Stop Playing Your Role

 Welcome to my show. This is Dr. Ray Self, I appreciate you listening. please be sure and go to the website for the show, icmcollege.org/selftalk. icmcollege.org/selftalk, and there you can subscribe and you can also give us a review. What that does is the reviews helps us go up in our Google rankings, what they call SEO, more people listen to the show, and hopefully more truth and more people come to the knowledge of Jesus Christ. I thank you for the show today - for listening to us - and today's a very important topic, I'm talking about destructive roles we play that began in our childhood. So again, thank you for being part of this ministry, I appreciate you very much, this is Dr. Ray Self.

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Welcome to my show, this is Dr. Ray. Heavenly Father, I thank you for everyone that's listening today. I pray, Father, that my words uh, will be coming through your wisdom, Father. I ask you, Holy Spirit, to touch everyone listening to this broadcast. Let your anointing fall on them, protect them from every scheme of the enemy, and bless their footsteps. We pray this and believe this in the name of Jesus, amen. 

So I want to talk today about roles that people play that begin in childhood. Now, most of us, we, we all had families and some of the families were healthy, some families not so healthy. Most every family has some form of dysfunction I, I tell my students at the International College of Ministry, I said, find me a normal, healthy family somewhere in the Bible, and you really can't do it. I mean, every family in the Bible had some form of dysfunction. My family was so dysfunctional we used to– our expression was we put the fun in dysfunction. Anyway, growing up, children have a tendency to play roles and you– if– when I want to describe the four roles, sometimes five roles, that children play, you may pick up yourself and your siblings. I may be able to describe this. So in order to cope with life, children develop certain coping mechanisms not even knowing why they do it. 

Now, the four mechanisms or roles that children play - and the reason I want to talk about this is because these roles will carry over into adulthood, I still, I see this all the time. So, there are four roles: one is the clown, Now, if you remember going back to elementary school, high school, there was always a Class Clown. As a matter of fact, I believe a lot of comedians today have this, uh, role-playing defense mechanism. The clown child makes a joke of everything. Everything is funny. It's uh, laugh, laugh, laugh, kid, kid, kid, um, uh, everything is a joke, and sometimes they're in trouble. But this, this laughter, this comedy, this um, humor is a way of coping. And unfortunately, families many times encourage this role play and, and when the child was doing this through this constant joking and laughing cutting up, he's actually coping with something that is bothering him. It's called the clown, and I can remember so many class clowns growing up. I think…now, I think Robin Williams had this uh, role-playing mechanism, or defense mechanism, and probably developed as a child. He carries this role of being the clown all the way through adulthood, he was an amazing comedian, but eventually what happens is these defense mechanisms quit working and when they quit working, we get into trouble and do not know how to cope. And as you know, sadly, Robin Williams committed suicide. 

So the first role that kids play is the clown. The second role - and I'm not putting this in any particular order - is called the Scapegoat, the black sheep of the family. The scapegoat is, “Everybody just blame me. Yeah, I did it, I'm the one, yeah, I'm guilty I did it,” uh, “I'm the bad guy, I'm the bad kid,” um, “Yeah, it's my fault, I did it, just put it all on me. I don't care, I'm bad,” and it's called the scapegoat and everything tends to be blamed on the scapegoat. The scapegoat accepts this responsibility as being, quote, the black sheep. Meanwhile, the scapegoat is, is being blamed for stuff but actually the scapegoat is playing a role that's helping them cope in, in a very dysfunctional way. Um, my older sister played the role of the scapegoat, okay.

Now, the third role that children play is the uh, hero child. Now the hero child is the one that just tend– strives for perfection, makes straight A's, is the teacher's pet, is the parents' pet, doesn't get in trouble, does everything with the spirit of excellence, and has to be…achieve and be perfect and high performance in everything that they do. It's a very stressful role that they play and it, it's called the Hero Child, they become the hero of the family. So you have the clown of the family, you have the scapegoat of the family, and you have the hero child who can do no wrong. Again, it's a way of coping, all right? And it's stressful, it's hard to maintain that, and they'll, they'll take this all the way into adulthood.

The fourth role that people play, or children play, is the Lost Child. Now, this was the child, this was the role that I played. The lost child is the kid who just says, you know, “I'll just be invisible,” uh, “I don't matter, I will just melt into the wall” and uh, “I'll try to be seen and not heard all my life. I will be invisible,” you know, “I don't matter.” This is a very destructive role. I played this role, I tried to be invisible, not make any waves, just to be seen and not heard, not cause any trouble, just sort of be there. And the problem with that was it created a very low self-esteem in me, um, and eventually when I got into my senior year of high school, it led into drugs, uh, to cope from this.

So, these four roles are typical roles that children play in dysfunctional situations. You have the clown, you have the scapegoat, you have the hero child, and the lost child. Now, there's a fifth role, sometimes I see, it's called surrogate spouse. Now, surrogate spouse happens when a young child is forced to play the role of mommy or daddy. Sometimes you'll see that when Mom's not available or Daddy's not available and a young child steps into the role of surrogate spouse. They become the mama, they become the daddy. And again, that's very unhealthy, very unhealthy. 

Now why do I mention these roles? Because what happens is without an awareness of this, I see 40, 50, 60-year-old adults still playing these roles that came from coping in their childhood - these destructive roles. And if you think about this, you probably know the clown, the hero, the black sheep, the, the, the scapegoat, and the lost child. All these roles are unhealthy and are destructive and can lead to consequences because eventually, you know, you can cope for so long with most of these roles but eventually, all this coping stops. Now, what I have heard and been taught is that most coping mechanisms that we develop as young people, as children and teenagers, begin to completely fall apart when we get into our 30s. Now, this is not etched in stone, but I've seen this many times, usually about age 35, mid-30s, all these coping mechanisms just stop working and all of a sudden, you have a crisis and you don't know what to do. Depression could set in, marital crisis could set in, midlife crisis could set in, all kinds of problems occur because you– your coping mechanism is not working anymore and all of a sudden you have to cope with reality and come up with a whole new way of living. 

Now, as Christians, we have a great support mechanism. We have a healer, we have the anointing, we have the Holy Spirit, we have Jesus, we have the word of God we have an edge because as Christians, the Lord can restore us, He can convict us, He can heal us, He can make us into a new creation, He can make us uh, healthy mentally, spiritually, physically. He can do all this. Um, it does take– now, God's good but God gives us wisdom to use. It does take wisdom to admit and look honestly at yourself. Are you still playing a role from– that emanated or began as a child? I still see these roles being played by many adults, I still see the clown, the hero, the scapegoat, okay, the invisible one, and we just we have to stop it. At some point, we have to recognize what is going on. You shall know the truth, the truth shall set you free. Well, to recognize an issue is not a negative thing. I know we got to have– power of positive thinking and make sure our confession is in line with the word of God and I believe in, in positive confession and confessing the word of God, but I also know that God expects us to confess our faults one to another and pray that we may be healed. So, it's important that we look at damage that's been done, look at issues in our life so we can bring those to the Lord.

Now, what happens with God is there's, there's an expression that says the Lord will reveal it to heal it. So many times in our life, God will allow things to surface from our past that are painful but it's time to face it right on, look at it, see what you can do differently maybe get counseling, pray, bring in the anointing of the Holy Spirit and let the Lord Heal you. But to live in denial that you have issues is just not wise. As a matter of fact, denial is maybe the most serious issue of all and I know as a man, men are pretty good at denial, not wanting to admit flaws, mistakes, and weaknesses, but we must admit them, confess them, look at them square in the face so we can deal with them, bring the healing of the Lord into our life and make the changes that we need to make for our health, for our family, for our job, for our community. Stop playing these roles. If one of these roles I've talked about is, is you, stop playing it. You know, just say, “Lord, I see this in me, I don't want to do this anymore. I know, Father, I know, Father, that you are my healer, this is not the way you made me. You, you created me to be a child of God, a joint air with Jesus Christ. And so, Father, I have played these roles that were even expected of me and I'm not going to do that anymore.” 

So my question for you today is have you played the hero child to try to cope to get the approval of the family? Have you played the role of the scapegoat, maybe? Do you know somebody who's still playing the role of the scapegoat? Have you played the role of the clown, making a joke of everything…uh, just, just to get by? Have you played the role of the lost child? Just trying to be invisible, not make waves, and not matter. None of this is God's will. And…but I've seen this play out time and time and time again. It's…the roles that children play in order to cope. Now, unfortunately, once a child starts developing a role, many families will encourage that role to continue. And so, look back, look back at your past. There, there's nothing wrong with looking back at your past. Look back at your past. Were you expected to play a role that maybe, perhaps was not the role that God gave you? Were you expected to play that role? Was this the role that you played? Confess it, “Lord, I did this, Lord, I did this, I recognize this. God, I did this. Lord, forgive me, Lord, Heal me. Holy Spirit, change me, let me become the person you created me to be. I lay down all false– foc– focus, uh, coping mechanisms, I lay down every false coping mechanism. Lord, I cope with you. Lord, you are my healer, you're my anointing, you're my strength, you're my savior, you're everything to me. So I refuse to play destructive roles, unhealthy roles anymore. Thank you, Father, in Jesus' name.” 

Now I hope this has been a blessing to you…um, you know, not to be negative but just to look at the– look at the past so you can have a better future. You know, I wrote the book, Redeeming Your Past and Finding Your Promised Land. And I believe, honestly…it's, it's foolish not to look at your past because there's things from your past that are impacting your present, and the things from your past that are impacting your present day can be hindering your future. So yeah, we look at our past not to live life in a rearview mirror but we look at our past to bring healing into our present and to make our future easier and brighter and more according to the will of God, amen? Amen. 

So let's pray. Heavenly Father, I thank you, Lord,  for everyone listening to this show. I pray, Father, this this show would be a blessing to them, and Father, I thank you, Father, and if anybody recognizes these roles, Father, I thank you that you are a healer you reveal it to heal us and that you can convict us to change and we can do it all through you, Father. In Jesus’ name, amen. One final word, there's no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus. If one of these roles - you say, “You know what, Dr. Self? I actually played that role of the scapegoat,” or, “the clown,” or, “the hero,” or, “the lost child,” or, “the surrogate spouse,” there's no condemnation. I am not trying to make you feel guilty, there's no guilt, okay? There can be a conviction. See, guilt and shame was taken to the cross, we're not guilty, we're not full of shame, but we can be convicted to make a change with the help of God, Amen. I appreciate you listening to my show today, I hope this has been a blessing to you. Be sure and you know, do all the good stuff that makes us continue the show, amen. God bless you, thank you so much.

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Well folks, that wraps up episode 185, the destructive roles that people play, and we are to stop playing these roles. No more am I to be the clown or the lost child or the hero child or the scapegoat or the surrogate spouse. We are to be who God created us to be and that's the truth and the Lord can set you free, the Holy Spirit can set us free from anything that's hindering us, in Jesus’ name. If the show has been a blessing to you, maybe uh, help us out financially. This– the show is costly, uh, you can go to uh, our donate, to our scholarship fund, that would help tremendously. That's icmcollege.org/donate. The website for the show where you can see every episode, subscribe, and give a review - reviews help the show get uh, get downloads and views -  and the website is icmcollege.org/selftalk. So uh, please give us a review and you know, share this show with people, help us to increase the downloads to get this message out to help people, that's all we want to do. I thank you for listening uh, to Self Talk with Dr. Ray Self and I just pray God's blessing, God's anointing on you, and God's favor on you and all that you do today and the day following. God bless you.