{"id":14259,"date":"2025-06-13T17:00:23","date_gmt":"2025-06-13T21:00:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lightbearers.org\/blog\/?p=14259"},"modified":"2026-03-10T17:54:56","modified_gmt":"2026-03-10T21:54:56","slug":"how-can-god-be-totally-selfless-yet-demand-our-worship","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lightbearers.org\/blog\/how-can-god-be-totally-selfless-yet-demand-our-worship\/","title":{"rendered":"How Can God Be Totally Selfless, Yet Demand Our Worship?"},"content":{"rendered":"

What do you call a person who demands that all attention be centered on them?<\/span><\/p>\n

A toddler?<\/span><\/p>\n

A teenager?<\/span><\/p>\n

God?<\/span><\/p>\n

There\u2019s a theological picture of God that frames Him as essentially the biggest egomaniac in the universe. And if you\u2019ve ever wondered if that might actually be true, you’re not alone.<\/span><\/p>\n

There are a lot of people who are under the impression\u2014from what they’ve been taught and what they’ve picked up from Christianity and other religious persuasions\u2014that God is the ultimate narcissist, that God is ultimately self-centered.<\/span><\/p>\n

For example, the actor Brad Pitt, who was raised in a Midwestern evangelical Christian home, was once asked why he walked away from Christianity. His answer?<\/span><\/p>\n

That picture of God\u2014a being who demands praise and punishes anyone who won\u2019t applaud\u2014isn\u2019t just a Hollywood caricature. It\u2019s what many people have actually been taught<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t understand this idea of a God who says, \u2018You have to acknowledge Me. You have to say I\u2019m the best\u2014then I\u2019ll give you eternal happiness.\u2019 If you won\u2019t tell God He\u2019s the best and put Him at the center of everything\u2026 you don\u2019t get in.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

And then he said something profoundly revealing:<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt seems to me to be about ego. I can\u2019t see God operating from ego, so it made no sense to me.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

That picture of God\u2014a being who demands praise and punishes anyone who won\u2019t applaud\u2014isn\u2019t just a Hollywood caricature. It\u2019s what many people have actually been taught in religious settings.<\/span><\/p>\n

In fact, some Christian thinkers affirm this idea of God’s \u201choly self-centeredness\u201d\u2014arguing that God has the right to be self-centered because, well… He\u2019s God. In that view, God\u2019s ego is the only justified ego in the universe.<\/span><\/p>\n

There are some texts that could be misinterpreted that way. Psalm 150:6 says, \u201cLet everything that has breath praise the Lord.\u201d If we believe Scripture is inspired by God, then isn\u2019t God essentially saying, \u201cEverything that has breath should praise Me\u201d? If any human said that, we would call them a narcissist.<\/span><\/p>\n

But what if that\u2019s not the Bible\u2019s picture of God <\/span>at all<\/span><\/i>?<\/span><\/p>\n

Let\u2019s flip the script.<\/span><\/p>\n

What if the reason God calls us to worship Him isn\u2019t because He needs it, but because <\/span>we do<\/span><\/i>? What if God isn\u2019t speaking from a place of position and authority\u2014throwing His weight around\u2014but rather from a place of purpose and identity?<\/span><\/p>\n

Psalm 63:3 says, \u201cBecause Your loving kindness is better than life, my lips shall praise You.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

This text isn\u2019t just spiritual poetry. This is someone realizing how reality is wired. The text is not describing praise out of obligation. It\u2019s not a spiritual performance for a demanding deity. It\u2019s a human being realizing what they were <\/span>made<\/span><\/i> for, what they were designed for\u2014the nature of things.<\/span><\/p>\n

God doesn\u2019t need my worship.<\/span><\/p>\n

I need to worship Him.<\/span><\/p>\n

God doesn\u2019t need my praise.<\/span><\/p>\n

I need to praise Him.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

God\u2019s love is better than life itself\u2014more essential than oxygen, water, food, or shelter. More foundational than life itself.<\/span><\/p>\n

C.S. Lewis put it this way in <\/span>Mere Christianity<\/span><\/i>:<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cGod made us: invented us as a man invents an engine. A car is made to run on petrol, and it would not run properly on anything else. God designed the human machine to run on Himself. He Himself is the fuel our spirits were designed to burn, or the food our spirits were designed to feed on. That is why it is just no good asking God to make us happy in our own way without bothering about religion. God cannot give us a happiness and peace apart from Himself, because it is not there. There is no such thing.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

This isn\u2019t God throwing His weight around.<\/span><\/p>\n

It\u2019s not divine ego. It\u2019s design.<\/span><\/p>\n

When David says, \u201cMy soul shall be satisfied as with marrow and fatness, and my mouth shall praise You with joyful lips,\u201d he\u2019s not describing religious duty (Psalm 63:5).<\/span><\/p>\n

He\u2019s describing thriving.<\/span><\/p>\n

God doesn\u2019t need my worship.<\/span><\/p>\n

I need to worship Him.<\/span><\/p>\n

God doesn\u2019t need my praise.<\/span><\/p>\n

I need to praise Him.<\/span><\/p>\n

Why?<\/span><\/p>\n

Because the only viable existence is an existence centered outside of oneself. You and I were designed\u2014mentally, emotionally, physically\u2014for other-centeredness. And when we live for ourselves, we gradually move into dysfunction, then disaster, then death.<\/span><\/p>\n

God is the antithesis of egoism. He has never experienced a nanosecond of self-centeredness. Every thought, every feeling, every action of God is centered on the well-being of others. How do we know this? He has shown us:<\/span><\/p>\n

Jesus \u201cmade Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross\u201d (Philippians 2:7\u20138).<\/span><\/p>\n

God\u2019s love is so absolutely other-centered that when I focus on Him, when I worship Him, I become like Him. I begin to love like God loves. Therefore, I become who I really can be when I give Him my full, undivided worship and adoration.<\/span><\/p>\n

That\u2019s why He alone is worthy of our worship\u2014not because He needs it, but because we do.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What do you call a person who demands that all attention be centered on them? A toddler? A teenager? God? There\u2019s a…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":61,"featured_media":14260,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14259","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-article"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/lightbearers.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/Blog-Post-June.webp?fit=2560%2C1440&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paAh8r-3HZ","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lightbearers.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14259","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lightbearers.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lightbearers.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lightbearers.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/61"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lightbearers.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14259"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/lightbearers.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14259\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15426,"href":"https:\/\/lightbearers.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14259\/revisions\/15426"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lightbearers.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14260"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lightbearers.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14259"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lightbearers.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14259"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lightbearers.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14259"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}