One of the characteristics of a narcissist is the need to be elevated in the eyes of others. Some of the actions to accomplish this are intimidation, elevated voice in discussions, negating others through dismissiveness, not listening to hear truth, making their own reality based on how they want to think of themselves rather than what is real.
When we encounter someone like this we can be sure it will be an exercise in futility to try to reason with or explain anything. These people cut you off in the middle of a sentence, when they begin speaking they talk so long no one else can engage in conversation with them and if one tries to interject a word, they are quickly cut off.
Narcissists think they know things about others even with little or no information about their target. These people are easily offended because they are weak, their ego needs constant stroking to maintain a pleasurable view of self.
They are intolerant of any correction or teaching that may convict them of sin. They run from confident personalities and surround themselves with people who elevate and admire them. Anyone who is not impressed with them is ignored or negated. There is a need to denigrate anyone who will not bow to them. They tend to be like spoiled children, having a tantrum when they cannot have their way, making everyone around them miserable for not giving them what they want.
This phenomena of narcissism is growing rapidly. The reason we see an increase, is because of the lack of family structure. Children who are raised with little or no instruction or discipline in their early years will demonstrate these characteristics. Children who have been praised too much in their early years, or neglected will engage in narcissism.
It is an insecurity that demonstrates this malady. These people feel an entitlement to special treatment, admiration and self-glorification without anything in their life that earned or deserved it. Their very existence alone, is enough for them to believe they should be elevated. They need heroes in their lives because they have a strong desire to be thought of as a hero themselves.
One of the main characteristics of these people is that they are prideful, unteachable and largely ignorant. They believe they know everything already with little experience or knowledge of a matter, thereby making judgments that are wrong based on their own ideas colored by how they want to think of a matter, rather than how it really is.
If they are prejudice against someone, they do not look at the evidence, they devise thoughts in their own mind to fit their view of things, based not on the evidence, but on their own desires, how they want to think of someone.
Those who are not born again, and have lived a life of narcissism will make up stories in their mind about a person they know little about, to discredit them if that person is a believer. Narcissists hardly ever really know even those who are close to them, they are spending all their time on themselves. We see this with our current president. His favorite tactic is to tell lies about someone else, accusing them of things he does but those he accuse, are not doing.
Our president declares that Christians are the terrorists, when he is one, but they are not. We see the effects of this, in the lives of many believers, those who hate correction, instruction and are convicted, work to make the believer look as though they have done something wrong when they are merely obeying God.
When we are confident in the Lord, having been made into a new creation by Christ, we have no need of heroes other than Christ, nor do we desire to be one ourselves. Those who need heroes or want to be one, are weak minded, feeling a need to have a crutch to look up to, that is not Christ, is a worldly man centered focus, rather than Christ centered.
2 Timothy 3 tells us that in the end times, our world will be full of these narcissists. Those whose focus is entirely on self, pleasure and personal aggrandizement. There is little if any, fulfillment in having human heroes, most of them are dead, the legacy they leave behind is flawed at best if we are to look into their lives in truth.
God used the World War 2 vets to do a good work in eliminating the threat of Hitler on the world stage. However, has anyone taken a good look at the lives of many of those men? I knew many of them over the years, since I was in the baby boomer generation. The men I knew were not moral, didn’t love God and never raised their children to love Him, and yet the world calls them the great generation.
2 Timothy 3:1-5 “3 But know this, that in the last days perilous times will come: 2 For men will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, 3 unloving, unforgiving, slanderers, without self-control, brutal, despisers of good, 4 traitors, headstrong, haughty, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, 5 having a form of godliness but denying its power. And from such people turn away!”
When our sense of heroism is based on man, it will be flawed causing idols in one’s mind. Our only hero ought to be Christ, no one else could measure up to God and what He did on that cross. It is proper to be grateful to a man for saving your life, or rescuing someone, but the use of the word hero, is not only overdone but misplaced in our generation. Everyone is called a hero if they do something others would not do that placed them in danger, but this does not make them born again or worthy of worship.
Anyone who does not love Christ, will not be accepted by God, no matter how many good deeds they do, or how much they demonstrate heroism. Someone who does merely what is right, will not want to be praised for it, a clear conscience before God is enough for them as believers.
Keep in mind, the need for “heroes” is an indication of our desire to be thought of as one ourselves. Whatever we promote is what is in our heart to be.
Romans 12:1 “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.”
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