Can a person be “a self-made man”?

© 2015 by Tom Boynton (editing by Kathy Boynton)

Have you ever heard someone claim to be “a self-made man?” That man is a glory thief. God made man to enjoy and praise God’s own great glory.

“Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honour and power: for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created” (Revelation 4:11).

Anyone claiming to be “a self-made man” is robbing God of the praise which He deserves. It’s a great blessing that God won’t permit this.

“I am the LORD: that is my name: and my glory will I not give to another, neither my praise to graven images” (Isaiah 42:8).

Anyone claiming to be “a self-made man” takes credit for God’s work. This claim mimics Satan’s behavior which God describes in the following passage.

“For thou hast said in thine heart, I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God: I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north: I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the most High. Yet thou shalt be brought down to hell, to the sides of the pit” (Isaiah 14:13-15).

When Satan tempted Adam and Eve, in the Garden of Eden, he seduced them to embrace this same wicked mindset. He told them,

“…ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil” (Genesis 3:5).

They embraced the Devil’s lie, plunging all of humanity into wickedness. That catastrophic event is now known as “the fall.” Their spirits died. They lost their ability to love, enjoy, and commune with their creator. Now man proclaims his own glory, rather than God’s. The statement, “I’m a self-made man,” is just one example of this mindset.

Only the power of God, the Holy Spirit, through the sacrificial death of God the Son, Jesus Christ, can impart new life into a spiritually dead person. When God does this, that person becomes a new creature in Christ. He repents and entreats God to save him.

“Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new” (2 Corinthians 5:17).

Are you a self-made person, or has God, Himself, breathed life into your dead heart causing you to praise Him alone?

 

 

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