Many of us struggle with feelings of shame. Today we’ll talk about some reasons for that as well as some tips, or truths, for next time.
Do you wrestle with feelings of shame? Many of us do at some point in our lives.
As Christians, sometimes we feel shame for our actions, attitudes, and feelings from before starting our Christian lives. And sometimes we struggle with shame for mistakes we’ve made since becoming Christians. We feel like we should have known better.
Or maybe we feel inadequate—like we’re not good enough or that we continue to mess up.
Maybe we feel unable to meet societal or cultural standards around us. Do we attend the right church? Do we attend regularly enough? Do we wear the right clothes?
Or maybe we struggle with mental illness. We feel depression shouldn’t be part of a person’s life who claims to love God.
We imagine the day we get to heaven. God will welcome us, and then He’ll shake His head and say, “Oh, what you could have been if only you had done (or not done) all these things.”
There are so many reasons we can feel shame at any given time in our lives, and so many of us struggle with it. But today, let’s set those feelings aside for a moment to remember a few things.
Letting Go of Shame and Embracing Our God-Given Identity
#1 – Acceptance of Jesus
I write a lot of lists here. Of course, they’re never exhaustive on the topic, and they’re not usually in a particular order. This one is different. Although this list still isn’t exhaustive, this point has to be number one.
Shame has a place in our lives. Closely related to guilt, it is the state of humanity since the fall of mankind and helps to point us to the only Source that can remove it from us. It’s a result of the choices we have made since the beginning to choose everything but God.
But God still provided a way for us to be restored to Him. God the Son died for our sins. When we accept His sacrifice, surrendering to His leading, Jesus restores our relationship.
If you’re reading this and you haven’t accepted Jesus, I encourage you to stop here and read this page.
Any shame you experience, allow it to remind you of your need for the Savior and accept His gift to you. And please don’t fall into the trap of thinking you must fix yourself or atone for the things you’ve done before coming to faith. You’ll never come to Him if you do that because it’s not possible for us to fix ourselves or to be good enough to save ourselves.
This is the point of the whole gospel. The good news is that we messed it up, and we couldn’t fix it, so Jesus, the sinless, blameless Son of God, fulfilled that part for us by living in a human body without sinning to be the sacrifice we need. Again, do check out this page.
#2 – Forgiven Once for All
So, back to those who’ve made the decision to follow Jesus. We talked about how we’re restored to a relationship with the Father. Another component of our blessing is the forgiveness of our sins.
It may seem obvious. We kind of talked about this already. Because Jesus made a way, we are forgiven our sins and saved. But this point is important to talk about—at least it was for me—and relevant to a discussion about shame.
For me, I’ve especially struggled with my past mistakes that happened after salvation. I recognized my need for Jesus around eight. So I’ve spent most of my life as a Christian. But I’ve made so many mistakes over that time. So many.
For the longest time, I’ve felt that my mistakes were worse because I should have known better. This logic gets into another point also, which I’ll discuss later in this post.
Now a couple of things eventually occurred to me:
- Even if I could go back in time and change those mistakes, there would just be other ones. It’d be an endless loop.
- Jesus died for our past sins and future ones.
Even those things we’ll do in the future, Jesus took care of them on the cross. Even those things we don’t even know we’re messing up right now.
#3 – Perfection Not Required
Perfection is never asked of us. Or even attainable.
As we’ve talked about some already, Jesus lived a perfect earthly life because we couldn’t. So why do we feel that we will be perfect after salvation? Yes, we’ve been saved, but our souls are still housed in imperfect bodies—bodies that are prone to wander as the hymn says.
If we’re not knowingly sinning, then how about we extend the grace to ourselves Jesus knew we needed?
#4 – Study the Source
Shame can be one of those things we must readdress from time to time. Nights and times of discouragement can put us right back in that place.
We need reminders. But even more than that, we need reminders of who God is. I’ve found the best answer for those times I’m filled with shame—doubt, feelings of inadequacy, confusion, all the things—is to look outside myself.
Look to the One who doesn’t change, doubt, mess up, or fret. And He’s given me tools to do this: by reading His word and by praying to Him.
#5 – One Day
I’m sure I’ve had this point on other posts on this topic, but it’s such a good one. Not that this idea is original with me, because it’s definitely not. But it’s something that brings me hope.
One day we will have bodies that match our washed-clean spirits. Shame will no longer be part of our lives. It’ll be a distant memory as we stare into the loving face of our Savior with only hope and peace and adoration.
Feelings of shame, no matter the cause, can resurface from time to time, but it’s always helpful to remind ourselves of the truth just as often.
As children of God, we are forgiven, and we aren’t expected to be perfect. We can rest assured that one day we’ll see God face to face, and only His glory and majesty will be important to us—not what we should have done differently.
What a day that will be, but until then let us hold to the promises that we are enough because Jesus is enough and He makes so. Even when it doesn’t feel like it.
Do you struggle with feelings of shame? What helps you? Share in the comments below.
More reading
- My Story: Finding Eternal Assurance from HISsparrowBlog
- 6 Simple Ways to Handle False Guilt from HISsparrowBlog
- Blessed Assurance: 6 Reasons I Believe in Eternal Security from HISsparrowBlog
I frequently link up with the following: Grace & Truth with Embracing the Unexpected, Tell His Story with Jeanne Takenaka, Let’s Have Coffee with Joanne Viola, and Blessing Bloggers with Deb Wolf.
