This revised edition of “The Sensation of Being Somebody” updates the original work which was first printed by Zondervan in 1975. Instead of using the King James Version and the Revised Standard Version in quoting Scripture references, this edition quotes the New International Version. The text is essentially the same as in the first writing.
The Sensation of Being Somebody has enjoyed over fifty years in the market place. It has been printed as a hardback, a paperback, and a mass market edition. It is available in German, Spanish, and Hungarian.
The book has been a blessing to many, and has been used freely as a teaching aid in Bible study classes and home study groups. It gives the overview of Dr. Wagner’s unique and practical way of making the Bible truths relate to individual problems.
During his 45 years of ministry, Dr. Wagner spent thousands of hours counseling. This vast experience gave him a deeper understanding as he observed the Holy Spirit’s healing power. Dr. Wagner’s objective as a counselor was to get the person connected to God by unraveling the emotional “knots” of their past. Once that was accomplished, the person graduated. Dr. Wagner always had this goal in mind in personal counseling or in his writing. This book, and the other writings of Dr. Wagner, seek to make the connection to God stronger so that each person can truly know the abundant life that Jesus offers to all.
During the years prior to his death in 2005, Dr. Wagner discussed these truths, at length, with his son Maurice T. Wagner. His son has taken the text of this book and clarified and expanded several key areas of this book based on those conversations. The section on spiritual conversion in Chapter 12 and the section on thanksgiving in Chapter 18 are the ones that have been most altered.
The Sensation of Being Somebody is now in its 50th year and was very early in focusing on identity as a necessary element in personal development. The subtitle, though, has caused critics to misunderstand the goal of the author’s instruction. Here I want to give the reason that it will be changed into “Developing Productive Relationships.”
The terms “self” and “self-esteem” have taken the psychological community into self justification or at least into relative community standards of behavior to validate the individual. The author is, first of all, a Biblically trained Bible teacher, but because the author also has a degree in psychology, some Christian groups have included Him in their denouncement of anything psychological. They claim that psychology is godless and it emphasizes a humanistic, presumptive “self-esteem.” This is an ironic twist as the author coined the term “selfism” as the attitude to be overcome.
Self-concept is the term that describes the container of identity. It has no implied esteem or relative value. The value of the self comes from its contents. Those have their value in relation to the values laid down in the Word of God. For persons to assign any other value to the self is deceptive and destructive as they have no reasonable authority to do so in themselves and to look to others for worth is very unstable.
The purpose of an Adequate Self-concept is to give a person the ability to relate to others in a healthy productive and confident manner without becoming dependent. This is based on a Biblical method of ridding a person of anger in all forms by having God dwell in the self-concept container. This book describes those things that get in the way of this dynamic accepting relationship. Being at peace with ones self and God is the only way to bring blessing to a family and its generations.
There are several unique concepts that Dr. Wagner devised:
• The three part structure of identity and how they mirror the Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. These structures are seen in the interplay of emotions.
• That anger is the human problem as it is deceptive and destructive. Man is not made to be angry. There are generational ideas that become barriers to applying truth into self concept. These act as static distorting the truth and must be revealed and removed.
• The Anger can be eliminated, not just repressed or suppressed. This is accomplished in an exulted realistic view of God to the extent that one can be thankful for things that he does not like. Thanksgiving and anger are opposites and cannot reside together in the mind.
• Overcoming selfism is key to empathy, which is the fuel of productive relationships as it is a necessary component of love.
• An emphasis on the developing years and how to end generational curses by growing in Grace. How these can reside out of awareness yet have an impact on feelings of self worth.
• That mental illness can find cure through becoming a new creation in Christ. He found that mental patients became rational after receiving Jesus as Lord and Master.
Dr. Wagner worked on several books right up to his departure. He was alert right to the end. The alterations mentioned above are verifiable in those works, as Dr. Wagner continued to grow intellectually and spiritually. The many lives he helped are a testament to the power of God unleashed through his ministry which spanned over 60 years.