April 21, 2022

Freedom From Shame (Part 3)

LOOK and SEE.

Look at your shame and the cause and effect of it.

A simpler, more excellent way to deal with shame:

Face your shame - look right at it. Own the choices that caused the shame. Don't turn your face away from it. Look at it. Once you truly see the choices and the consequences and the piles of excrement that result from it you have a chance.

Just look right at it. Don't shy away. Turn toward it. Sit in the pile and experience the completeness and the fullness of the consequence. "How can I do that?", you say… Well, I believe it is actually impossible to do it by yourself, and it results in the cycles outlined above. BUT, if you have someone with you, someone who you know absolutely loves you, you might be able to. Someone who will look with you, see all of the excrement that you - YOU have created, and still commit to loving YOU. IMPOSSIBLE, you say? Those who are closest to me, who really know me, are the very ones who have born the brunt of these bad choices. So - where does the power come from? Who has this ability and where do I find it? Only one person can handle it. Only one person has seen it all, and has the ability to wade through all of it and begin the clean-up, reclamation project.

That person? - Jesus Christ himself. Yes, the very Jesus that is either blamed for being the cause of our shame, or explained away as all loving and one who does away with the law so we don't have to have shame, is actually the one who can address our shame and clean up the messes of our lives

Don't run, don't hide, don't out-strategize, don't defend

You see, we don't overcome sin and shame by running. We don't overcome sin and shame by explaining, or out thinking or manipulating our minds. We don't overcome sin and shame by making ourselves unlovable to everyone around us. We don't overcome shame by tearing down the foundations of the moral code or exploding our historical belief systems. All of those responses are ones where WE are the power, WE are the workers of the clean up and WE are the ones who are making our own realities. WE CAN'T DO IT. WE WEREN'T MADE TO DO IT. God knew all along, since the beginning of creation that we would sin, and that we'd screw things up and make a mess, and try as hard as we could to overcome it ourselves, only to dig ourselves deeper. God knew all along that what we thought was the system was simply a way to point us to the real solution. Jesus Christ is the solution. Jesus Christ can take us with Him to the cross, and put our sinful, shameful selves to death with Him on the cross. When we die with Jesus on the cross, the shame and sin moves over to a place where we can see it, but we see it with Jesus right beside us.

The real Jesus did not give us the option of following Him as a mere guide or teacher or spiritual mentor. He claimed multiple times that He was the very Son of God, and even God Himself. He said that no one can come to the Father, except through Himself. You see, God the Father, Jesus the Son, and the Holy Spirit knew all along that systems that require us as mere humans to completely be holy by ourselves would never work. We will ALWAYS eventually desire and take a shortcut to growth. We will ALWAYS do well, and be tempted to feel self-pride and self-justification. We will ALWAYS do well, and then turn around and comparatively judge others as less than.

Allowing Jesus to merely be a teacher, explaining to us how our effort sets us free will not work. Using scripture and the laws and principles of God as a guide that requires us to perform will not succeed. Throwing out all belief and replacing God with some sort of universal force or all encompassing thought processes eventually comes back to how well our minds perform and, ultimately, back to our work. No- you see, the only way to righteous, holiness, and freedom from Sin and Death is through the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross on YOUR behalf and on MY behalf, coupled with the resurrection power over death that Jesus demonstrated on YOUR behalf and on MY behalf. The only way is to receive Jesus as our way. Jesus gets us into relationship with the Father, and the Holy Spirit then comes and brings the new life that we begin to walk in and understand, and grow in. But without giving up, without submitting, without total acknowledgement that God is God and we are not, YOU WILL FAIL in this life. YOU will fail in becoming holy and overcoming shame. We were made to fail, because God always desired that His work in us would be the way. Come to it now.