Podcast: The Danger in Being a Self-Made Woman (Jen Oshman)

March 02, 2020 by: Crossway

This article is part of the The Crossway Podcast series.

Finding Lasting Joy in Christ

In this episode of The Crossway Podcast, Jen Oshman, author of Enough about Me, discusses what it looks like to pursue real fulfillment in God, rather than in self. She explains what's wrong with the self-obsessed, individualistic culture that dominates our world today, breaking down the massive popularity of books, podcasts, and conferences that say that what we really need is to believe in ourselves. She also discusses what the evangelical church can learn from the MeToo era and shares the key lessons she hopes her own daughters take from her as they transition to adulthood.

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Topics Addressed in This Interview

Enough about Me

Enough about Me

Jen Oshman

This book calls women to look away from new self-improvement strategies in order to find the abundant life and joy God offers them in Jesus.

Looking for Satisfaction

01:30

Matt Tully
In your book, you share a story about a time when you were in college, and you found yourself on your dorm room floor; you felt sad, but you didn't really know why. Explain what was happening there.

Jen Oshman
I grew up in a really typical American home. Christ was not the center of that home; the world was. I would say we were a very average American family—get good grades, work hard, play hard, be on all the teams, be in all the clubs—go for the American Dream is how I grew up. It was a great childhood. Those goals were good. But what I found when I went to college and I was removed from my family and removed from some of the brokenness that came along with that kind of lifestyle, the things that I was still pursuing—grades, sports, social activities, all the socials that you can think of, everything that the college campus provides to you—those things were not delivering the satisfaction that they used to. I was not living the carefree lifestyle that I had in high school. And so for the first time, as a freshman in college, I found myself absolutely paralyzed and heartbroken. These things are not giving me the high that they used to. Accomplishments are not meaning what they used to mean to me. And I can't put my finger exactly on what triggered it, except that I believe it was the Lord causing me to seek him and find him. He made those things ring hollow for me for the first time in my life—the grades are hollow, the accolades, the accomplishments, the goals that I was actually in college for, to be wealthy and to pursue the American Dream—those things began to ring hollow. I did find myself in January on the floor of my dorm room absolutely just burdened, very sorrowful for days on end, and just feeling like, I don't know what's going on with me, but this life is not what I thought it would be. And it was in that moment where the Lord really reached down from heaven and scooped me up and said, Jen, I made you and I can make you whole; but you need to give yourself to me. I will not make a girl who's chasing after herself whole, but you can be whole in me. And so what was a super painful time in my life was redeemed and used by God to draw me to him. And now I'm incredibly thankful for that season, as painful as it was.

Matt Tully
What did he use to pull you out of that? What were the practical things that happened that you, looking back, see as God's hand?

Jen Oshman
I tried all the things of the world first. I tried to study harder, I tried to work harder, I tried to run after those things even harder—run after the accomplishments of the world, and the respect of my classmates, and the accolades on campus—even harder. And that really did not work. And the midnight pizza really wasn't cutting it either. Visiting the counselor on campus wasn't cutting it either. But I had brought with me a paperback Bible from Young Life camp that I went to in high school. In high school I was very much a divided person: youth group, but also the parties. I would go to church, but also cared more about my own social reputation. So probably like a lot of American teenagers—a very divided life. Party lifestyle, but also go-to-Young Life lifestyle. So I had this paperback Bible from Young Life and I took it with me and never looked at it. But in that moment, I pulled it off the shelf, literally blew the dust off of it, and just started to read it and wondered, Maybe there's something in here for me. And I turned to the story of Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane and read how he was clearly so broken as he's anticipating the cross before him. He knows that the Father's going to forsake him and he's going to bear the sin of the world. Clearly, a much greater heartache than I was enduring. But to read in those pages of the tears of Christ, him turning to his Father and trusting him and saying, Not my will, but yours be done—confessing that his Father is good and able and that he's trusting the Lord with the ultimate heartbreak was a huge comfort to me. It opened my eyes to the nature of who God is in his kindness and his mercy that he would reach down and rescue me in the midst of my heartache as well. So he used his word.

Matt Tully
Do you feel like you read that passage of Jesus in the garden—suffering at the thought of what was to come—do you think you read that differently because of just how low God had brought you?

Jen Oshman
Absolutely. I had not been acquainted with that kind of heartache before, and so the Lord allowed the heartache to happen. The Lord allowed me to go low, to literally get on the floor, to be humbled. My hope had been in myself. My hope had been in my accomplishments and academic scholarship. My hope was in me. My goals were me. The Lord disabled me with that season of deep discouragement and sadness and awakened me to the reality that I can't heal myself. I can't pull myself up by my bootstraps. I need something—someone—beyond me to rescue me.

Women’s Depression and Anxiety

06:40

Matt Tully
My guess is that a lot of people listening to us right now—men and women alike—can probably resonate with some of the things that you're saying: with trying as hard as they can to achieve the things that they thought were their dreams, trying to be the person that they felt like they needed to be or wanted to be, and even if they did accomplish those things, being left with a sense of incompleteness, of maybe even failure. And yet, broadly speaking, it seems like women in our culture today are dealing with these feelings of depression and anxiety about insufficiency more acutely than men tend to deal with. Why do you think that's the case?

Jen Oshman
Well, you're absolutely right. So what you're sensing is statistically true. Research shows that women in the last two generations are 30% less happy, objectively, than we were before. Suicide is up among women—especially among girls ages 10 to 14—and suicide has tripled over the last couple of decades. So you're absolutely right—we are much less happy than we used to be. And I think we can look at a number of factors related to that, but what I have found to be true in my life in the lives of the women around me—the women in my churches and my Bible studies, the women that I'm exposed to, and the women that I see even online and in other ways—is that we grew up in this age that said, You can be anybody you want to be. We grew up in classrooms where literally there were self-esteem mantras and slogans sung over us and hung up on the classroom walls saying, Reach for the stars! Be whoever you want to be! You imagine your future, and then go get it! So we grew up with this incredible optimism like, Well, yeah! I can be whoever I want to be. We pursued that with all we had and we went after education, sports, athletics, clubs, politics, or career—the “you can have it all” mindset is what we grew up with and what we have pursued as adults. Now women in their 20s, 30s, 40s, and 50s are realizing, I actually can't have it all. It turns out, I'm finite. It turns out, I'm tired. It turns out, to pursue a career, and a family, and to be able to have it all when it comes to church, and sports, and being on the sidelines of your kids, and having your own company out of your own home, and just the endless list of goals and dreams and things that we think we can have, we actually can't have them all. And so we're disappointed, we're jaded, we're cynical, we're depressed, we're seeking medication, and we feel very alone because we imagine that everybody else can do it and that everybody else is succeeding, but we're not. We think we're the only one. So it's true: women are more depressed now than they've ever been.

The Role of Social Media

09:30

Matt Tully
Do you think the advent of social media and just the prevalence of all these different platforms that we can be involved with—and they're just immediately accessible in our pockets—is that contributing to this problem?

Jen Oshman
For sure, because we see these beautiful pictures online and we think that everybody has it all together; but they really don't, and neither do we. And we are all finite human beings in need of our Creator, Maker, and Sustainer.

Matt Tully
Are there any practices, or maybe rules for yourself, that you have developed related to social media to help you guard against comparing yourself to others or spending too much time enmeshed in that world?

Jen Oshman
Definitely. We say frequently that you've got to rehearse the gospel to yourself, and that is true when it comes to social media. We need to be constantly rehearsing the gospel—remembering who you are and whose you are. Remembering that you don't have to be self-made. The Lord did not plunk you here on this earth and say, Go get 'em! Pull yourself up by your bootstraps and make it happen, girl! He is a good, kind, and merciful God who draws near to the brokenhearted. And so for me, to remember who I am—I am a child of God, created in his image; but I am weak, and he is strong. I need almighty God to help me. He is the one who gives life and breath and everything else, not me. So I must remember who I am, how I am made, who created me, and his goodness, and then take that with me as I scroll Facebook and rejoice in what God is doing in the lives of other people, or mourn with them as maybe they are sharing a lament on social media. But I must not view social media as the goal or the prize. Looking in the mirror is not the goal or the prize—I am not the goal and the prize. Her lifestyle is not the goal and the prize. Jesus is the goal and the prize. He created me for him, and I thrive when I am in him. So, you become what you behold; or, you are what you love. So what am I beholding? What am I loving? Where have I set my affections? If I'm going to set them on another person's lifestyle that's portrayed on social media, I'm going to be very disappointed. It's going to be very hollow, very hurtful, and very unsatisfying at the end of the day.

Perspective from Life Abroad

11:57

Matt Tully
You and your husband, Mark, have had a pretty interesting story as a family. You got married young, and then you pretty quickly thereafter moved to Okinawa, Japan as missionaries. You had four daughters overseas, eventually ended up in the Czech Republic as missionaries again, and now you live in Colorado where you guys have planted a church and your husband's a pastor. As you look back on the time that you spent overseas, do you think that experience has given you any perspective on how we, as Western Christians, tend to view ourselves and think about meaning and purpose in our lives?

Jen Oshman
Definitely. Having lived in both Japan and the Czech Republic, those are two of the most atheist nations on the planet. Depending on what chart you read, they both rank in the top three, generally, all of the time—so two really spiritually dark places. In Japan we were ministering to Americans—American military stationed overseas—and in the Czech Republic it was to Czechs. But in neither location—especially when it comes to the indigenous population—in neither location is being a Christian at all culturally acceptable. It's not what anybody just does. There are no churches that everybody's just going to. Now, I'm from Colorado, but I hear in other parts of the United States everybody goes to church—that you wouldn't be seen mowing your lawn in Texas on a Sunday morning because everybody thinks that you should be in church. That would be sort of like a cultural taboo. That's not true in Colorado, but I'm told that a lot of the United States is like that. And that's definitely not the case in Japan or the Czech Republic. There's no benefit to being a believer, at least culturally, in those countries. So the Christians there have had to make a very counter-cultural, counter-intuitive decision. They have come to a moment where they have said, I will follow Christ no matter what it costs me. And it costs them a lot. It costs them their family relationships, it costs them career opportunities, it really makes an impact. They are making a daily sacrifice, whether it's relationally, professionally, or financially to walk with the Lord. But that's not the case in the United States—even in quite atheist Denver, Colorado—it doesn't cost you to follow Christ nearly what it would cost in those settings. It costs very little. So we can seek “the good life” in America, and sprinkle a little bit of Jesus on. We can live a life that looks exactly like our non-believing friends and family—go for the same goals, operate the same way, even have the same motives of the heart—and then say, And God bless it. Jesus, bless this, please, as I pursue myself and the things of this world. Lord, please bless it. Clearly, that's Christianity all messed up. That's completely wonky.

The Problem with the Empowerment Movement

14:53

Matt Tully
Right now it seems like a big theme in our culture—and I think this is true for a lot of Christians and a lot of Christian books that are published—is that really what we need is just to believe in ourselves more. We're not saying God isn't involved and God isn't important, but there is the need for us to have more confidence. For women in particular, the theme can be believing that you are strong, beautiful, powerful, and that you can be an agent of change in your own life. That seems like a very positive, very encouraging, very empowering message. What's so wrong with that?

Jen Oshman
So, it's sinister because there is a morsel of truth there. We do have a good God who made us in his image; so we are good, created beings and the Lord mercifully made us. But there's so much more to that truth. We stop there and go, Yeah! A good God made me a good person, and so I'm going to try to do good things and come up with good results on my own. And we truncate the gospel. In fact, we really turn it into a false gospel because we flip it upside down and we end up pursuing our self-sufficiency, rather than pursuing the all-sufficiency of our Creator, our Maker, and our Redeemer. So there absolutely is a massive movement, and I saw it from overseas and it was disturbing to me. I could see it from across the ocean and I saw it much more pronounced even as we moved back. It feels like the majority of materials that are made by and for women really speak to this. We've got throw pillows, coffee mugs, T-shirts, and conferences telling us, You are enough. You don't don't need more. It's all within you, just reach down, dig deep, figure out who you are, and then get your cup of coffee, and get your tribe, and make it happen. Women are going to these conferences, they're reading these books, and they're getting totally jazzed up and super excited and going for it . . . for like 48 hours. And then they realize—the majority realize—Actually, I can't keep making it happen. Then they fall off the wagon. They can't maintain that kind of capacity, or that kind of energy, to be self-made all the time. There are some who seem to be thriving, but the reality is when you are self-made—when you seek to be self-sufficient—and you don't turn to your Creator, then you're going to eventually run out of steam. We are not enough. We are sinful, finite human beings in need of the mercy and the kindness of our God who made us. So I feel like the message is totally toxic and it makes me angry. It drives me to write. It drives me to speak. It drives me to share with other women that this is a toxic message.

Matt Tully
Do you think there's anything about the message that's reactionary to an equally incorrect biblical message from a previous generation of women that says, You can't do that. You're not smart enough. You're not good enough. You are wholly dependent on men. Is there anything to that?

Jen Oshman
Yes, that's absolutely a conversation that the church needs to be having. Absolutely. I have been so fortunate because I've been married to my pastor for 20 years, so that's awesome because I have always been championed in my churches. I've always had the opportunity to be a leader in my church—not an elder, but a leader. I've had a space to teach, to lead mission teams, lead women's Bible studies, and to have a voice. And that's absolutely what should be happening in every church that claims Christ. Every church that claims Christ should be seeking to exalt, elevate, and equip women to serve in the way that God has made them. Whatever capacity or dream it is that they have—whether it's in writing, teaching, serving, artistry, I don't know what it is—God is so diverse and we reflect that. He's so creative. We are as diverse as he is creative. So churches absolutely must take time to stop and figure out how we can equip and elevate our women to walk as the women that God has made them. Not to elevate them above the Lord—so that's sort of where this gospel turns false: You don't need God. We prize you so much. Just go get up. No. We need to rightly order ourselves under the supremacy of Jesus, to serve him, to have eyes for him, to behold him, and to be seeking to honor him. This false gospel has been birthed out of a void in the church—and certainly not all churches—but the bigger church in the United States has made some mistakes in past generations and this is a reaction to it. But the reaction is just as bad as the cause.

The MeToo Movement

19:47

Matt Tully
I want to speak about related issues to that. Many people have termed our moment the “Me Too” era, and we're all familiar with all the deluge of stories of disrespect, mistreatment, and even abuse that women have suffered at the hands of men. And that's even happened in the church. There is this "Church Too" movement now that's calling attention to similar issues within the church, perpetrated by pastors, by church leaders, and just by men who claim Christ and have acted terribly. So, were you surprised as these things came out over the last couple of years? Particularly related to the church,was any of that a surprise to you?

Jen Oshman
I said earlier that I wasn't raised in a Christian home. My mom, in God's mercy, started taking me to church when I was about nine, and that a huge gift of grace that I was beginning to be exposed to the gospel at the age of nine. But before that, and then up until about college, I was not really in a Christ-centered context. So I can't speak from an insider's perspective of what it was like to grow up in the church or grow up as a pastor's kid; but as a woman who's been in women's ministry now for about 20 years, I meet with, counsel, and grieve with women all the time who have been abused, and a number of them are from the church. So, no. When these headlines came out, I already had a long list of faces to put with the stories. The abuse, the neglect, and the hurt that women, children, and boys—not just little girls—have endured at the hands of pastors, youth pastors, and ministry volunteers is absolutely evil. It's horrific. And so I am now walking with women who endured it a couple of decades ago, and they are still just absolutely wrecked by the abuse that they endured. So it is lamentable—absolutely lamentable—and we need Jesus to bring healing at every level.

Biblical Gender Roles in the Church

21:53

Matt Tully
What do you think the evangelical church—conservative Christians who claim the Bible as their authority, who believe in biblical gender roles in the church and in the home—what do we need to learn from the “Me Too’ era?

Jen Oshman
As you said earlier, this female empowerment movement may be a reaction to women being neglected and women being ignored in the church, and so I think that women need to be at the table. I'm not suggesting that women become head pastors or elders, but every other role in the church is open to women. That's a lot of roles. That's a lot of opportunities. There are a lot of spaces where women can be serving. God has created each one of us with unique skills, capacities, joys, and abilities. To honor him and to honor the image of God in each other is to give those women equipping. I think pastors and elders need to invite women into these conversations. Personally, I have always been a part of that conversation, and so I personally haven't experienced that pain. But there are a number of women in my church who have left that kind of destructive situation where they were not allowed to have a voice—literally and figuratively. They were prevented from exercising their gifts and they walk with an incredible limp now, whereas they could be thriving and sprinting and striving as they behold Jesus and encourage others to do the same. Rather, they are confused about the character of God. And that's a terrible sin against the Lord and against the body. I pray that the church would pause and take a long look at ourselves and be quick to be humble, be quick to repent, be quick to own whatever it is that we need to own in that, be quick to be sorrowful and to say “sorry” and to seek correction in those areas. Grace is such a gift, and grace is freely available to all who seek it. Why would we walk in pride and reject it? Why would we say, No, we've got this figured out. We've done it right all along. May we not say that ever! Whatever issue it is, may we walk with humility and seek the face of Christ.

Is It Okay for Women to Self-Protect?

24:16

Matt Tully
What would you say to a woman who is listening to us who has suffered some of this stuff and hears what you're saying about all of this, but just feels like, If I don't look out for myself, if I don't guard my dreams, my aspirations, and put myself as number one, no one else is going to. I'm going to be taken advantage of. What would you say to her?

Jen Oshman
I think that is the fear of a lot of women. I think the truth is that they have found themselves in a toxic context, and that is a huge grief to me. I lament with that woman if she feels like she doesn't have anybody around her championing her and helping her to identify how the Lord has made her so that she might walk in that. That is a grief to me. And so whether it would be if it's in the context of her marriage or the context of her church—I don't know, of course, everybody's situation is so unique—but my my dream for her would be that she would know the character of God, that she would be able to seek his word and see what is true about who he is, that she would come to him freely, and that she would experience, by the power of the Holy Spirit, a rejuvenation, a refreshing realization that he has made her for himself that he has created her to be a part of the greatest story ever—his story—that her life is beyond even her. To just focus on her own goals, her own aspirations, her own future is not enough. That's not what we were even made for. We were made for more than that. We were made to be a part of the greatest story—the story of redemption, creation, and restoration. So my hope for her would be that she would be able to find a community, a friend, or a group of sisters somehow, somewhere—women who love the word of God, who are empowered by the Spirit of God, who can be for her as the people of God seeking the truth about who he is, and walking in health and wholeness. That is his plan. That is his design and that is his desire—not by any means to repress women or to keep them silent; but that they would thrive in exactly the ways he made them. And those churches do exist. That context does exist. It's out there. And so my prayer is that women would find that and grab hold and run.

Matt Tully
You have four daughters, as we mentioned already.

Jen Oshman
Yes.

Matt Tully
What are their ages?

Jen Oshman
They are 11, 13, 15, and 21. Our 21-year old is our newest child. We adopted her when she was 12.

A Message for Our Daughters

26:51

Matt Tully
When you think about the world in which they live as they're growing into adulthood, what message—if you had to boil it down to a few sentences—what message do you want them to leave home with?

Jen Oshman
That is something I wrestle with every day. I lay awake at night wondering, Have we equipped our daughters with what God would have us equip them with? Have we done enough? What else can I do tomorrow? How can I make sure they know who he is and who they are? And actually, I guess I'm just answering my question right there: I want them to know who they are and whose they are. Who they are and that they are daughters of the king. He made them. The Creator of the universe made you exactly the way you are: the way you look, your skills, your abilities, your talents, the things that you like and the things that you don't like—God made you like that. But he made you on purpose for a purpose, and that purpose is him. That he would be the goal and the prize of your life. Outside of him, you will suffer. He is the fuel that we are meant to run on, and he is the goal that we are meant to run towards. And if they can do that, if they will be able to remember day in and day out—and myself as well; I'm preaching this to myself right now—if they can remember day in and day out that they are created and loved, but they are also called to reflect him to a watching world, they will thrive. They will be healthy, they will be whole, there will be nothing but rejoicing. They can do that as medical missionaries on the other side of the world if they want, or they can do that as stay at home moms, or they can do that in the corporate world, or as artists, or as dishwashers at the local restaurant. I don't care what it is they do. I just want them to know who they are and whose they are. And that's something that we have to daily renew our minds on through the word of God, the people of God, and by the power of the Spirit of God. That's something that I have to remind myself of as well. So I do pray that they would know who they are and whose they are. As long as God keeps reminding them of those truths and that they abide in him and walk with him, they will have days of joy ahead.

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