Can God heal a narcissist?
Hi, everyone, I'm Shaneen Megji.
Welcome to my YouTube series on
on Toxicity is not your Destiny.
This is a channel on how to navigate toxic people and places in your life
from a spiritual, practical and biblical perspective.
In today's video, I'm going to answer the question, can God heal a narcissist?
I just want to preamble this video and all my videos
By saying that I'm not a therapist or a psychologist.
Everything I share is based on a mix of research,
insight and the gems of my personal experience of having lived through
narcissistic abuse and toxic relationships.
My desire is to offer you encouragement, to build you up, to enlighten you,
to help you accelerate and cross over into your life's calling.
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Now, let's get into it.
A lot of people say there's no remedy for healing narcissism.
If you go on most YouTube channels on narcissism,
read books about it,surf on the net, study it further,
that is the consistent story you will get.
The verdict everywhere is that you cannot heal a narcissist
or it's extremely difficult.
At best, you can do some behavior modification
and that might take a very long period of time.
And even then, it doesn't result in an inner heart change with a narcissist.
Now, there are two issues involved and research shows this as well.
The first thing is that traditional methods in psychology and mental health
have not worked for someone with narcissism.
And secondly, it's difficult to arrive at the truth
of the matter because narcissists tend not to go for treatment.
And if they do, it's because they have
been coerced into it by either their significant other or possibly the law.
So they're not there because they think they need help.
So all that said, can God heal a narcissist?
My simple answer to that is, of course he can.
Jesus said the words, "With God, nothing is impossible."
Nothing means nothing.
There is nothing that God cannot do, including healing a narcissist.
But, that then begs the question,
Why do narcissists seem like a lost cause in society?
Why aren't more narcissists healed?
it seems like there is no hope for them.
And so how do you reconcile that
with the fact that with God all things are possible
and with God, nothing is impossible?
That is what I want to talk to you about today.
The fundamental issue is that a narcissist doesn't think he or she has a problem.
That's really what it boils down to.
And any person who does not think they have a problem, you can't help them.
No matter what their illness is. They're beyond remedy.
Even Jesus said to the Pharisees,
"Since you think you can see your guilt remains."
And by saying your guilt remains,
he was actually saying, "Your blindness remains."
And he also said that only the sick think they need a doctor.
Those are such profound words of Jesus.
And that really characterizes the problem
with not being able to bring healing to someone who is narcissistic.
It's simply the nature of the arrogance and the pride that tells them they are
the only ones who are seeing and everyone else around them is blind.
So how do you remedy that pride
and that arrogance that is so inherent in a narcissist? It's by humility, right?
And the Bible says that either you fall on the rock or the rock falls on you.
So what that means is either you humble yourself
or you end up getting humbled in some worse way by God.
And the sad reality is that it takes a lot
for narcissistic person to see that they have a problem.
They don't think they have a problem,
so they're not willing to fall on the rock themselves.
They're not willing to humble themselves.
They think everybody else is the problem
and everybody else needs to fall on the rock.
They are notorious blame-shifters.
Their pride is the outward cover for their narcissism.
All the traits of a narcissist are hinged on pride and arrogance in order to cover up their deep, deep shame.
Narcissists have a grandiose vision of themselves.
They're highly entitled.
They demand utter compliance.
They have unrealistic expectations.
They can dish out the criticism and abuse
like no one's business.
But what it comes to them.
They're utterly fragile when it comes to receiving any criticism.
They exploit people.
They view themselves as superior.
They are preoccupied with being successful,
with being powerful,
with looking good all the time.
They exaggerate their talents and their achievements and the list goes on.
So if pride is the cover for narcissism,
and the narcissist is not willing to humble themselves and fall on the rock.
Then it means that it takes a rock to fall on the narcissist
to break through their barrier of pride
in order to get to the real issue, which is shame.
In other words, it takes an intervention from God to humble them.
And the greater the pride, the greater the intervention that is needed.
I'll give you an example of two narcissists in the Bible.
The first one is King Nebuchadnezzar.
Now, how do you know King Nebuchadnezzar was a narcissist?
The scripture does not say he was a narcissist, but it does say he did not
acknowledge God as God, but saw himself like a God.
He said, did I not build Babylon?
Was it not by me that this royal residence was created?
Was it not my mighty power and my majesty and my glory that did all of this?
So because of that pride and that arrogance,
God drove him away from society
where he lived in the wilderness
like an insane person for seven years
until he would acknowledge God as the true God.
Now, this remedy of God was pretty extreme.
I mean, from being the leader of the most powerful, influential country in his day
to going insane and living in the wilderness? That is quite drastic.
But, it was that level of intervention
that King Nebuchadnezzar needed in order for his heart to change.
And so God might employ a strong intervention in your narcissist's life.
I'm not saying it will be that drastic,
but God knows what is needed to bring repentance and a change of heart.
And so God might bring a strong
intervention in your narcissists life and it could lead to repentance
and a change of heart like Nebuchadnezzar
or maybe not.
There's another example in scripture of a narcissist who did not change,
and that was King Pharaoh.
I would say most kings in the biblical times
were narcissists, King Pharaoh, one of them.
He was the leader of Egypt, the most powerful country in this day.
And he also considered himself to be like a god.
God had to send ten plagues to rival his authority to prove to him that he is not God
but God is God and God is the God of the whole earth and the universe.
And everything was created by him and belongs to him.
But despite Pharaoh's country being
practically decimated and losing his firstborn son, he never relented.
He never once softened his heart through
the whole process. And right to the very end, he chased the Israelites
until God had to drown him and his men and destroy them.
So if you can imagine, all the ten plagues of God did not reach Pharaoh's heart.
He could not be healed from his narcissism.
And that is very sobering.
So God will do what he can to try
and confront and humble a narcissistic person.
And the response can go either way.
Like Pharaoh, the narcissist can continue
to harden his or her heart and never change.
And they end up dying in their narcissism.
Or God's discipline can change the heart
of a narcissist where they do become humble and they do ask for God to heal them
and change them,
just like King Nebuchadnezzar.
At the end of the day,
even though God is all-powerful, God himself does not heal a narcissist.
And it's not because the illness is too difficult for Him.
But it's simply because God has given every human being free will.
But when a narcissist comes to a place where they are humbled,
broken and their defenses are down, there is definitely an opportunity there
for them to cry out to God and receive healing from Him.
When that cry comes out
from the narcissist to ask for healing from God,
then that is the invitation God is waiting for
so He can come in with his healing balm and heal the narcissist
all the way down to the wounds of their childhood traumas.
But God will never intrude on the free will of a person.
If someone doesn't want to be healed
or doesn't think they need it,
God is not going to overstep that boundary.
God loves a narcissist so much
that out of His love,
He will influence the narcissist's circumstances
to motivate him or her to ask for the healing.
But he will not just step in and do it against their will.
I want to talk about some other narcissists in the Bible.
And those were the Pharisees.
How do we know that they were narcissists?
Well, narcissists have these baseline negative emotions,
primarily anger, hatred and envy.
These are the three dark triads of emotions of a narcissist,
and if you look at the religious leaders, they had them all.
They were full of contempt.
They hated Jesus.
They were angry.
Whenever Jesus would confront them
or point out their hypocrisy,
they would get so enraged.
I mean, so enraged,
they would want to throw him off the cliff or kill him.
They were so envious of Jesus.
It was their envy that nailed Jesus to the cross.
So the ancient leaders of biblical times are very similar
to today's modern narcissists,
maybe the narcissistic minister today.
So I want to point out about these
religious leaders that the way Jesus dealt with them was very,
very different from the way he treated everybody else that was around them.
The difference is Jesus confronted the religious leaders.
He was continuously pointing out their hypocrisy
every chance he could get.
He would render them speechless
every time they would try to question him.
He sometimes would provoke them.
I mean, he would do things intentionally.
He would heal on purpose on the Sabbath,
right in front of them all just to trigger them.
If you read the book of John,
the entire book is nothing but a showdown between Jesus and the religious leaders.
And it wasn't because Jesus was trying to pick a fight with them.
With these types of people, the only way to get to them is to confront them.
Confrontation has a way of exposing
to them and everyone else around them what is truly going on in their hearts.
It cuts through the veil of deception.
That's the only way.
And as long as you are enabling
a narcissist and helping them, then they carry on with their deception
and believing that the source of their problems is you.
Now, I'm not saying you need to go
and confront your narcissists because it could be very dangerous.
It could actually most likely increase the abuse and put you in grave danger.
Remember when Moses confronted Pharaoh?
How did Pharaoh respond?
We know that Pharaoh became even more abusive,
even more brutal with the Israelites to the point where
the Israelites became so disheartened and discouraged.
So definitely confrontation has to be
something that is very much spirit-led, something that God is calling you to do.
But my point in telling you all of this is
just to say that a narcissist needs confrontation.
They need it to be awakened and to be jolted.
And sometimes it's only the Lord that can do that
by using the circumstances of their life to expose what is going on
in their hearts, just as Jesus did continuously with the Pharisees.
Now, we can never know if Jesus' rebukes actually led to repentance.
It seems like things just got worse and worse.
But sometimes God can have His way
and sometimes we just need to get out of His way.
Sometimes we get in God's way and we think, "Oh, I just need to love them more."
"I just need to show them more grace."
"I just need to turn the other cheek."
"I can win them over by my meek submission. That will change their heart."
"My good conduct will change everything and I will win them for Christ."
Listen, this only enables their deception.
The path to a changed heart, if there is a changed heart, is very, very different
for someone who is a narcissist.
They truly need a head-on confrontation and that likely may not come from you.
It may be too dangerous for you to do that.
The best thing you can do is to find
a quiet and non-dramatic way to create as big of a space as you can between yourself
and the narcissist and entrust your narcissist into God's hands.
Leave it to God to deal with that person directly.
You can trust that by taking your attention off the narcissist and focusing
on moving forward with your life, with healing yourself, with growing,
with rebuilding your identity in Christ, with cultivating other relationships,
that you're not only healing yourself, but you are giving God the space He needs
to confront your narcissist and maybe to bring a change of heart.
And this may not happen right away.
It may not happen for a long time.
So I want to encourage you to no longer allow the narcissist
to take up for free
any more real estate in your mind.
Focus on the healing God wants to do
in your heart because He has awesome plans for you.
You might be feeling anxious or stressed, but look to Jesus.
You can cast every care and worry of your heart on Him, and He will supernaturally
fill you and fill every fiber of your being with His peace.
He is so faithful.
He is called the Prince of Peace for a reason.
And that brings me to the end of this episode.
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