way God does, looking at life through the lens of His love. It's knowing God loves us not just because it's what we are told in church but to actually live out that love and live a life of being loved. To live knowing that God's love for us is so great that it is greater than our greatest mistake. Let that sink in for a moment. And to know that nothing, absolutely nothing we do, say, or think over and over and over again, can separate us from His love.
It is promised to us; "Nothing can ever separate us from God's love. Neither death nor life, nor angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing—not even the power of hell can separate us from God's love." Romans 8:38-39
Jesus Prioritized Time for Self-Care, and We Can, Too
While the Bible again doesn't use the words self-care, Jesus did many acts of self-care. I love looking at his life; he is our greatest example of how to live and practice self-care in this world. He prayed, He fasted, He rested. He spent deliberate time with God. He didn't fill His mind with worry or anxiety. He loved God first and received His love, being able to love others well like Himself.
We, too, can take what the Bible says around the topic of self-care and practice it biblically in our everyday life.
3 Ways to Biblically Practice Self-Care as Jesus Did:
1. Practice Self-Care by Filling Your Cup with His Word Over the World's Words
The second you wake up, your mind can be flooded with the things of this world. Just as Jesus prioritized and woke up early to pray, we should do the same. It's crucial that we hear from the Word of God before the world. Otherwise, our minds will quickly fill up with the world's opinions and values. Mark 1:25 says, "Very early in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house and went off to a solitary place, where He prayed."
While some of us may not be morning people, I find there is great value in making sure that the moment you open your eyes and step into the world, you fill your cup immediately with Jesus. Whether that's praying and speaking to Him while making your morning coffee or waking up earlier to spend time in His Word, it's important that we do this before any app notification, email, text, or social media post hits our mind. They fill our cup so full that we don't have room for any word from the Lord. Everywhere we turn, the world is filling our minds and cups with worldly things. A great way to practice self-care, as Jesus did, is to fill your cup with His words over those from the world.
2. Practice Self-Care by Giving Your Body the Proper Care
There are many biblical truths and guidance on practicing self-care through your body as our bodies are representations of "temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you…and that we are not our own: for we were bought at a price, therefore we are to honor God with our bodies" (I Corinthians 6:19-20). It is pretty powerful when you are reminded that the Holy Spirit lives inside you. Knowing that encourages me to care for the temple where the Holy Spirit takes up residency. We wouldn't invite guests into our home that was messy and dirty, would we? What an honor and a gift to have the Holy Spirit reside inside us, so let's take care of the temple.
Taking care of your body could be your nutrition, exercise, fleeing from things that damage your body in any way that doesn't glorify God, and a huge thing that is often missed in our go-go culture is rest.
Jesus made time for rest throughout His ministry here on earth. He tells His disciples in Mark 6:31, "Let's go off by ourselves to a quiet place and rest awhile." Rest is a time to restore and refresh our bodies and take a break from the world's demands.
Resting also allows us to bring our burdens to him so we no longer have to carry the load with our own self-sufficiency. Matthew 11:28 says, "Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest." Rest is crucial in self-care, and God reminds us of this through Scripture, telling us many times not to worry and to bring it all to Him. A great way to practice self-care is by giving your body the necessary self-care.
3. Practice Self-Care by Being Aware of Your Thoughts
The average person is said to have 50,000-70,000 different thoughts enter their mind in a given day. If we are not paying attention to those thoughts coming at us, they can affect the way we live.
Proverbs 4:23 says we are to "Guard our heart above all else, because everything flows from it." The NLT version says to "guard our hearts because it will determine the course of your life." The thoughts we allow into our hearts can determine the course of our lives. In other words, the thoughts that enter our minds that we allow to take residence in our hearts will dictate our actions, and every action in our lives can dictate our future. Think about that for a moment: many of us live our life not guarding our hearts and minds; we allow anything to enter without protecting it. With all the thousands of thoughts that enter our minds each day, many of us are not paying attention to them. We don't pay attention to what we are watching, scrolling through, listening to, conversations we are having, or who we are hanging with that could be influencing us. We mindlessly walk through life, allowing thoughts and lies to take root in our hearts.
One of the biggest ways we can biblically practice self-care is to be aware of our thoughts and guard our hearts above all else. This involves putting on our armor daily, as Ephesians 6:10-18 mentions, and start considering what you're thinking about and what is entering your mind. Start practicing self-care by caring for your mind and heart so your actions dictate a life walking in step with the Lord.
Read More: 5 Reasons You Need to Prioritize You-Time
References:
https://www.iriworldwide.com/en-us/insights/publications/self-care-trends#:~:text=As%20a%20result%2C%20self%2Dcare,on%20their%20health%20and%20wellness https://asdonline.com/blog/retail-news/what-self-care-trends-mean-for-retailers-in-2020/
Originally published Wednesday, 13 March 2024.