Self

September 23, 2012 at 1:11 pm (Prayers, Remodeling the Mind) (following, God, life, self-denial, the Way, true gain, truth)

Self, I have not to consult you but Him whose idea is the soul of you, and of which as yet you are all unworthy.
I have to do, not with you, but with the Source of you, by whom it is that at any moment you exist – the Causing of you, not the caused you.
You may be my consciousness but you are not my being…For God is more to me than my consciousness of myself. He is my life; you are only so much of it as my poor half-made being can grasp – as much of it as I can know at once.
Because I have fooled and spoiled you, treated you as if you were indeed my own self, you have dwindled yourself and have lessened me, till I am ashamed of myself.
If I were to mind what you say, I should soon be sick of you; even now I am ever and anon disgusted with your paltry mean face, which I meet at every turn.
No! Let me have the company of the Perfect One, not of you! Of my elder brother, the Living One!
I will not make a friend of the mere shadow of my own being!
Good-bye, Self! I deny you, and will do my best everyday to leave you behind.

~ Written by George MacDonald in UNSPOKEN SERMONS, Second Series, on Self-Denial

Mark 8:34-37
Then Yeshua (Jesus) called the crowd and His talmidim (disciples) to Him and told them, “If anyone wants to come after Me, let him say ‘No’ to himself, take up his execution-stake, and keep following Me. For whoever wants to save his own life will destroy it, but whoever destroys his life for My sake and for the sake of the Good News will save it. Indeed, what will it benefit a person if he gains the whole world but forfeits his own life? What could a person give in exchange for his life?”

Luke 14:27 – Yeshua (Jesus) speaking
“Whoever does not carry his own execution-stake and come after Me cannot be My talmid (disciple).

John 1:3-5
All things came to be through Him, and without Him nothing made had being.
In Him was life, and the life was the light of mankind.
The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not suppressed it.

Grace and peace in Yeshua the Messiah ❤