A Different Response

You know my reproach and my shame and my dishonor; all my adversaries are before You. Psalm 69:19 (New American Standard Bible)

Many carry feelings of shame over past sins if they have not fully embraced God’s love, acceptance and forgiveness for them. Along with the shame is the fear that if people knew what was in their past and present, respect would be lost and abandonment would be forthcoming. The mere thought of exposure fills them with indescribable terror.

I have a few mental images of people who felt the shame of being found out. Adam and Eve grasping for leaves and self imposed hiding. The woman caught in adultery and thrown at the feet of Jesus. Jim Baker being arrested and taken away in handcuffs. Countless people whose past caught up with them and the very thing they tried to keep hidden from those whom they loved the most being exposed. Webster’s dictionary says shame is “a painful feeling of having lost the respect of others because of improper conduct or incompetence.” Each of us carries the deep need to be loved, accepted, affirmed, and included. Shame tells us that not only do we not deserve those things but what little we have found will be taken from us.

The worst kind of shame is public humiliation. A one on one scenario does not begin to compare with standing before a jeering crowd who wear scorn and disapproval on their faces and tones of disgust in their voices. It is shame that makes us want to hide, play pretend, and go to any lengths to keep our secrets a secret. How many people do you know who would remain supportive of you and loving toward you if they knew the contents of your “closet?” I have often said that the true test of love is not what people think of us when they know the best about us but rather when they know the worst.

The One who knows me best and has the most reason to reject me is the One who loves me most and fully accepts me….God! His response to me is tenderness, gentleness, and open arms when I dare to admit what He already knows about me. He is the One who wipes the dirt from my face, dries the tears in my eyes, brushes the hair off my brow, wraps His arms around me and walks me out of the room in which I was hiding. It has taken me a long time to realize the truth about God and His radical love.

Father, You not only know the feelings and conditions of my shame but the causes as well. With You there is gracious acceptance. Thank You!

Before the Throne of God Above
http://youtube.com/watch?v=f0S5Z0H4SpI

Exchanging the Garments

I rejoice greatly in the LORD, my soul will exult in my God; for He has clothed me with garments of salvation, He has wrapped me with a robe of righteousness. Isaiah 61:10

I look at this verse and it is a wonderful reminder to me of what takes place the moment we accept Christ as our Savior and are born into God’s family. Instantaneously, we receive all the luxuries of being God’s child. The day I trusted Christ, He changed my identity, my destiny, and my relationship to Himself. That was completed and unalterable. Yet I have learned He still has much to do in my internal world.

He has spent the past three decades helping me to see the areas in my life that need His healing touch. The longer I know Him the deeper He goes, the more profound His measures, and the more radical the freedom. What many times may start out as steps of fear and timidity eventually become the places in which I learn to dance! While I may cringe at the process I come to cherish the transformation.

This is exactly what took place for me this past weekend while visiting some friends in Wisconsin. God had been bringing me to a place of opening up an area embedded in my memory from early childhood. It wasn’t a repressed memory by any means. It was something I was totally aware of for the last 44 years. The incident left me frozen and unable to voice its existence. God had let me know that when this event had taken place a robe of innocence was taken from me and it was replaced by a garment of shame. In order to exchange the garments I had to expose the secret. Over the course of a three day visit I found myself in a safe haven. Safe enough to finally open up and verbalize to my friend what had taken place. She listened without condemnation and then voiced the words I needed to hear, “That shouldn’t have happened to you. It wasn’t right!” We had a precious time of prayer and then took a piece of paper with the perpetrator’s name on it over to a paper shredder to finalize the closure. Finally, that little child in me was able to exchange the garment of shame for God’s intended garment of innocence. Thus ended a 44 year internal world of turmoil. I now embrace a freedom of great proportion!

Father, You saw the first exchange when I was just four years old. You then wept for me as I wore the wrong garments for all these years. It is with joy I now don the robe You have given back to me. Amen.

*****I share this with you in order to help someone who might also be haunted by memories of shame in their own life. For some people they can simply take it to God and come away whole. For me, I needed to get the secret out. If that is you, ask God to lead you to a person equipped to listen and handle what is to be exposed. Preferably someone who has had some training. This person’s role is to allow you to speak what has been painful. Then they can tell you what you need to hear….it was wrong for someone to do that to you. Please don’t continue to wear garments that were never intended for you.

Dealing With Shame

But you will forget the shame of your youth. Isaiah 54:4

I have a list of past sins, guilt, and shame that rears its ugly heard from time to time. The enemy of my soul loves nothing more than to remind me of past failures, deliberate sinful choices, and shameful acts. Sometimes the people in our lives do the same with looks and comments that let us know they haven’t forgotten what we did.

Freedom from shame and the ability to forget can only be accomplished when we see that it is not God who is condemning us. When we realize the truth of Isaiah 53 we begin to see it has ALL been paid for. Then Isaiah 54 replaces the image of a harsh, condemning God with a God of compassion and loving kindness. It is only as I see these truths side by side can I begin to discard the shame and walk in beauty.

It is occurring to me that from childhood I have struggled in the area of dealing with sin in the right way. Fear of disapproval, punishment, and anger was all it took for me to hide the truth about myself and my actions. At a young age I learned to dress myself in shame and the garments stayed on me well into adulthood.

What is the message shame gives me? It tells me because of my actions I am worthless, no good, ruined, disgusting, unlovable, and devalued. I then take that message and determine I will do everything I can to make sure no one finds out. It becomes a life of hiding and secrets.

It wasn’t until recently that I learned there is freedom when I come before God in honesty. As I admit what He already knows and longs to forgive, the prison door of shame swings open and I am free. While God does judge sin, He loves me with compassion, mercy, and grace. It is His heart’s desire to forgive, redeem, restore, and reconcile me with Himself. He is not wanting me to live my life in shame. Rather than walk with downcast eyes, slumping shoulders, and internal condemnation, He desires me to accept His forgiveness and live unashamed.

Confession is necessary but it is not the whole story. It is simply the first step in replacing shame with a song of freedom and deliverance.

Father, so often I forget Your heart. Sorrow over sin should drive me to You. Shame will cause me to hide. May I stop hiding. Amen.

Instantly Changed

And he laid his hands on her: and immediately she was made straight, and glorified God. Luke 13:13

I am coming back to this verse this morning because as I have reread this passage of Scripture a few words have jumped out at me…..immediately and made straight. While growth in Christ is a gradual thing, there are times when God chooses to produce immediate change in our life. It is instantaneous and noticeable!

I am reminded of a time when I cried out to God in prayer over an issue in my life and He immediately answered in a powerful way. I have shared before that I was not brought up in a Christian home. From a young age I saw and experienced things no child should be subject to. When I received Christ as my Savior at the age of 14, I instantly became a child of God. That decision redirected the path I was on, redefined my life, and completely changed where I would spend eternity. I took on new interests, became a part of a loving church family, and had a desire to read the Bible. I began a relationship with God Whom I never really knew before. Those things were automatic. They were changes God brought about.

But over the years something did not change. Those things I had seen and experienced from early childhood left me with a sense of shame from which I could not seem to escape. Like a nagging toothache it was always there. I told no one. I simply carried the feelings and disgust with me. I did not know my heavenly Father longed to free me from the load. Several years ago, in my early 40’s I read an article by Lisa Bevere that God used to end my torment. It led me to a time of prayer in which I simply asked God to make me feel clean and pure in all the places I harbored shame and disgrace. I was in the shower at the time, and as the water poured over me I sensed an instant cleansing taking place. I sensed a removal of all that had clung to me for so many years. God made straight the tangled mess inside of me. I will tell you this, even though that was a number of years ago the shame has not returned. The freedom was given by God and has never been removed. I, too, glorify God!

Father, some things we will not be relieved of until we stand before you in Heaven. But I thank you that the release of shame is not one of the things that must wait. I revel in the purity with which You clothed me. It was mine for the asking! Amen.