I’M NOT OK: Godly Self-Care

Pastor Steven Osborne
Transcribed by PulpitAI (with edits)

Life Happens

Last week I shared with you that we received, as a family, we received some news that really impacted our hearts. And it was like just really painful, and it was unexpected news, and it’s like, man, what do you do with that, right? And just like, how do you deal with some of that pain? And, you know, and so obviously this week we had a lot of time to just kind of reflect on that and to do some self-care.

And like with most things, you know, sometimes we go and experience stuff, and it’s maybe one night and it’s over and you’ve dealt with that, and sometimes there’s more intense and more complicated things. And there’s not just like a, “Here’s… drink a blue meds, or a blue pill,” right? And it’s like, it’s all over. It can be a process. And we have to allow the Holy Spirit to do some care and ministry in our hearts. And how do we take self-care and to make sure that we get healthy? And so it’s been an ongoing process for us. But Wednesday sure helped. It was such a victory and such a high. And just to be with you and to, you know, enjoy our neighborhood. And we’re very grateful for that.

And so we went—as part of kind of just our healing and the time as a family, we went camping on Thursday. Venessa worked, and we left early, Hailey and myself. We’ve got a little, just a trailer, and then it just kind of pops out a little tent. And so we came back yesterday, and on our way back—so just as we were trying to clean everything and we’re ready to leave, we were in Hayward, and as we’re ready to leave, I kind of did a check around. It’s like, okay, yeah, all the lights are working, you know, left blinker, right blinker, kind of the checkup, and everything looked really good. And we just left the campsite; we were gonna go for some breakfast, and the next thing, it’s just “kkkhhh” and sparks, right? And the trailer came unhitched. I think that the pin broke, right? I don’t know how the pin broke, but it broke. And it was like, man, it is embarrassing, right? Just the noise, and there’s somebody that (praise the Lord) pulled over and helped us, and we pulled the trailer to the side, and there was a place close by that I was able to go and purchase another pin. And so not a lot of damage to the car, not a lot of damage to the trailer, so very grateful for that. But in that moment, you go like, “Ugh, do I need that?” Right? You just had a fun camping experience, now this happened, and so we put the trailer on the side, and Venessa was standing and waiting for me as I went to the store to purchase another pin.

And so in that moment, you have a couple of options, right? Like just when life happens, and when life gets unhinged, right, what do you do? What do you do in that moment? What’s kind of self-care? And it’s like, yeah, I can go all nuts next to the trailer and kick the tire, and it’s like, “Oh, life is just not fair,” right, and I could be, “I’m so mad at life, and I’m so mad at the trailer, I’m so mad at Venessa. I’m just leaving them there.” Right? I mean, there’s all kinds of options.

And so you look at kind of in the moments like, “Hey, this is not too bad. We can fix this. Praise the Lord, this is an easy fix. This is gonna cost me $7. It happened in a convenient place. It is not that bad.” But just to say that, you know, life happens. And even when you sometimes do everything that you can, and you try and do everything right, and you check everything, life happens. And what do you do with your heart? What do you do with your spiritual life and your spirit and emotions when life happens?

Filling Yourself Up

Several weeks ago we took about 17 kids—16 or 17 kids to Unite in Ohio, and we had two vans, and we had to fill up, and I could see that Christo was distracted, right? And he was chatting with people, and so the gas was—he was filling the van with gas, and I walked to him in his distraction, and I said, “Christo, why are you filling the van with diesel?” Right? And you could see the panic in his eyes for that moment, right? It’s like, you’re just like, man—and I don’t know if you’ve done it like, “Man, did I really fill the van? Am I filling the van with the right fuel?”

And so in life too, a lot of times when, as life happens and as we do life, sometimes we can fill ourselves up with the wrong things. And then when the trailer comes off, when life happens and there’s painful stuff, then you find out, it’s like, “Man, is my tank full of the right fuel or is it full of the wrong fuel? Is it full with diesel?” Right? And it’s like, there was no way that van was gonna run on diesel.

And so for us as well, when we deal with pain, and when we deal with the challenges that life throws at us—I was just looking at some stats in the U.S. They say that there’s one out of every six people are struggling with depression. And obviously there’s several levels to depression and kind of the effects that that can have on your body and where that can all lead to—sometimes when it’s severe, where it can lead to suicide. And so you look at those things and it’s like, when life happens, what did I fill my life with? Is it the right stuff? Is it full of God? Is it full of hope? Is it full of joy? Is it allowing him to fight my battles?

And the reality is that that’s not always the case. Sometimes we do, we run, we fill ourselves with a busyness. Sometimes we fill our lives with addiction. Sometimes we fill our lives with self-harm, whatever it might be. And then you get to a point, and the trailer comes off and you go like, “Man, this isn’t good. This isn’t good. This is not gonna sustain me. My engine, my spiritual engine, isn’t gonna run well if I keep filling myself with the wrong things.” And so we all have a responsibility then to say, “How do I fill myself with the right things so that I can be healthy?”

I was looking at this one verse, Proverbs 31. You probably know it well, it talks about this example of this godly woman, what that looks like. And so Proverbs 31 says:

She is clothed with strength and dignity;
    she can laugh at the days to come.
She speaks with wisdom,
    and faithful instruction is on her tongue.
She watches over the affairs of her household
    and does not eat the bread of idleness.

And so, you know, you’ve heard this maybe on Mother’s Day and different things like that. But when I was looking at that, I was like, “Whoa, this is amazing. This speaks of a healthy wife. This speaks of a healthy mother.” And what are the things that need to be in our place? Because I believe that this needs to be true for all of us, where we all are that healthy—where we’re healthy mothers, where we’re healthy fathers, where we’re healthy husbands, where we’re healthy wives, and where we are healthy spiritual church members. And so how do we get to this place?

An Example from David

Last week, I shared with you Psalms 34, and I want to read that again from verse 3, and then we’ll read up to verse 22. If you have your Bible with you, you can turn with me, Psalm 34. It says:

Glorify the Lord with me;
    let us exalt his name together.

I sought the Lord, and he answered me;
    he delivered me from all my fears.
Those who look to him are radiant;
    their faces are never covered with shame.
This poor man called, and the Lord heard him;
    he saved him out of all his troubles.
The angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear him,
    and he delivers them.

Taste and see that the Lord is good;
    blessed is the one who takes refuge in him.
Fear the Lord, you his holy people,
    for those who fear him lack nothing.
The lions may grow weak and hungry,
    but those who seek the Lord lack no good thing.
Come, my children, listen to me;
    I will teach you the fear of the Lord.
Whoever of you loves life
    and desires to see many good days,
keep your tongue from evil
    and your lips from telling lies.
Turn from evil and do good;
    seek peace and pursue it.

The eyes of the Lord are on the righteous,
    and his ears are attentive to their cry;
but the face of the Lord is against those who do evil,
    to blot out their name from the earth.

The righteous cry out, and the Lord hears them;
    he delivers them from all their troubles.
The Lord is close to the brokenhearted
    and saves those who are crushed in spirit.

Now to give you a little bit of just context, we have to go and look at the story in 1 Samuel chapter 21, right? And so if you get a chance and opportunity, I want to encourage you to read through the life of David. And we find the time period that when he was writing this was just kind of after that 1 Samuel chapter 21, and so he was going through a really hard time, right? He actually was so bad that he was running back—so just kind of think back, who was one of David’s biggest enemies? Saul, right. Who else? Goliath, right? And Goliath was part of which tribe? Philistines, right? And so this was an enemy. And so actually when you go and read 1 Samuel, you see that he goes back. He goes and hide to the Philistines, right? And so imagine how bad it needs to be in your life to go back to your enemy, to go and stay with them. And so he goes back, and it is so bad that he actually acts like he is insane. It talks about how the saliva is dripping from his beard, when you go and read that story. So he’s acting all crazy, and the king says, “Why are you bringing a madman into my house? Okay, send him away!” And so David now ends up going back to the cave, and it’s in these moments that he is writing this psalm that I just read to you.

And it is beautiful, and so just to realize again that, you know, life is happening all around David. David is experiencing all kinds of brokenness. He’s experiencing all kinds of pain, and it’d be so easy for him to complain and to be negative, and obviously we see all the highs and the lows in David’s life. But somehow, in the midst of everything that he’s dealing with, in his suffering, in his pain, in his brokenness, he’s giving a testimony about God’s faithfulness.

It's Okay to Not Be Okay

And so this morning, as we say—and we say, “Hey, it is okay not to be okay.” You know, sometimes in life we just deal with pain, we deal with brokenness, and then for us to realize, hey, God is faithful. God is faithful. And for us to be on a place to remind ourselves, to say, “Taste and see that the Lord is good.” Even in my brokenness, even in the pain of life, the things that life can throw at us, and the discouragement when those dreams feel broken, to be on a place, to be in the cave where hard things are happening, and there’s persecution, and people are talking bad things about you, and it looks like your whole dream is falling apart, to be on a place, to have that maturity, because you have filled your life with enough of God’s presence, you’ve filled your life with enough of God’s Word that you say, “Man, I’m gonna just taste and see that the Lord is good. And God has been faithful in my past through story after story. God is faithful. And that God has delivered me from so many painful things already, and I trust that he will continue to deliver me from this future and present pain as well.”

And then just to be on that place to say, “The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit.”

And so even for us this morning, for those of you that are dealing with hard things—I was so grateful this week for all of the prayers, people just sharing prayers and scriptures with us, just thank you so much. I really appreciate it. And some opportunities where people were sharing some of the painful things that they’re dealing with, right? And so we just, we never know. You don’t know some of the things that people are going through that is sitting right next to you right now. And so this morning, I just want you to know, as you’re dealing with maybe some things, that I want you to know the Lord is not abandoning you, right? The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and he will save those who are crushed in spirit. And so it’s about just, it’s about holding on to those promises, to keep your eyes on God. And I know when you’re in the midst of pain, and when you’re frustrated and angry, those things aren’t always easy. But that is what is required of us in those moments is to just hold on to the promises of God and to realize that he’s with us in some of those things.

The Importance of Self-Care

Now, as we talk about self-care—you know, if you’ve done any flying, you know that in the beginning, before you can take off, somebody will give an illustration, show you all the exits, and then they’ll say, hey, in case of an emergency, the oxygen mask will fall—you know, drop out of the… wherever it’s dropping out of. And then they said, “Before you put the mask on your kid’s face, make sure you put it on first,” right? And the first time I heard it, I was like, “Man, that sounds pretty selfish.” It’s like, no, I’m not gonna do that. I’m gonna help Venessa first. I’m gonna help Hailey first, right? There’s no way I’m gonna do that. But then you realize that I am pretty much useless if I’m in a situation like that and I’ve passed out. I don’t have oxygen, then I cannot help anybody else.

And so I want you to know this: that I am no good to you when I’m not at my best. You are not good to anybody, you’re not good to your family, when you are not at your best. And so to be your best, we have to do self-care. We have to pay attention to our spiritual hearts. We got to pay attention. What is the stuff that impacts my heart, my spirit? How do I take time for the Holy Spirit to bring healing? What are some steps that I have to take to receive healing?

But a lot of times it is just like, “Oh nothing’s wrong. I’m just gonna walk it off. I’m gonna just ignore the pain. I’m just gonna ignore my heart and hope it goes away.” It’s like a toothache. I don’t know if you’ve had that where you’ve had a toothache, and it’s like, “Well I’m just gonna ignore it. I’m not gonna go and see the dentist,” right? And that usually never ends well. It might go away for a little bit, but the problem usually gets worse over time, from a quick fix to suddenly you have to have a root canal. Believe me, I have been there. Just ask my dentist.

How To Care For Yourself

So what are the things that I have to do today to make sure that I stay healthy?

Well, self-care can sometimes sound a little worldly—maybe even self-centered. If you look at social media, you look at YouTube, you will see there’s all kinds of secular views and ideas on self-care. And for me, it’s kind of sad that I think that the secular world has a better handle on self-care. They probably are just going in the wrong direction and are grabbing on the wrong tools, but I am thinking that the church should be leading this movement, that the church should be a place that actually talks about self-care more than the secular world.

But I believe that godly self-care is not only biblical but also essential for our spiritual health and for living the life God calls us to. The idea of caring for ourselves comes directly from Jesus’ words in Mark. We are commanded to love God, love our neighbors, and to love ourselves. Loving ourselves is not selfish—it’s an extension of God’s love for us. And so just again, here’s the passage, Mark chapter 12. It says:

“‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these.”

And so how will we be able to love our neighbor well if we don’t love ourselves, and if we’re broken, right? And so, you’re not self-centered and selfish if you actually take time to say, “How do I love myself in a biblical way?” And that’s what we’re gonna look at today.

We are called to steward the gifts God has given us, including our bodies, minds, and spirits. When we neglect ourselves, we risk burnout, resentment, and even physical illness. By caring for ourselves, we are better equipped to care for others. I don’t know if you have experienced that in your own life, and maybe just when you are already struggling, and there’s just kind of layers of complexities, and everyone is asking for your attention, and everyone is asking for your help, it is really hard to be your best and to give to people when you are not in a good spot. And so we are called to steward. When I asked Christo to share this with our kids, for us to actually realize again that, man, our bodies is a temple, and it’s a temple for the Holy Spirit, and God wants us to take care of our bodies. He wants to take care of our hearts and to make sure that we stay healthy.

And we see it in the life of Jesus as well. Matthew 14, after he’s doing all kinds of ministries and spending time with the disciples:

After he had dismissed them, he went up on a mountainside by himself to pray. Later that night, he was there all alone.

I don’t know if you can agree—maybe for some of you this comes a little bit easier—but it is hard for us to be alone, right? And again it’s one thing to be alone, but a lot of times we’re looking for all kinds of noise, right? If you’re like me, I know, it’s like there’s always music, always a podcast, always a sermon. And those things are good things, but are we actually alone with our thoughts, with our hearts, just conversation with God, and where we share with him the stuff, the pain, the disappointments, the grief, the hope, the joys, and just to be in that moment to be with the Father? And Jesus gives us that example. He probably didn’t need it, but he showed us the way on what that looks like to do self-care, to spend time with him alone.

Great quote by Martin Luther. It says:

“I have so much to do that I shall spend the first three hours in prayer.”

I’m not there. I repent.

The Danger of Missing Self-Care

So here’s the danger. When we don’t take self-care, we start to feel overwhelmed, frustrated, and even distant from God. Our relationships can suffer, our ability to serve others diminishes, and we might find ourselves running on empty, feeling like we’re just going through the motions. And that my dear friends is a hard and a dangerous place to be at, because again, it will catch up, and it will cause great pain in your life. And something that could have been fixed easily over a short period of time, when we don’t pay attention, when we don’t take care of our hearts, and when life happens, it can really grow into something bigger.

And as a church, I have shared with you over and over, I want us to be a healthy church. A healthy church. I want you to be healthy. I want to give you the tools to make sure that you stay healthy, and I want to be there for you and to encourage you, and I want us to be there for each other, to bring encouragement to one another, because again, just, life happens. Nobody is protected against pain and hurt and brokenness. It is all around us. And who is gonna help you? Who’s gonna help you in your journey to healing? And so we want to be there for each other.

But the big thing is, I want you to know that that self-care in your heart is your responsibility. And so for us to be a healthy church will mean that we are healthy individuals, and everyone will need to do their part in this. And I think it’s important for the church to talk to talk about this.

Reasons to Address Self-Care in Church

So a couple things. Important reasons why the church needs to address the topic of self-care.

First of all, preventing burnout in ministry and service. It is—when you do surveys on pastors, you just see how many of them are burned out, right? And I think sometimes we use that too easy, and we can also get to the place where every other pastor is just burned out, and it’s like, hey, we got to also appreciate the gift of hard work, but we got to pay attention. And we got to pay attention for you as volunteers, right? A lot of you—many of you—are so passionate about volunteering and giving yourself, but how do you stay healthy? Do you have healthy boundaries in your life? And next Sunday we will talk about healthy boundaries and margins. But to take self-care means that you will not burn out and that you will be helpful in God’s Kingdom.

Number two, why we need to talk about it: it’s promoting healthy relationships and community. If you are not healthy, you will not be able to have healthy relationships. It’s just not gonna happen. And when that happens, we will not have a healthy community, and so the healthier we can get, the healthier our relationships will be. And so it’s important to have healthy conversations. It is important to press in, to make things right, to take care of your heart, so that we can stay healthy.

And then lastly: building resilience for life’s changes. Like I said, when your trailer gets unhitched, right, a lot of times when these things aren’t built into your life, when there’s not self-care and life really gets hard, it is easy to quit and to give up on life. But when self-care is in place, and when your heart is healthy, when little things happen, you’re not in a place where you go like, “Oh, I’m giving up on life. I’m quitting.” Right? You will have resilience. You won’t allow Satan to distract you and to give up on God’s purposes in your life.

Self Care vs. Self-Denial

So a couple things here, the difference between Godly self-care and self-denial.

Self-denial is about surrendering our own desires and will to follow Christ. It means putting God’s Kingdom first and being willing to sacrifice for the sake of others.

Godly self-care is about creating space for God to work in us. It’s about recharging our batteries so that we can continue to pour out love, grace, and mercy to those around us. It’s about ensuring that we are healthy vessels through which God can work.

I’ll give you another quote here from John Calvin. It says:

“We must remember that the welfare of the soul is not attained by some magical, instantaneous, and secret infusion, but by continual care and diligent work.”

And so it’s an ongoing process in our lives.

Practical Steps

So practical steps for us. I’ll share with you just some practical steps, and then we will pray.

Prioritize your spiritual renewal. Just as Jesus withdrew to solitary places to pray, we, too, need moments of quiet with God. This is where we find rest for our souls, hear God’s voice, and recalibrate our hearts. Right? So spending time with him.

Foster emotional and mental health. Setting healthy boundaries, taking time to do activities that bring you joy, or seeking support from a counselor. Do whatever you got to do to get healthy and to stay healthy.

And then lastly, build relationships that will strengthen you. Who are the people that is speaking into your life?

Closing Prayer

And so I said, we we’ve been doing several things to help us through some of the things that we’re dealing with. We’re excited with what the Lord is doing and the healing that we’re already experiencing. Some days there’s highs; there’s some days there’s lows. Thank you for your prayer. Continue to send those prayers and scriptures; we really appreciate it.

And this morning, I want to just pray with you. And I’m gonna put the prayer here on the screen, and I’m just gonna read through it slowly. And maybe you just take this time—pay attention to your own heart this morning. And you know, just to pay attention, like hey, how self-care going in your life? So let us pray.

Gracious Father, we come before you, recognizing that you are the source of all life and rest. You know our hearts, our worries, our struggles, and our weariness. We ask for your peace to wash over us as we seek to care for ourselves, body, mind, and soul. Lord, teach us to honor the temple of our bodies that you have entrusted to us. Help us to find moments of stillness in the busyness, to breathe deeply of your presence, and to listen for your voice in the quiet. Grant us the wisdom to know when to pause, when to rest, and when to let go of burdens we were never meant to carry. Help us to embrace the truth that caring for ourselves is not selfish but a reflection of your desire for us to live whole and healthy lives. Thank you, Father, for being our refuge and our healer. We rest in your unending grace. In Jesus’ name, amen.