We think that the Gospel offers good self-esteem to replace the shame of our sin, but it doesn’t do that at all. The real Gospel doesn’t offer strong, healthy ego. It offers freedom from ego entirely.
If you could step behind the veil just for a moment and breathe in the heavens, you would not find yourself full of self-esteem. You would not revel in how loved, how cherished, how celebrated you are by your heavenly Father. You would not find shame either. What you would find is that you forget yourself completely. In the heavens, in true, capital “R” reality, the only true worth, the only real esteem is Jesus himself. The only real comparison in the universe is God vs. all else.
There is no status, no comparison of persons in the heavens. There is only “worthy is the lamb.”
“Me?” “Me, who?”