MG on Self Esteem, Dumps & you are your own worst enemy

Self esteem: Does "he loseth his life" mean...?
Posted By: MG
Date: Saturday, 27 April 2002, at 4:04 a.m.
One time DB came before the faithful, the "king's house" staff, to give a Bible study. To the consternation of the king, one of the assembled had the "dumps". It was going to effect the prophet, get him the "dumps", and everyone else in the whole room too. God forbid. Thus the diatribe began...soon to be published to feed the multitudes. So the classic Mo letter "You are Your Own Worst Enemy" oozed like honey coming out of God's mouth, through the humble prophet's mouth, dripping life giving nourishment into our eager hungry souls.

We find out later why the person in question had the dumps: she wasn't attracted to the man she had no choice in having as a room-mate. In other words she was rebelling against the law of love--"the doctrine", because she didn't cheerfully accept the man being imposed on her.

For all of you who remember the letter, he blasts away at the girl's selfishness and "evil self". There's page after page about how there's only bad "self"....nothing good about anybody....on and on, until he says the only way out is to be so busy for Jesus and others, especially the Family, then happiness will find you--you don't go and look for it. The dumps are defeated. Self has been exposed for what it's worth....not only just zero, but bad and evil and worse that the Devil.
Jesus said, "He that loseth his life for my sake shall save it." The Psalms say "There is none righteous, no not one." Jesus later quoted that verse.
But I have a question. How come millions of alcoholics, drug addicts, and people with all kinds of dysfunctions are now recovered because God woke them up to the fact that not only He forgave them, but they needed to forgive themselves and start learning to love themselves and to do things for themselves? It's a question that I've been able to find some partial answers too. (Well if David Berg were still around he'd be the wrong person to ask, he wouldn't know much about recovery would he? Oh, I forgot...he's still around, I can ask him and he'll give a "Dad speaking" message for the GNs.)
Anyway, we drilled this into our children. They are their own worst enemy. Self is evil There were illustrated versions and we gave them all kinds of classes on the subject. At the same time we told them that they were going to grow up to be the greatest force of God that the world has ever known. We drilled into them that when they were teens they would be the leaders of God's people, literally millions of people, they would be this ON THE CONDITION that they stayed in the Family and obedient to the mission and doctrines and goals. (--So much for God's unconditional love which Zerby seemed to make such a big deal out of...total contradiction.)
Low self esteem has been the biggest battle my kids fight. I have 3 kids out of the F. They each manifest this in different way. I'm very proud of two of them because of their achievements in both work and at university. What does the fact that they are OVER ACHIEVERS mean? And the other one has dropped out of school, and is on drugs and alcohol.
Anyway, the Worst Enemy letter ends with "Jesus is your own best friend and He is the only one who can help you get the victory." True. But when Jesus, after He said to the religious people that "the one without sin could cast the first stone", when He looked at the woman, and loved her, did He not mean for her to see that she was of worth, that there was something about her, her SELF that was God created and good that she needed to love too, and that she should go and "sin no more" in other words stop living in a way that hurt herself? Go, take care of yourself.
A lot of what's in that one You Are Your Own Worst Enemy letter is right, but along with it there's something really manipulative.
I need to go so I must post. (I'm a little worried that since I used the story about casting the first stone, that that will be used against me for Berg bashing. So let me say now, whether I'm casting stones at Berg or not I don't know, but I do know that I'm not without sin.)