“And he said to all, ‘If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it.’”
~ The Gospel of Luke, 9
“He must increase, but I must decrease.”
~ The Gospel of John, 3
When Christ asks us to die to ourselves this comes across as both puzzling and resonant - it connects with something in us. On the one hand, we might ask what it means to lead a meaningful life if one is dead to oneself? On the other hand, we might be inspired by the idea of losing ourselves in a cause that's bigger than just us. This could be something related to social justice, family, or meaningful work. And we might celebrate those who seem to have done this as we celebrate the lives of Martin Luther King Jr., Gandhi, or Nelson Mandela.
The idea of denying oneself would have been familiar to the context in which Jesus spoke. Stoicism, an influential Roman philosophy of the time, emphasised the renunciation of pleasure in pursuit of virtue and self-governance. The true self was to be found in devotion to reason and the common good (Cicero, De Finibus, III). Self-denial in the service of this end led to a nobility of spirit and character fitting to those entrusted with governing an empire, as Marcus Aurelius - both emperor and philosopher - came to govern the Roman Empire in the years after Christ's death. Yet the idea of losing one's life for the sake of Jesus, who would go on to die on a Roman cross, would no doubt have been puzzling to many who heard these words, whether in the moment they were spoken or the years to follow.
Similarly, if we are attentive, some of us might feel a tension in ourselves as we read these words. We might feel that it's difficult to let go of certain desires, ambitions, or the way we think things should be, and live for Christ in the competitive environments many of us inhabit. I find this is a tension I have to continually work through in the 21st Century university environment I work in. Universities are highly competitive settings and this is becoming increasingly so. Add to this that I've been trained to think a certain way about what sort of work, institutions, publication venues, and activities are valuable, and I'm incentivised to pursue some things and avoid others. We should be strategic in our work. Good publication venues are good things. Excellence matters and we should pursue it. But the problem (or moral hazard) here is that these things can come to matter too much. The drive for success and distinction can drive away others; our competitiveness can isolate us from the people around us. For me, that could mean seeing a student who seeks my help as an unnecessary interference with research time, seeing a gifted colleague as an adversary to be overcome, or seeing time with those I love as unimportant in relation to completing a given project. Sometimes we have to make compromises - there is a time for everything, of course, and we bear with one another through moments and seasons that stretch us in myriad ways. But the danger is that the values of a competitive environment, in my case the university environment, can come to dominate or eclipse in our life the things that matter most.
In this setting, the self that Christ asks us to die to is the self that seeks dominance and elevation over other selves, often at their expense (whether directly or indirectly). We often tie too much of who we are, our identity, into external markers of status or achievement. But these aren't the things that are most important. What's most important is the people around us and whether they are living well, flourishing, to use a popular word. Christ asks us to broaden our view of what matters, to step back and behold the value in others, rather than be fixated on things that matter less.
The second half of Christ's injunction speaks of finding oneself. If we lose ourselves in the above way, how do we then find ourselves? Part of what's going on here is a shift in perspective, followed by a shift in relations. When we step back from our own quest for success and comparative elevation, we open up space for us to be with others in friendship, solidarity, or communion. And we open up space for friendship and communion with God. Our highest good involves both these things, communion with God and others. In the context of my work, I like to view this through the metaphor of sacrament (though I don't think the sacraments are a metaphor). When I cease to view my (competitive) workplace primarily as an arena for personal achievement, and instead view it primarily as a place to join with God and others in the work of attaining knowledge and fulfilling education, I feel a greater degree of peace, fulfilment, and joy. My work becomes a channel for God's grace - both a gift and a means of empowerment - as I participate and play a small part in the work of healing and restoring a broken world. Whatever brings truth, goodness, nobility, and beauty to others, and draws these things out of them, is a part of this work and an outworking of God's grace, a space where life can be found.
Not everyone agrees with this idea of de-centring or relinquishing the self. Nietzsche likened the Christian idea of selflessness to a kind of torture, madness, sickness, and sadness (Genealogy of Morals, 2.22). But I think he was wrong. No doubt if we 'lose' ourselves to the wrong person we can become vulnerable to mistreatment and manipulation. But Christ's call to lose ourselves is not a manifestation of cruelty or an endorsement of self-harm. To whom we give ourselves makes all the difference. Giving oneself to Christ is entrusting one's life to someone who thoroughly knows and loves us, one in whom there is "no darkness at all", as John's Gospel says. That is what Christians believe. From an empirical standpoint, we can judge if this trust is well-placed by observing what happens when we venture out and try it, and looking at what happens in our life and the lives of those immediately around us. Does it increase or detract from things like goodness, nobility, flourishing, beauty (Letter of Paul to the Philippians, 4)? In my experience it increases these things.
Entrusting oneself to Christ in this way also means receiving his help. I have tremendous respect for Stoic philosophy, but I suspect that on its own it leads to a hard and inflexible character, whereas my experience is that life joined to Christ continually renews and regenerates my understanding of and compassion for others. If we are meant to hold an empire together on our own strength, we would need to be hard, immeasurably tough. But we would be less human as a result. Thankfully the Christian view of human nature is skeptical enough to see this. We are frail. We are worth it, we are loved, but we are incapable of becoming thoroughly good on our own. Thankfully we are not asked to do this alone. God promises his Spirit will work within us and in our midst to enable good things to happen. It's a wild proposition. At once it puzzles and resonates with me. But the more I lean into it, the more it connects with my experience, just as it challenges my preconceptions of how the world operates and I'm meant to operate in it.
What have I been asked to let go of lately? Myself. That includes aspects of my work, certain desires, and perhaps more generally what I thought my life would look like. The letting go is ongoing (for all of us). Christ showed us that this is the way of the cross. It's not cheap grace or therapeutic deism (both shams). But it is the way of life. As I progressively let go, I find I am progressively more fulfilled. I also feel more fulfilled, and I think it's important to pay attention to that aspect of our spiritual lives. A long time ago I incorrectly thought that dying to self meant signing up to suffer per se and that was somehow a Christian duty.* In that moment, ironically, I was closer to Nietzsche than Christ. I have since found that when I choose to die to self I'm released to become a better, more fulfilled self, and those are the times when God does something new.
*There's an interesting affective dimension to a life released to Christ, which enables one to experience peace, contentment, and joy amidst a variety of (otherwise unpleasant) circumstances, including suffering. Here is not the place to get into the mystery of suffering, but for all of us life will involve suffering, even if that suffering is or seems to be unevenly distributed. It's not suffering per se that we are called to, contra Nietzsche, but often the things we are called to will involve suffering, hardship, or frustration (most worthwhile things do). I am consistently moved by those who find peace, hope, perseverance, forgiveness, and meaning amidst their own experience of suffering. Christian faith is a tremendous resource here. I think success amidst suffering has something to do with connecting to what really matters, confident that there is a good personal force behind the universe that one is aligned with (to put it one way), in addition to the active consolation God provides in the Spirit and the trust that God will weave these experiences into a meaningful, redemptive whole. Stephen's serenity amidst his death (The Acts of the Apostles, 7) is a powerful example of this. He seems almost joyful. What is joy? I imagine it will in part involve pleasure or positive emotion - peace, contentment, etc. - but I suspect it's not necessarily unmixed with pain. So, there can be joy in pain, peace in suffering, and perseverance in hardship.
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