Disarming Your Guilt and Shame
Old Skeletons, New Life
RT: Restoring Truth
Of all the burdens we carry through this life, shame is surely one of the most crippling. It leads us into its lonely and clouded vales, turning otherwise beautiful scenery into a depressing slog through guilty regrets. It makes our feet drag, our hopes sink, and our fears explode. No matter how glorious the sunrise, we’re still swamped in darkness when imprisoned by the ball and chain of shame.
Despite the wisdom otherwise gained by their decades of life experience, parents are not immune to the chronic suffering of shame. Many of us hide our shame quite cleverly; our nice clothes, successful children, and social busyness seem to deflect the sharp arrows of bruised consciences. As believers, we are perhaps too busy tending to our children’s hearts to investigate the mysteries of our own. Eventually, though, those ghosts from the past find us in our unguarded moments, rattling chains and bringing forth their dreaded gloom from the corridors of our memory.
Maybe it’s a personal history of profuse sexual sin, shattered relationships, or public indiscretions. Maybe it’s an embarrassing addiction or habit that seems unique to you; “nobody would understand this depressing struggle”, you conclude. Perhaps you always felt ugly, unlikeable, or less accomplished. You may have even battled and repented from years of destructive sin, but you fear a gathering threat of consequences. Regardless of the source of nagging condemnation, the heaviness of shame is real and palpable.
Plenty of self-help books and podcasts offer a path—or at least, a purported path—out of shame. For the Christian, though, shame must be viewed as a spiritual assault, a Satanic lie designed to negate the cosmic victory of the cross. The ancient foe uses shame to cloak our vision, hiding the dazzling truth about our identity and making us ineffective and droopy citizens of the Kingdom.
What is the truth about us? What is the happy secret to disarming shame? Maybe you’ve heard it before, but it’s worth considering it afresh. As believers, we are not destined to be emotional wrecks; we are chosen, justified, and loved by God, who created us in Christ Jesus for good works before the foundation of the world. He has chosen the weak and unimpressive people of our world—the poor in spirit—to confound the strong. God sees his redeemed as those clothed in righteousness, bursting with gospel-infused purpose.
When we say we trust God, we must then actively obey him by refusing to indulge in Satan’s spiritual lies. As God’s redeemed, we aren’t just “messy” people or lifelong strugglers; we are new creations, vessels for his own glory which now shines through the old cracks that have so often inspired our shame. Jesus, our high priest, bore our shame for us and covered us in his righteousness; therefore all the dark accusations are now powerless before God’s throne. Do not gratify Satan by believing his impotent claims or giving them merit.
A powerful symbolic artwork split into two sides that overlap: on the left, a towering dark church casting shadows over a crowd of fearful worshippers, with storm clouds, large stone crosses, and symbols of control and guilt representing religious dogma and spiritual oppression; on the right, a radiant, peaceful Jesus seated in a lotus posture, heart glowing with golden divine light, surrounded by soft halos, and a luminous atmosphere representing esoteric Christianity, inner Christ awakening, and soul liberation; cinematic lighting, spiritual surrealism, highly detailed, mystical and transcendent, digital painting –ar 16:9 –stylize 50 –v 7 Job ID: 2c943943-fd63-44b5-a380-a98a24878ffa
Such truths may fall on deaf ears when we’re swamped by reminders of not just one or two old regrets, but perhaps years of foolish decisions or discouraging battles. Even here, there is good news! God’s compassion outdistances our long timeline of shame, and he can heal even those secret scars—both physical and spiritual— that loom large in our mental shadows. He will complete his perfect work in us, and our story is not over—regardless of what our tangled thoughts of shame and regret may suggest.
If we’ve confessed that old sin, the voice of shame is nothing more than the enemy’s attempt to yoke us in slavery and render us ineffective ambassadors for gospel freedom. Our everyday struggles aren’t beyond God’s reach, and his arm is long enough to repair even “the years that the locust has stolen.” Walk in the freedom of this truth today!
“As far as the east is from the west, so far does he remove our transgressions from us.”—Psalm 103:12
