It is difficult to estimate or know the damage that “the self” has done to each human soul. While Jesus taught and teaches that a person must deny self in order to follow Him, it appears that the most popular message is that Jesus is there to help people fulfill themselves. What we end up with, then, is that brand of pseudo-Christianity is actually harming people and is but another religious way to serve self rather than Christ. It is a particularly virulent sort of harm in that it tries to teach that God wants for man what sinful man wants rather than man needing to be regenerated and become like God. This leads to all sorts of books and media products that are nothing more than the building up of self.
In Philippians 2 Paul told the church there that he had no one to send them. “For I have no one else of kindred spirit who will genuinely be concerned for your welfare. 21 For they all seek after their own interests, not those of Christ Jesus” (vv. 20-21). This is to say in order for a man to be a true shepherd of the flock of God that man must not be a seeker of the interests of self (literal translation), but instead be a seeker after the interests of Christ. It is only possible to be concerned for the spiritual welfare of souls if a person loves Christ and seeks the interests of Christ. The seekers of the interests of self may appear to have a spiritual interests in others and may even be self-deceived in some manner, but those who seek self in the depths of their hearts do all that they do out of self-interests. Their preaching may be orthodox, but it is for self rather than Christ and therefore will not truly be for His people either. They may have the services lined up perfectly and in order, but it is for self rather than Christ and His people.
When a people are taught that God loves all people and seeks their good by giving them what they (as fallen or natural men) want, this is simple and bold heresy. People must be taught that they must repent and seek God for Himself rather than the world. People are taught that God will give them what they want if only they will do certain things, but this is again to make God out to be a genie of some sort. The living God is to be bowed to and served according to His pleasure. The living God is to be bowed before and submitted to as a sovereign and glorious Being who gives to people as He is pleased to give them. The living God is to be wholly submitted to as clay in the hands of a potter with self given over to Him to be done with as He pleases.
It is the self in its likeness to the devil that fights God and wants to be served and wants self to be fulfilled. It is self that gets angry when it is denied what it wants. It is self that will blast away at people in anger and instead of loving the neighbor it will seek to do harm. It is self that hates others because they do not honor self as self wants. It is self that will trample on others in order to get what it wants and to climb a ladder to gain a position or honor. But all of this is still true of the religious self as well. Oh how that wicked heart will strive in the things of religion to gain honor and esteem for self. How that wicked heart will appear to deny self in many things, but that apparent self-denial is really for the sake of self and as such self is not truly denied.
When the self is not denied, it will grow worse and worse as God turns that heart over to sin and hardness of heart. As the sin of self increases, so does the blindness of self to self. The self is what part of man opposes God at each and every point. It is the proud self what rebels against God and His perfectly wise and holy will. It is the proud self that wants all things as it wants and is angry at God when He does not give self what it wants. It is this proud and self-centered self that wants to love self rather than God and the neighbor, which shows that even the best of what self can do is nothing but sin. The soul that is given over to self is in the hands of a fool and a vicious person who would kill God if s/he could get hands on Him.
The self, though it may feel good when it is being filled with its own selfish desires, is doing an unimaginable harm to the soul. Each sin that self does (which is everything that a person does) is as a child of the devil and that soul is doing nothing but treasuring up wrath for the day of wrath (Rom 2:4-5). With each thought, desire, and act the self is choosing itself and love for itself rather than for God and neighbor. Even when self does something that benefits others, it is still for the purposes of self. It is a horrible act of idolatry to want others to honor me rather than Christ, yet that is the nature of the sinful self. It lives a life of doing all things for self and the honor of self. In doing so, it is in direct opposition to all the commandments of God and God Himself.
God Loves... Himself 
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