The Lesson
Pleasing men is a distraction aimed at shifting my focus and trust away from God, in whom I find my true identity. Loving myself is not the same thing as seeking approval. It is the opposite.
I’ve been sitting with understanding love: the breath of life, being love, made by love, in an environment of love. Then listening and hearing as an act of love. Then hearing God. Then He showed me humility in a new light.
This morning something came up — pleasing men, seeking approval, versus loving myself. It took me a moment to see how they connect. I love myself so I can love others, and so I can receive love. That is very different from the selfish approval I have sought.
Many years ago, during prayer, I first heard the reference about pleasing men. I get it now.
The Order of Things
Love flows in one direction: from God, through me, to others. When I get the order backwards, I go looking to people for what only God gives.
- Made by love. God breathed the breath of life into me. I exist because of love, and I live in an environment of love.
- Loved first. Before I did anything right or wrong, He loved me. I don’t earn it; I receive it.
- Identity in Him. Who I am is settled in God, not in anyone’s opinion of me.
- Loving myself. I accept what God says about me, and I take care of what He made. This is receiving love, not grabbing for it.
- Loving others. Out of that fullness I can listen, hear, and give without needing anything back.
Approval-seeking flips this. It starts at step 5, trying to get from people what step 2 already gave me. It’s the same pattern as Faith → Identity → Attitude → Action: when identity comes from people instead of faith, everything downstream bends toward pleasing them.
The Distinction
They can look alike from the outside. The difference is where the love comes from and where my eyes are.
| Pleasing men (approval) | Loving myself (in God) | |
|---|---|---|
| Source | Other people’s reactions | God’s love, already given |
| Focus | Me, and how I’m seen | God, then the person in front of me |
| Identity | Changes with every opinion | Settled; hidden with Christ in God |
| Driven by | Fear and shame | Trust and gratitude |
| Listening | Listening for how I’m doing | Listening to actually hear them |
| Toward others | Transactional; I need something back | Free; I can give without needing a return |
| When I get it wrong | Threat, hiding, defending | Forgiven, and back to the ground |
Scripture
Quotes are from the English Standard Version (ESV).
Pleasing men
- Galatians 1:10 — “For am I now seeking the approval of man, or of God? Or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ.” Probably the verse I heard in prayer all those years ago.
- Proverbs 29:25 — “The fear of man lays a snare, but whoever trusts in the LORD is safe.” The distraction is a trap, and trust is the way out.
- John 12:43 — “for they loved the glory that comes from man more than the glory that comes from God.”
- John 5:44 — “How can you believe, when you receive glory from one another and do not seek the glory that comes from the only God?” Approval-seeking gets in the way of faith itself.
- 1 Thessalonians 2:4 — “so we speak, not to please man, but to please God who tests our hearts.”
- Ephesians 6:6 — “not by the way of eye-service, as people-pleasers, but as bondservants of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart.”
Made by love, loved first
- Genesis 2:7 — “then the LORD God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature.”
- 1 John 4:16 — “So we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us. God is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him.” Abide again: love is the ground I choose to live on.
- 1 John 4:19 — “We love because he first loved us.”
Identity in Him
- Colossians 3:3 — “For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.”
Love myself so I can love others
- Matthew 22:37–39 — “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” Loving God comes first, and the second commandment assumes I love myself.