In the Eyes of Your Creator: Truly Valuing Yourself and Others by Ancient Faith Publishing

In the EYES of Your CREATOR Truly Valuing Yourself and Others

david l. fontes, psy.d.

 a nc ie n t fa ith pu b li s hi ng  che s terton, india na

In the Eyes of Your Creator: Truly Valuing Yourself and Others © 2014 David L. Fontes All rights reserved. Scripture quotations are taken from the New King James Version, © 1979, 1980, 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. Published by: Ancient Faith Publishing A Division of Ancient Faith Ministries P.O. Box 748 Chesterton, IN 46304 ISBN: 9781936270224 Printed in the United States of America

Dedicated to my mother and paternal grandmother whose prayers and devotion to our Lord Jesus Christ helped to inspire my life for God and the writing of this book.

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Contents Acknowledgments Introduction

part one: Truly Valuing Ourselves

chapter 1: What Does It Mean to Truly

Value Ourselves?

chapter 2: The Damage of the Fall

chapter 3: Our Original Sin

chapter 4: Revelation in Relationship

part two: Truly Valuing Others

109

chapter 5: Valuing Your Spouse

111

chapter 6: Valuing Your Children

135

chapter 7: Valuing His Church

173

chapter 8: Valuing Those in the World

199

chapter 9: Valuing God

223

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Acknowledgments

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he idea for this book started back in 1982. I was finishing my master’s degree in counseling and was assigned as pastor of my first mission church in the small town of Colby, Kansas. I pondered how what I was learning in psychology could help me, if at all, in counseling people who sought my advice as a minister. The years went by, then in September of 2005, I actually sat down to begin what was to become this book. I had been ordained as an Antiochian Orthodox Christian priest on June 11, 1992, and received my doctoral degree in psychology in 1998. These experiences gave me more truths to incorporate into this book. I wish to acknowledge all my friends who over the years encouraged me to write a book. I want to thank two friends in particular—Archpriest Donald Hock, pastor of Saint Mary Antiochian Orthodox Christian Church in Omaha, Nebraska, and Protopresbyter Constantine Pappademos, pastor of Saint Katherine Greek Orthodox Church in Elk

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in the eyes of your creator Grove, California—for not only reading my draft manuscript but giving me their feedback, which was most helpful. I also wish to thank Khouriya Maggie Hock from Omaha, the director of Marriage and Parish Family Ministries in the Antiochian Orthodox Christian Archdiocese of North America. She is a fully licensed and credentialed psychotherapist and has been one of my biggest supporters in writing this book; she critiqued it as well. I would also like to thank Dr. Alisa Wong, a psychologist who has been a colleague of mine at Creekside Counseling Associates in Elk Grove. She is a dedicated Christian who has been very helpful in assisting me to better clarify points within the book. Of special value to me was the critique given from within my own family. My daughter-in-law, Gabriela, spent many hours painstakingly going over every sentence of my manuscript to help make the book more understandable. I was also helped greatly by my son, Paul, who would analyze points I made in the book and suggest perhaps better ways of writing something more clearly. I would also like to thank Dr. Richard Cervin, professor at Sacramento City College in California, for his willingness, despite his time restraints, to go over my book in detail and make his recommendations. I am very grateful for the time he gave to review my work. Finally, I wish to especially thank and acknowledge my wife, Alice, who has been my proofreader going way back to my college days. Over the years, she has spent many, many hours going over my written work with me to ensure I understood

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Acknowledgments

the reasons for her suggested changes and in general to make my work read more smoothly. I wish to thank all of these individuals, as well as others in my Christian walk, for their encouragement and prayers along the way during the writing of this book. I hope I have done them justice and that this book will increase your awareness of who you are in the eyes of your Creator.

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Introduction

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have been counseling people since 1978, first as a priest only and later as both a priest and a clinical psychologist. I have discovered over these years that most people tend to come for counseling because they are wrestling with one of two issues, or perhaps both. The first issue is that they don’t know in the deepest core of their being—their heart—how truly valuable they are in the eyes of their Creator. The second issue they often wrestle with is how to truly show unconditional value toward others, especially those who have treated them poorly in the past, even those whom they see as enemies. When we say we love someone, in one sense, we are trying to convey that the person is of extraordinary value and importance to us. It is more than just liking someone. Perhaps you remember having some very special toy or item you treasured in your childhood. It might have been a seashell you found on the beach, or a gift your aunt gave you on your birthday, or

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in the eyes of your creator something else of significance, at least in your young eyes. You demonstrated how valuable these items were to you by how well you cared for them and protected them, perhaps even hiding them from others in a special box under your bed. To someone else, that special toy or item might have seemed to have little significance, but not to you. You didn’t leave these precious treasures on the street where cars could run over them or people could take them away or throw them in the trash. If you accidentally lost one of these precious items, you would likely have become extremely sad and upset. I have been to London, England, a couple of times and, like most tourists, have visited the Tower of London to view the Crown Jewels. It would be an understatement to say these jewels are well cared for and protected. They are kept in a huge vault tourists can walk through. Isn’t it sad that some people treasure cut stones more than they value the people around them in their everyday lives? Jesus Christ demonstrated how much we are valued in God’s sight by coming to us in the flesh and being willing to die for us, to remove the impediment or spiritual gulf that kept us from full communion with God the Father. The truth is that we are God’s ultimate creation, of the highest value to Him. The mystery of our salvation is that we were created to become like God Himself through His grace in our lives— namely, to become His own children. Yet every night on the news we hear about people being devalued through verbal, physical, and psychological abuse, as well as by wars, rage, poverty, destruction, and killing. This is not the world our Creator envisioned for us to have.

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Introduction

When will this tragedy end? I think it starts to end when humans begin to understand how important they are in the eyes of their Creator, and then when they show that same importance toward everyone they meet—starting in the home, but spreading throughout the world. Our spiritual and psychological problem seems to be that we don’t fully comprehend how valuable we are to God, how important we are to Him. If we did, we would behave much differently than we do. Do we treat everyone we know as being extraordinarily valuable in our eyes, even those who have treated us poorly or are not precious to us? There are many self-help books that address this issue of our personal value, often by trying to correct our thinking through mental effort and willpower. In counseling others, I have learned it is very difficult to convince someone of something they are not convinced of. That could be the limitation of so-called “positive thinking,” a movement that originates from our minds, or of cognitive/behavior therapy, which tries to correct inaccurate or false thoughts and behaviors by using true and correct affirmations about ourselves and others. You might have some success using these affirmations, based on your own mental effort, but how long do your newly founded thoughts last? One reason this method may not work permanently is that it depends on the power of our rational mind to create a lasting change in our thinking, our emotions, and our behavior. Although our will can and does play an important part in correcting our maladapted or irrational thinking about ourselves and others, I believe we must go beyond thinking

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in the eyes of your creator about ourselves to knowing about ourselves, that is, knowing our true-self or authentic-self in Christ. This doesn’t come from merely using our mind. We must go deeper, to that which comes from our heart. We think or believe things primarily in our mind, but direct intuitive knowledge comes from our heart. Knowing your true value in the eyes of your Creator comes through a revelation in relationship with God, a directly spiritual intuitive knowing, through the power of His Holy Spirit working deep within you. I do not believe simply trying to persuade yourself to believe you are valuable using only your mind will ultimately convince you of this truth. You need God to give birth to that revelation in your heart. It is God, through the power of the Holy Spirit, who will convince you of your true value and the value of every human being. Through your cooperation with God’s grace, your heart will then begin to convince your head, the seat of your conscious thoughts, of the truth about yourself. A favorite topic of therapists and educators is the need to build up one’s so-called self-esteem. By this they mean to help us and our children see how valuable we are in ourselves—that is, our intrinsic value. When I hear these professionals use the word self-esteem, I get the impression they see it ultimately as coming from some kind of self-effort, apart from God’s grace. Special programs for children and adults are designed to build up self-esteem through self-effort and self-mastery. Public education tries to build up the self- esteem of its students. The problem with our self-effort is that it comes with the

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Introduction

possibility of self-doubt, emanating from an often fickle mind. Doubts, as well as beliefs, are born from our thoughts, while faith and knowing are conceived in our hearts. We know with our heart, or as one pastor exhorted his congregation, “Do you know it in your knower [meaning your heart]?” If more people knew in their knower, their heart, how truly valuable they are in the eyes of God, I believe the caseloads of many therapists would drop significantly. This book is meant to help you in three areas: first, in understanding the importance of knowing how valuable you are in the eyes of your Creator; second, in learning how to acquire that spiritual knowledge in your heart; and third, in learning to value those around you, starting with those in your own home, with that same godly value our heavenly Father demonstrates toward us. If we value our bodies with godly care, we are not likely to abuse them with drugs or unhealthful behavior. If we see with our spiritual eyes how valuable we are in the eyes of our Creator, we are more likely to want to avoid sin and spiritual corruption. If we treat our spouse as someone precious and extremely valuable to us, we are likely to have a better and stronger marriage. If we show people in the world how much they are valued as God’s creation, we may see less unnecessary suffering in the world around us. To put it another way, to devalue a human being is to sin against him. On the other hand, to value a human being with the love of God is to bless her, to validate her existence. This is what we are all called to do. Yet it is hard to give what we don’t have or haven’t experienced. We need to know in our

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in the eyes of your creator hearts how valuable we are in the eyes of our heavenly Father, and then remember to value others out of that love. Let’s begin our journey by taking a closer look at how this sense of personal value left the heart of humanity to begin with. How does the Fall of mankind from God’s grace affect humanity psychologically?

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part one

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Truly Valuing Ourselves

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chapter one

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What Does It Mean to Truly Value Ourselves?

or centuries, mankind has pondered the question of what makes a human being happy. Psychiatry and psychology have discussed the importance of having good self-esteem in order to be happy, yet those in the Orthodox Christian Church historically have labeled self-esteem as sinful and coming from demons. How do we reconcile these two points of view that appear to be so diametrically opposed to one another?

Personal Value Do you know deep in your heart, in the center of your being, that at this very moment you are valuable in the eyes of God? When you ask people if they believe they are  19 

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in the eyes of your creator valuable, I think a good number would probably say yes. If you then ask them whether they know in their heart and not just in their head how valuable they are as a person, you are likely to hear fewer say yes. If you ask if they know in their heart how valuable they are to God, you might get even fewer positive replies. You are likely to hear, “I would like to think so, but I’m not sure.” Do you tend to get sad or angry when others devalue you in some manner? When couples come to me for counseling, in most cases, I know something about their situation the moment they walk through my door. It is that one or more likely both of them have felt devalued by their partner for some time, and they have come into counseling to work through this issue. Also, when people don’t know their own sense of personal value in the eyes of God, it makes it harder for them to believe anyone else (including their partner) could value them simply for who they are. The devaluation of others is the result of a spiritual disorder within us. When we don’t have a revelation, a spiritual intuition, an awakening to our personal value in the eyes of God, we are more inclined to sin against others. God has never stopped valuing and loving us, but our disorder of sin has obscured or covered that knowledge within our hearts. It then becomes much harder for us to show others we truly value them. I think this is the most chronic problem of our day and has been so in every generation since the creation of Adam and Eve. Sadly, we eventually begin to believe the devaluation we receive from others to be justified. Have you ever wondered why Mother Teresa of Calcutta

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was so loved by millions of people around the world? Was it her stylish Hollywood appearance, or her impressive graduate degrees from Ivy League colleges, or her personal material wealth? No, of course not. She neither had nor strived for any of these things. Instead, she valued those in society who were being devalued by society. She valued and recognized the image of God in every person, especially in the poorest of the poor, in the sick and the dying. She saw Jesus in the distressing disguise of the poorest of the poor. Jesus said that whatever we do to the least of our brethren we do to Him (see Matt. 25:40). Mother Teresa would cradle dying people in her arms so they would not die alone or unwanted in the street. She valued the devalued of the world, and many in the world loved her in return. But even if they hadn’t, she would have continued to do exactly what she was doing. She gave us a glimpse of God’s love toward us, a love that never stops. Isn’t this what we tend to see in most godly people? They show love to all they come in contact with and never stop loving. Jesus said we are to love our neighbor as ourselves (see Matt. 19:19). But what does this mean? I know that as a Christian I am to love and value my neighbor, but what about loving myself? How am I to love myself? Could this not be seen as a form of pride, self-centeredness, or even narcissism, all of which are sinful? You may remember the Greek myth of Narcissus, who saw his own reflection in the water. He fell so much in love with his image that he tried to embrace his own reflection and drowned. This is not the form of self-love Jesus was talking about.

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in the eyes of your creator Perhaps this scripture passage means we are to love others at least as much as we care for ourselves. But what if we don’t care very much for ourselves? How life would change if we believed that what this passage of scripture is really saying is that we are to value our neighbor as we know how valued we are by God Himself! We would become a vehicle of God’s love to others. This is a tall order. But if we do not know how valuable we are to God, never having fully experienced His love and grace in our lives, never having known how much He truly cares for us, we are not as likely to value others as we ought.

Secular Psychology In the late 1970s, I started pondering the differences between the theories of modern-day secular psychology and the Christian approach to good mental health. I wondered whether these two ways of helping people were compatible, especially in dealing with the issue of one’s personal sense of worth and value. The different types of secular psychological theories and interventions generally tend to focus on ways to rid us of maladaptive behaviors and thoughts by teaching us new and healthier ways to deal with our world. As human beings we have a keen ability to adapt to our surroundings and circumstances. Our experiences in life can either help us to deal effectively with our environment in a loving way, or they can sabotage our ability to cope and deal productively with our life situations. Maladaptive behavior comes from the latter. This maladaptive behavior or thinking comes from what

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has been called our “adapted self”—that is, our presentation self, or what some have called our “false-self.” This false-self is the way we learn to adapt using our thoughts, emotions, and behaviors in a sinful and often cruel world, while our true-self is the creation of God within our spirit at conception. In other words, our false-self comes from the reasoning strategies we develop to survive in this world. It is the self we want the world to see and which over time we come to believe is who we actually are. This false-self, in effect, hides and covers our true-self made in the image of God. It would take a long time to summarize all the different secular theories of psychology and the approaches to intervention that attempt to correct maladaptive thinking and behavior and the inappropriate use of our emotions. They include psychodynamic and gestalt psychology, object- relations theory, self-psychology, and cognitive-behavioral therapy, among others. The bottom line is that most psychological treatments attempt to change a person’s thinking and behavior, or to create an environment in which change can occur in how we behave toward and what we think and believe about others and the world. The hope of these different therapeutic approaches is to give us functional ways to better deal with life. Some theories also focus on developing a healthy self-esteem. Some of these approaches have merit; truth can be found in a number of them. For example, cognitive-behavior therapy may see our maladaptive self as a result of faulty or illogical ways of thinking about the world and ourselves and of the behaviors initiated by this thinking. It focuses on ridding ourselves of

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in the eyes of your creator irrational thoughts that sabotage our lives and our relationships with others. The truth is that many of us do indeed view our world and ourselves in faulty and incorrect ways, including the way we view God and the way we believe God views us. Cognitive-behavior therapy attempts to challenge our faulty thinking so that we can willfully and purposely change our behavior for the better. Our thoughts about others and ourselves do indeed have the power to help us or harm us. I have used these types of insights to help parishioners or patients to rethink their perception of the world around them, in particular themselves and their perception of God. However, I have also found that some people, especially those in challenging and traumatic situations, still revert back to their old ways of thinking and behavior over time.

Self-Esteem One of the areas therapists often say they need to address with their patients is their poor self-esteem. They may see poor self-esteem as contributing to their patients’ maladapted behavior or as weakening their ability to pursue what is best for them in this life, in their relationships with others, and in their ability to maintain a healthy outlook for the future. They may also see poor self-esteem as something that reduces a person’s ability to live a happy and fulfilling life. These therapists use various techniques and homework assignments to help their patients overcome poor self-esteem or lack of pride in themselves and in their accomplishments.

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They want their patients’ thinking or mentality freed from past emotional memories of traumatic and negative events that have contributed to their deficient self-esteem. The challenge, then, is to maintain the new healthy way of thinking about ourselves. Relying solely on a person’s own self-effort or willpower, most psychologists try to help patients convince themselves of something they may not easily believe deep in their heart, in the core of their being, as we mentioned earlier. Generally, these therapists focus on the patient’s rational thoughts and will, which the Church calls the “gnomic will.” These thoughts come solely from the faculty of common thoughts and reason. They do not come from the faculty of the intuitive heart (nous) and a spiritual will that is in communion with the Holy Spirit, which the Church calls the “noetic will.” (We will discuss these two wills at greater length later on.) Although a flashlight can operate for a long time, eventually the batteries will die. What happens after our human will and determination lose energy? Is this the kind of life we were meant to live, trusting our limited mental power and ability to keep us shining? Or is there something more we can do? Is there a better way to know our value, and know it in a way that will last forever, a way that does not lead to what some early Church writers have called the demons of self-esteem and pride? The answer is yes! A number of the people I have counseled over the years have discussed how they believe their poor self-esteem has contributed to many of the problems and unwise judgments in their lives. It seems people define good self-esteem in different

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in the eyes of your creator ways. Some refer to the need to think well of themselves, believe in themselves, and have healthy self-confidence. Others focus on freedom from shame or guilt. Still others desire to learn to make better decisions in their lives or to feel they have accomplished something important. In contrast, sometimes as Christians we learn from the Church, the Bible, or from early monastic writings that taking pride in oneself or in one’s accomplishments, or having self-esteem at all, is sinful. Some ascetic writers even talk about the need for “self-hatred” as part of the process that leads to deification—that is, the process of becoming like God to the degree a human person can. Authors like Fr. Sophrony (1896–1993) and St. Silouan (1866–1938) who write about the need for self-hatred are talking about the experience we human beings go through when we see our sinful self (false-self) in the Presence of an all-holy and pure God. One could say we hate or loathe ourselves for being so distant from God’s holiness even though God has given us everything we need to be holy before Him. The Scriptures contain passages like, “Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall. Better to be of a humble spirit with the lowly, than to divide the spoil with the proud” (Prov. 16:18, 19). Or, “For all that is in the world—the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life— is not of the Father but is of the world” (1 John 2:16). And also, “For if anyone thinks himself to be something, when he is nothing, he deceives himself” (Gal. 6:3). Similarly, early Christian writers talk about the evil of pride and the demon of self-esteem in the volumes of the

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Philokalia. St. Antony the Great (250–350) writes, “Having fallen from his heavenly rank through pride, the devil constantly strives to bring down also all those who whole- heartedly wish to approach the Lord; and he uses the same means which caused his own downfall, that is pride and love of vain-glory.” Abba Evagrius (fourth century) says, “The demon of pride is the cause of the most grievous fall of the soul.” Evagrios the Solitary (345–399) proclaims: We shall suffer another shipwreck, worse than the first, blown off our course by the contrary wind of the demon of self-esteem . . . let us day by day rid ourselves of all that fills us with self-esteem. . . . Self-esteem gives rise in turn to pride, which cast down from heaven to earth the highest of the angels, the seal of God’s likeness and the crown of all beauty.

St. John Cassian (360–435) teaches: Our seventh struggle is against the demon of self-esteem, a multiform and subtle passion which is not readily perceived even by the person whom it tempts. . . . He should not do anything with a view to being praised by other people, but should seek God’s reward only, always rejecting the thoughts of self-praise that enter his heart, and always regarding himself as nothing before God. In this way he will be freed, with God’s help, from the demon of self-esteem.

It has been said that the English translators of the Philokalia (a book written for ascetic spiritual growth) should have used the word vainglory instead of self-esteem in their English translation. The English term self-esteem can mean “pride in oneself.” The English term vainglory can mean “glorying, boasting, or taking unwarranted pride in one’s accomplishments.” Now, one might make the case that there is a difference between taking pride in oneself and taking unwarranted pride in one’s

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in the eyes of your creator accomplishments; however, both can lead to the sin of pride. Many monastic and ascetic fathers caution us against seeking or desiring the praise or accolades of others because this can puff up our self-esteem or pride. If we define self-esteem as “knowing our personal value in the eyes of our Creator,” we can say that is a good thing. On the other hand, valuing ourselves apart from our Creator is not a good thing—it is the seed of the sin of pride, the source of all sin. In other words, my sense of personal dignity and value can lead to boasting in my intrinsic worth apart from God and His grace if I do not acknowledge God’s work of grace in my life or God’s hand in my accomplishments. I tend to shy away from using the word self-esteem when talking to people because it can lead to the idea that my self-esteem comes from my self-effort apart from God’s grace working within me. We need to understand as human beings that our personal value and the value of our so-called accomplishments is first and foremost rooted in God’s love for us. It is He who is working in and through us when we cooperate with His work of grace in our life. Yet having “healthy” pride in ourselves and restoring our self-esteem apart from God’s grace is the way many modern-day secular self-help books and contemporary psychologists teach us to acquire good mental health. In my experience, many people who lack a sense of their true value before God develop symptoms of depression and anxiety and end up with little direction or sense of purpose in their lives. They often are defensive toward others and have few healthy boundaries or limits to avoid being abused

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by others or abusing them in return. Unfortunately, many children are left with the sense of value they received or didn’t receive from their parents. When they don’t receive enough healthy empathic nurturing, these children can be left with a distorted sense of their personal value, which in turn can manifest as different types of personality or mood disorders. It can also lead to suicidal thoughts, if not suicide itself, or to anger that can lead to violence, including homicide. When I worked for the California Youth Authority (CYA) some years ago, I worked with young men who had committed serious and violent crimes. I found that many lacked a healthy sense of personal value and were inclined to devalue others as a result. Therapists rightly tell us that if as a child we were never given by our parents enough of a sense of our own inner value and importance for just being a child of God, we are likely forever to seek that sense of personal value outside of ourselves. In the case of these youthful offenders, their sense of self-value often came from gaining the respect of other gang members on the street and rising in the gang hierarchy through committing crimes, violence, and destruction. A few tried to gain respect through materialism—having lots of money, fancy clothes, cars, and other things to flaunt before others so they could feel special.

An Orthodox Christian Approach One of the primary reasons for psychological and emotional problems in our life today is that we do not know in our heart how truly valuable we are in the eyes of

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in the eyes of your creator our Creator. As I have already noted, our true sense of value and importance does not come from trying to convince ourselves mentally of something that deep in our hearts we do not truly believe. We have to know how valuable we are to God through the action of the Holy Spirit within us, which then awakens our heart. This in turn influences our thoughts about the real truth of ourselves—that all of us are made in the very image of God and called to become like Him. The Holy Spirit will always tell us the real truth about ourselves if given the chance. This knowing is not so much cognitive as spiritually intuitive. It goes beyond words or concepts—it is simply a knowing. In fact, this knowing does not come from our rational thoughts or emotions at all, nor does it come from other people. It comes from personal experience, what might be called a spiritual revelation or discovery, an inner touching from the One who created us to begin with. The more we become like God, which is who we really are in Christ Jesus, the more we begin to see and know how truly valuable we are to God. A true and real transforming relationship with God begins with totally surrendering our lives to the will, direction, and leading of the Holy Spirit within us. It means to have a desire and intent to love the Lord our God with all our strength, mind, and heart (see Mark 12:30). It is a surrendering of our fleshly will (our gnomic will) to the will of God, which involves our spiritual will (our noetic will). This comes through kenosis, emptying ourselves of our theories, our carnal thoughts, our opinions, and our sins before God. When we do this,

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the Holy Spirit shows us who we really are: one made in His image, our true-self, a child of God in all splendor and glory. We know we are valuable because we are valued by the One who created us and fully knows us. Why, then, do so many of us lack this knowledge? We lost it in the Fall.

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