shame on who? 

S

hame is a really painful feeling of humiliation and unworthiness because of a consciousness of something we participated in or partnered with that we reflect upon with regret. Shame blocks self love.  Shame holds hands with guilt,  invading our minds with a  burdensome rhetoric between our ears. How can we have a loving regard for ourselves while we labour under a burden of shame? Moreover, hindsight can be a hard taskmaster. “If only you had…..” Shame can be imposed by wrongs done to us. Sexual abuse, emotional abuse, and irresponsible behaviours of others often leave people with a horrendous legacy of shame and false guilt that won’t shift with rationalising. Shame can be self-induced such as when we have moments of deep regret over something we’ve said or done or aligned ourselves with because we’ve seen the negative consequences and feel bad about it or come into the place of conviction. Many times shame is a result of harsh self belief and expectation, journalling helps us figure that one out.

3 Rs of Restoration

Healthy guilt is an emotion we experience when we realize we’ve done wrong or neglected to do something we should have. It should not be a lingering emotion, but an activating emotion. It is supposed to lead us to make changes.  We reflect, repent and offer restitution. It’s tempting not to take the time to reflect as our minds are dumped on by downloads of guilt and shame simultaneously that make the reflection more painful than it needs to be. I find it helpful to journal, then I only write what’s going to be helpful. Be careful not to justify a less than gracious action by comparing it to another. Be accountable to your own heart for your own thoughts and actions. Once you’ve reflected, you repent. That just means you make a decision to refrain from that negative thought or action, and you initiate the opposite. Then you do what you can to make amends. That’s restitution. This helps you to remember your commitment and enables you to bless the one you may have wronged.I remember once stealing something from the owners of a house I was renting. It was a long time afterward that I felt a sense of conviction that it wasn’t the right thing to do. Reflecting and repenting were easy enough but tracing down the owner to apologise and offer payment was quite difficult. I considered it well worth doing to help me internalise the lesson. Choose your restitution action with wisdom, some well meaning people have re-activated a hurt by a clumsy restitutional effort. If in doubt consider an anonymous blessing.

Scorning Shame

Having done all that God asks of us in the place of conviction (2 Corinthians 7:9-11) we are free to receive forgiveness, but what a lot of people don’t realise is that this package comes with freedom from guilt and shame as well. (Romans 10:11) . We are encouraged to follow the example of Jesus in Hebrews 12:2 to fix our eyes on Jesus, who for the joy of the promises of God to him for his obedience, endured the cross, scorning its shame. “You puny little thing? As if you can touch me!!” This verse speaks of Jesus on a massive stage of shame. He was mocked as ‘clearly, he wasn’t the Messiah he was cracked up to be’, he was naked, he was enduring the most humiliating form of death, which was on a cross outside the city. He wore a crown of thorns and had the mocking inscription atop the cross. “Jesus, King of the Jews”. It’s amazing to think he chose to consider the reward instead and thumb his nose at shame.

For the Joy

The Joy for which Jesus endured was in part being able to take us with Him because His death here on earth meant that he could make a way for us to join him in Heaven when we are done here on earth. Having destroyed the power of Satan It was also so that we could begin living  empowered  in God’s Kingdom right now.  This wonder is the reason we can emulate Jesus approach to suffering and shame. Having become the ‘winner’, Jesus invites us to join him and choose to live in the joy he provided. (John 16) In this passage, he invites us to ask for anything, receive it and our Joy would be complete. Ever noticed that the hardest time to ask for anything is in the place of shame? If you go there in faith, theres a fight to win.  In every opportunity for shame, there will be an opportunity for Joy. Sometimes it will be obscured by the apparent size of the shame in front of it! Looking for the Joy you can see in Jesus invitation can eject you immediately out of it’s reach.

Unspeakably Unacceptable

One time, in celebrating a win in life with my family, I decided to try my hand at cocktails. Short story was that the margarita cocktails I imbibed had me driving off to a church women’s leaders planning meeting quite tiddly……but worse, as the evening unfolded, so did the effect of the alcohol and I was drunk and considerably verbose. The gracious crew didn’t shame me but I did a good job of it all on my own the next day as I dealt with the consequences. Shame comes with lies. It offers you the beating you feel you deserve and tells you that you are unspeakably unacceptable. How do you have Joy in the face of that?! With intention. I wrote down the shame, did the 3 rs, and then asked God to make me the opposite of the shame lie. This was “Im not hopelessly out of control, but I don’t give in to the fear of my own weakness because God hasn’t given me a spirit of fear but of power, love and self control”. (2 Timothy 1:7) and “I am completely acceptable just as I am” (Ps 27:10) Rehearsing the truth instead of the lies inherent in shame have helped me receive the promise and become much more self controlled and secure in being accepted. I expect eventually that these weaknesses will have been transformed into strengths.

Shame chain reaction

When under a barrage of shame and guilt, it’s tempting to lie, to justify, to attack, to defend, while underneath we can carry a plethora of negative emotions like  self-loathing, depression, anger and fear. To avoid the shame chain reaction, be focused and honest. I became pregnant when I was an unmarried Christian and it wasn’t the second immaculate one. I was in a particularly conservative Church at the time and the shock was palpable, the shame implicit though unintended. In my time of reflection, I knew I just needed to follow the 3 rs and trust God to take my shame. The joy to focus on was simply that I knew that nothing I did could separate me from God, and if He was for me, I’d be ok.  (Rom :31-39)  Some people regarded me with suspicion and judgment, but I could deal with that because I was looking for my approval from God. As far as he was concerned I had a clean slate. I had a hard road ahead, but I wasn’t carrying guilt and shame around like a ball and chain to make it worse.

Apply it, Own it

No shame, my gain.