your shame in the eyes of Christ

“These things I have spoken to you while I am still with you. But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you. 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. 

John 14:25-27

We can face our shame and find peace, or hide from it, your choice. One brings you closer to God, the other separates you. Shame is a powerful thing and it does one of two things to us, promotes Godly conviction which creates space for change in our hearts or it buries us alive, we stay stuck in it, and many times try to hide it. God sees your hurt, shame, embarrassment, guilt, and the other endless ways the Enemy tries to chain you to the world. But guess what, God doesn’t chase our hearts by bringing us to those places; He doesn’t chain us, He frees us through His Son, Jesus Christ. Jesus died so we could have freedom from the Enemy who so desires to make us believe that we have to live with our shame and guilt of our worst actions and choices. There is no sense in hiding our worst selves from God, because He already sees all of us, there is no hiding from Him. What He does desire, is that we recognize those ugly places where we cling to our shame and guilt, and bring them to Him, laying them at His feet. He seeks to show us that He is greater than any poor choice we could ever make, He wants us to be freed of those things and trust that He desires our hearts to grow from those destitute places in our souls. God sees our deepest darkest, so don’t hide, because He brings all things into the light. He just wants us to do it on our own and recognize that we need Him so we can go forward, moving on from those lonely, shameful places.

For godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret, whereas worldly grief produces death. For see what earnestness this godly grief has produced in you, but also what eagerness to clear yourselves, what indignation, what fear, what longing, what zeal, what punishment! At every point you have proved yourselves innocent in the matter.

2 Corinthians 7:10-11

Jesus shows us an amazing example through the story of the Samaritan woman in John 4:1-45 (read it if you have not) of what someones life living in shame looks like. In this case, it is a Samaritan woman who has been avoiding the public eye because she has had five husbands, and is living with a man whom she is not married to. Samaria was a community of people who were pagan and put Yahweh up next to all of their gods, but were familiar with the prophecy of the Messiah. They were a mixed people as far as heritage and considered outcast by Jewish culture at the time. The woman Jesus encounters is by all means an outcast of society and living a life of deep shame in her sin. In the time of Christ, men and women did not speak alone in public, nor did a Jewish man interact with Samaritans. In this case, Jesus went out of His way on the trip to Galilee to see this woman, knowing He would meet her at Jacob’s well. Jesus chooses to sit and rest at the well, knowing this woman is going to come and draw water from it at midday, alone, avoiding normal gathering times at the well. Jesus knew her deepest and darkest shame when He chose to go sit, to wait, and meet with her. In the story He reveals Himself to her three times, first in (4:10) as deity by telling her He can give her something everlasting, Living Water, eternal life. The woman doesn’t quite understand what He means, and is so shocked this Jewish man is speaking to her. So she questions who He is and seeks to understand more. He reveals Himself as a prophet in (4:16-19) asking her to bring her husband, fully knowing that she doesnt have one. He’s looking to see if she will confess this shame she carries, which she does. She grows more curious and seeks to understand who Jesus really is. The third time in (4:24-26) He reveals Himself as the Son of God. In this moment, the woman is in amazement of the Son of God coming to meet her where she is. She runs back to her town to tell everyone of what has just happened. In her faith in Christ, knowing what He can do, and who He is, many in the town become believers as well. All of this is because this woman was honest with Jesus about her shame, and put her faith in Him. In this, He restores her and she can now rest in the joy of relationship with God. Jesus came to heal her far beyond the physical, He wanted to heal her heart, and through this, a ripple effect throughout her village took place. Jesus removed that wedge of sin between her and God. Many, many, more came to know the saving power of Christ because of her faith.

A woman from Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her, “Give me a drink.” (For his disciples had gone away into the city to buy food.) The Samaritan woman said to him, “How is it that you, a Jew, ask for a drink from me, a woman of Samaria?” (For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.) Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.” The woman said to him, “Sir, you have nothing to draw water with, and the well is deep. Where do you get that living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob? He gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did his sons and his livestock.” Jesus said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water, so that I will not be thirsty or have to come here to draw water.”Jesus said to her, “Go, call your husband, and come here.” The woman answered him, “I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, “You are right in saying, ‘I have no husband’; for you have had five husbands, and the one you now have is not your husband. What you have said is true.” The woman said to him, “Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet. Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, but you say that in Jerusalem is the place where people ought to worship.” Jesus said to her, “Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.” The woman said to him, “I know that Messiah is coming (he who is called Christ). When he comes, he will tell us all things.” Jesus said to her, “I who speak to you am he.”

John 4:7-26

Jesus goes out of His way time and time again to fill up the people living in the most shame and pain. He desires to reconcile our hearts to the heavenly Father who loves us so deeply, that He gave His only Son, Jesus Christ. Jesus came and lived to be unjustly tortured, die at our hands, and then be brought back to life, so that God could show the world that no sin is incapable of being forgiven in His eyes. Your ugliest parts are no match for the greatest sin of all, which was the murder of Jesus Christ, our God. THAT is the worst we can get, and God shows us in that, there is life, by raising His Son through the power of the Holy Spirit on the third day. In that resurrection we find life for each of our souls, if we put our faith in Spirit and in Truth of the cross. We come before God with Godly grief , open hearted with our ugliest pieces and repent, asking Him to do a miracle in us. To top all of this off, Jesus leaves us with His Spirit, the Holy Spirit, so that we may be filled with His wisdom, and one day rise again just as He did. THAT is why we can’t hide our shame, because each of us have the Spirit of God living in us, and He desires to produce fruit in our live to glorify His name and His kingdom. None of this comes without change, cultivation of the garden of our souls, and probably deep uprooting of all kinds of weeds and rocks we’ve held onto. To become more Christ like and walk a good path, we have to accept our shame as a space where we haven’t let God in, and instead have been allowing the Enemy to work. The Enemy thrives on our shame when we don’t bring it before God. Our shame must be put on display before the Father so that He can prune it back and make way for new growth.

My encouragement to each of us is to remember that God desires change in each of our hearts, but attempting to hide from Him, does not help our cause. Instead it actually brings us closer to the Enemy. The Enemy will do everything He can to make you think that dark parts of your heart are just the way you are, it will hurt too much to deal with it, you can’t be redeemed, he will get you thinking you can handle everything yourself, etc. Well all of these are lies, God wants to uproot ALL of your garbage and shine it in the light of day. He wants to uproot every bad thing you ever thought or did, change your heart and soul to be more like Him, so that You can walk in the glory of His kingdom, and just like that Samaritan woman, shine before your village. In this, everyone will know who you belong to, why you are here, and who they need to know, Jesus. God’s glory can shine in our darkest places, bringing us, and others into His bright future, but first you have to let Him in. Do not hide your sin and shame from Him, He already knows, and wants you to know, He’s greater. All is for the glory of the Lord our God, even your darkest when you let Him in, and commit to the work He wants to do in you. God wants you to let go of your shame, so you can say let’s go when He calls upon you.

When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory. Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. On account of these the wrath of God is coming. In these you too once walked, when you were living in them. But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth. Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator.

Colossians 3:4-10