Shamelessness

We throw around the word “shame” like cheap plastic beads from a mardi gras float.

  • That quarterback should be ashamed of himself.
  • Is this the best you can do? You are a disgrace.
  • I can’t believe you did that … you should be ashamed.
  • I can’t believe I did that … I am ashamed of myself.

Professor and speaker Brené Brown differentiates guilt and shame like this:
Guilt: I DID something bad.
Shame: I AM something bad.

Brené’s TED talks on shame and vulnerability have been incredibly popular, revealing how we all, to different degrees and due to different circumstances, perform a shame-dance to a violently oppressive shame-song whose lyrics tell us that we are worthless, unlovable and isolated. Shame lobs our past at us like grenades, robbing us of our dignity, hope and future. But for all who are in Christ, Shame is a liar.

When I hear the accusing voice,
That whispers hopelessness in my ear;

When I am overwhelmed by my own sin
and tell myself that I’m a failure

When I am told by others that
that I am an utter disappointment


When my darkness is revealed to the world
and I am sure that my life is over…

I have to decide: Where I will take my shame? What will I do?

Will I go the Secular route, which tells me that I am fine just the way that I am? That there is nothing wrong with me. That my “brokenness is beautiful” and I don’t need to worry about the fact that I have causes pain to others, betrayed my Creator and broken the Image in which I have been made. This is mere ignorant, hurtful blindness that tries to convince me that I don’t need a Savior; it castrates the Gospel.

Or will I go the Religious route, which tells me that I am a disappointment to God (in fact, I probably made baby Jesus cry) and that I need to try harder, be better and never do it again. If I don’t watch out, I will either be kicked out of God’s love or, more likely, realize that I’ve never been saved in the first place.

  • Secular wisdom tells us that we don’t need Jesus
  • Religious wisdom tells us that we are too far from Jesus
  • The Gospel tells us both, and neither: that we are infinitely far, yet have been brought all the way home because Jesus, the Son of God himself, carried our personal shame into his shame-filled trial and onto the shame-filled cross so that he could be shamelessly raised from the dead.

Isaiah 50:6-7a
I gave my back to those who strike,
and my cheeks to those who pull out the beard;
I hid not my face
from disgrace and spitting.
7 But the Lord GOD helps me;
therefore I have NOT been disgraced..

Jesus didn’t only need to die for us but also needed to go through a horrifyingly shameful and disgraceful trial where he was spit on and mocked because he had to take the full brunt of shame that our sin deserved. Sin, at it’s root, is a betrayal of our Identity, of God’s Image engraved into our souls. In a state of Christlessness, shame is a very appropriate response because, like Adam and Eve, we are betrayers of the Almighty and find ourselves “naked and ashamed.”

And so Jesus needed to take on shame, pay it’s full price and replace our shame with His Glory. In Christ our Identities have been utterly transformed, even re-created. We are not longer “naked” but have been clothed with Christ:

Galatians 3:27
For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ.

And so now realize this — our IDENTITIES have been utterly renewed. There is certainly room for guilt when I am convicted by the Spirit that my behavior has been for my glory and not the Lord’s, but there is no more room for shame because I AM A CHILD OF GOD…my IDENTITY is not my behavior, but given and secured by Jesus Christ himself. The Devil (the “accuser” and the “deceiver”) will whisper in our ears that this isn’t true. He and his minions will tell us that we either don’t need Jesus or we are too far from Jesus. But he is a LIAR. We must combat these lies with the Truth of the Gospel…the greatest antidote to the disease of shame is TRUTH. We need to combat lies with what Gospel tells us…over and over again. In an effort to do this I have included below a downloadable/printable sheet with 32 proclamations of your Identity in Christ. To get you started, here’s a few:

Romans 8:1
There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

1 Corinthians 3:16
Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you?

1 Timothy 1:7
…for God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control


A Much Greater Rescue

Where do you go when times get rough? When you are in some sort of pain (physical, relational, spiritual, financial etc) and you can’t see a light at the end of the tunnel? We all have a a myriad of salves to apply to the wounds that this world inflicts, each with varying degrees of effectiveness. In the midst of these storms where resources seem scare and rescue seems distant, I have some good news, some bad news and some great news.

The Good News is that the very One that has perfectly, lovingly, personally and purposefully knit every atom in all of creation together has set his heart on you, even in our moments of chaotic confusion, anger, sadness, frustration, darkness and hopelessness. God himself passionately invites us to come to His throne of Grace in our time of need (Hebrews 4:16) because He has unparalleled compassion for us, desires only good things, and possesses the power to rescue. He says “come to me” when the storm is so loud that we truly can’t hear ourselves think because He has been through that storm, and a much much greater storm, and has come out on the other side unscathed. You can get more on this from my blog a couple of week ago called Gospel Butterfingers.

The Bad News (it’s not really bad news at all, but it might feel bad) is that sometimes God intentionally doesn’t deliver us right away (or maybe anytime in this lifetime) from the “thorns in our flesh” (2 Corinthians 12). Sometimes we are crying out to God in the middle of a lightning storm and He, for reasons we can’t fathom, doesn’t pluck us up and set out feet on sunny shores. And it’s really frustrating. And I often will get upset with Him for not coming though (in the way that I insist that he comes through). The reason for these seasons and situations of “bad news” is actually the Great News.

This is what the Lord was telling Israel while they were in exiled slavery to Babylon. They desperately wanted freedom (just like we would). And God said “Yes! But not yet, because I have A MUCH GREATER RESCUE.

Isaiah 49:6
“It is too light a thing that you should be my servant
to raise up the tribes of Jacob
and to bring back the preserved of Israel;
I will make you as a light for the nations,
that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth.”

You see, pleading with God to rescue us from our “everyday storms” is important. God wants us to come in prayer at all times, including these times. But he ALSO wants to conform us into the image of His Son. He wants SO MUCH MORE than our temporary happiness and comfort. We are so easily satisfied with being safe, having enough stuff and minimizing the causes of anxiety. But God’s plans are infinitely above my own, and He will do what He needs to do in order to mold me. See how C.S.Lewis addresses this in one of the all time great writings (1941) The Weight of Glory:

If we consider the unblushing promises of reward and the staggering nature of the rewards promised in the Gospels, it would seem that Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased

C.S.Lewis – The Weight of Glory

The Rescue from our Sin

So, what if God’s goal for us is radically different than our goal? We will be perpetually dissatisfied and frustrated, accusing God of not coming through. Maybe my goal of a happy and content life that is relatively void of problems isn’t what Jesus was talking about when he promises us the “abundant life” in John 10:10. Maybe Barbara Duguid is right in her (really great) book Extravagant Grace when she says “that the richest fruit of God’s work in our hearts would be evidenced by increasing humility and dependence on Christ for everything, rather than in a ‘victorious Christian life.'”

Maybe God doesn’t just pick me up out of my mud-pit because this is exactly where I learn how much I need Him and where I will learn that true satisfaction will never be found in creation but in the Creator. Yes, it can be painful and really frustrating. It causes deep tears and angry accusations. It whittles me down to nothing…and what is left is sheer need: need for a rescuer that is beyond myself, but one that has come to give me a far greater rescue…a rescue not from temporary discomfort but from sin itself. A rescue not even just from sin, but a rescue from the tyranny of myself. A rescue not even for my own sake, but also for his Glory.

The Rescue For Himself

Isaiah 49:3
And He said to me, “You are my servant, Israel, in whom I will be glorified.”

Right there in the middle of God promising to send the Ultimate Israel (Jesus) to deliver the Rebellious Israel (you and me) he says that it will ultimately be for his own glory. God excitedly and at great sacrifice has brought us the absolute Ultimate Victory through Jesus Christ, delivering us from every shred of bondage and slavery. And in the process, He is even more glorified as we, like join in with all of creation in:

Isaiah 49:13
Sing for joy, O heavens, and exult, O earth;
break forth, O mountains, into singing!
For the LORD has comforted his people
and will have compassion on his afflicted.

Yes, please immediately and passionately go to God’s throne in the midst of the storm regardless of it’s severity. Go sit with your Abba Father when the thunder claps and you are hurt and afraid. And while you are doing that, and while you are passionately asking for a reprieve, join with Jesus in his Grand Finale saying “yet not my will but yours be done” (Luke 22:42). As I do that, as I pray that, may the Lord give us eyes to see His Greater Rescue. May he help me fathom the depths of his Ultimate Rescue; that sometimes He gives us relief from the storms of life, but always and forever He gives us life after The Storm of Sin, Fear and Death. And upon this hope I can trust that what John Piper wrote is true:

God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him.
John Piper

Perfect Fear Casts Out Fear

We live in an age of anxiety. Even though we have more safeguards to prevent danger and more means of rescue from danger, we are a people wrought with fear. All of these protections have convinced us that life can predominantly be controlled. But, in fact, it can’t. It often feels like we are on a raging roller-coaster with nobody at the control panel as we wait for the next disaster to happen. And for many of us that are more acutely plagued with fear and anxiety, this problem is coupled with spiritual shame as we tell ourselves how faithless and weak we are to not trust God’s love, power and plan. And down the black hole we go.

The good news (and frustrating news) is that fear is one of the most common issues we see all through scripture.

  • Adam said, “I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked, and I hid myself.” (Gen 3:10)
  • God’s people were afraid of their Egyptian captors (Exodus 14)
  • God’s people were afraid to go into the promised land because of the overwhelming “giants” (Numbers 13)
  • The Shepherds were afraid of the angels (Luke 2)
  • Jesus’ disciples were afraid of the wind and waves (Matthew 8)
  • Peter was afraid for his life while Jesus was being crucified (Luke 22)

The incredible news it that “Peace” is also one of the more pervasive commands and promises God has for us:

  • God told Abraham to not be afraid to go to the Promised Land (Gen 15)
  • God told Jacob to not be afraid to go down to Egypt (Gen 46)
  • The angels on Christmas morning told the Shepherds “Fear Not”
  • Jesus told all of us to not be afraid because God even takes care of the birds (Mt 10)

Fear comes when we see a “Future without God.” We see real, imagined or potential problems and quickly deduce all the painful outcomes that could result. We naturally fall back into believing that our worlds, our problems, our lives are spinning out of control and about to fall of the cliff. It’s not that we are faithless, it’s actually a great deal of faith…faith that:

  • God isn’t loving enough to desire what’s best
  • God isn’t powerful enough to do what’s best
  • God isn’t wise enough to know what’s best.

We don’t mean to believe this, it’s just where our natural minds and hearts go.

So what do we DO about it? Is there a help, a cure, a hope?

Yes, but slow.

Believing and actually “resting” (the foundational definition of “peace”) in the Lord is a very slow marinating process. We swim in an insta-pot and instagram pool. But learning to trust is slow, and involves us, by the Spirit’s power, to re-focus out eyes off of the potential car-wreck and onto the whole journey. When I am struck with fear, I am forgetting the whole story and the character of God. I am forgetting the infinite proofs that God has always carried his people through the waters and fires. I am allowing what MIGHT happen to eclipse what HAS happened and, in the end, what WILL happen. I am believing that God is small and powerless; that his love for me is weak; that his arms are too feeble to carry me; that his wisdom is too faulty to know what is best for me and the world.

And so, once again, the initial weapon against our problems isn’t to “try harder” (“Just stop being afraid!”) but to believe differently….to be overwhelmed with the glory of God. The greatest weapon against earthly fear is the “Fear of God” — to be overwhelmed like Isaiah (in Isaiah 6) with the mind-staggering holiness, beauty, glory, power and perfection of the Lord.

Let’s look practically at a real-life example in Matthew 8

Matthew 8
24 And behold, there arose a great storm on the sea, so that the boat was being swamped by the waves; but he was asleep. 25 And they went and woke him, saying, “Save us, Lord; we are perishing.” 26 And he said to them, “Why are you afraid, O you of little faith?” Then he rose and rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was a great calm. 27 And the men MARVELED, saying, “What sort of man is this, that even winds and sea obey him?”

The wind and waves were real. The potential danger was extreme. But their eyes (just like mine most of the time) were not on Jesus but on the problems. Instead of being in awe of Jesus, they were in awe of their problems, and their own comfort. And this issue is debilitating, hindering us from living the passionate ambassador-lives to which we have been called and empowered to live. God isn’t slapping our hands for being fearful, He’s working to set us free from the slavery of fear that keeps us from fully enjoying Him and this life he’s gifted us. He’s setting us free from the shackles of this world that scream at us that “this is all there is.”

That’s why Jesus gives us this gift:

John 14:27
Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.

Jesus himself gives us Peace (doesn’t just tell us to be at peace) and He himself IS our peace. He has even given us the Spirit of Peace, the Holy Spirit, who resides in us to speak peace into our hearts when the rest of the world is screaming chaos and fear.

And so today, when fear begins to gurgle up from the springs of your heart, take some deep breaths and fight mis-belief with Gospel-belief. Ask the Spirit to overwhelm your mis-belief with the True-belief that Jesus has always carried you through and, as we see in Romans 8 over and over, will carry us through to the end.