Dying to Change: An Exposure of the Self-Protecting Strategies Which Prevent Us Becoming Like Jesus

This book is one of many that I have read by the author, Mary Pytches. Her discussion of the defense mechanisms that people use to compensate for their emotional neediness is thorough and soundly biblical. She brings the unique Christian perspective to the strategies that we use to cope with low self-esteem and insecurity. With compassion, she explains both how we have come to have these feelings and how we come to cope with them. However, she does not leave us there, but provides us with the Christian antidote: dying to self. This is not presented as grim self-denial but rather as partnering with the Lord Jesus Christ and recognizing that His will for us is to be healed and whole, not self-protective and self-absorbed. The process is most fully explained through the story of Val, a Christian woman who recounts the stages she went through to recognize and overcome the survival strategies in her life. Her testimony includes a vivid example of what is now being called Theophostic ministry: that is, experiencing the healing power of the Lord Jesus Christ as we allow Him to deal with our memories and faulty beliefs. I recommend this book to anyone who is involved in a Christian ministry of inner healing.