God Removes Our Shame

How do you feel about your scars?

Most of us have them. Whether they’re small and unobtrusive, or large and pronounced, scars are not generally something that we want people to see. These indelible marks, often the result of a painful experience we did not choose or anticipate, are proof of our mortality. They bear witness to the fact that we cannot make every problem just “go away.” Much like a Sharpy marker, a scar is a permanent “pain marker” that reminds us of how rough life can be.

Now, imagine your emotional scars. Sometimes, the pain that we feel in our hearts is much more difficult to deal with than physical pain. Often, physical pain can be healed over time. Wounds in the heart run deep, and don’t always have a place where they can surface safely and be treated. Consequently, whether it was the sin of someone else, or our own sin that caused our affliction, most of us are walking around with emotional wounds that would look like battle scars if they were visible. Sure, we can pretend that everything is fine by putting on a smile and a show. But what if every time we were hurting, we were physically marked on the outside? Or worse: what if we were made to bear our sins and the sins of others tattooed like a tell-all for everyone to see? We would all be mortified–shamed to death–by other people’s awareness of whom we really are, what we’ve done, and what others have done to us.

Shame is one of the most powerful poisons in the enemy’s arsenal. Shame immobilizes us with fear: the fear of being unworthy of love. And if there’s anything that the enemy doesn’t want us to experience, it is the all-knowing, all-merciful, all-redeeming love of Christ. Once we’ve experienced His love in our lives, it “casts out fear, because fear involves torment.”(I John 4:18) The shame that torments us is utterly wiped away as the blood of Christ covers our sins, and remembers them no more. And while we will still have a remembrance of whatever has caused us to feel shame, we can bring those memories and feelings to God, trusting Him to heal us and raise us up again.

“I sought the LORD, and He heard me, and delivered me from all my fears. They looked
to Him and were radiant, and their faces were not ashamed. This poor man cried out, and
the LORD heard him, and saved him out of all his troubles. The angel of the LORD
encamps all around those who fear Him, and delivers them.”(Psalm 34:4-7)

Shame really can feel like a double-edged sword: It’s either our own mistakes that drive us to despair, or the sins of others force the pain so deep into our hearts that it seems to become a part of who we are, affecting our self-image and our behavior. Shame can cause us to actually inflict hatred on ourselves if we don’t know how to deal with it. Even Jesus Himself knew the feeling of shame, as he hung on the cross, bearing the entire sin burden of humanity in all its filth and unholiness (Heb. 12:2). But Jesus endured because He knew the truth: By His atoning for our sins with His own death, His people were forever delivered from the curse of the law that judged us unworthy. His joy was to give us joy, the permanent joy of our acceptance by the Father into the kingdom of the Son of His love (Col. 1:13).

When we confess in faith that Jesus is our Savior, we also are given His righteousness, which is not affected by what we do, what we don’t do, or what others do to us. As the apostle Paul puts it, “...not having my own righteousness, which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith.” (Phil. 3:19bc) Christ’s righteousness makes us holy, blameless, and above reproach (Col. 2:2). We need to embrace this truth to understand who we really are–not worthless, but as worthy in God’s eyes as His own Son.

Feeling loved yet?

Maybe we should talk about the fact that even before God made us worthy by sending Jesus to die for us, before He gave us the riches of His grace and mercy and the promise of eternity with Him, before we were made right and while we were still very wrong, He loved us. The Bible states clearly, “but God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”(Rom. 5:8) He loved us before He created us (John 1:13, I John 4:7), and His perfect love is the source of our love for Him (I John 4:19). And once we are in Christ, rooted and grounded in His love, we can begin “to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge; that (we) may be filled with all the fullness of God.”(Eph. 3:17-19) That’s the fullness and completeness and perfection of love that will cast out fear and shame.

As long as we are here on this earth, our enemy will use shame to try and keep us bound in fear. Instead of allowing shame to control us, we can surrender it to Christ and remember the truth of His word:

“There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death..And if Christ is in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the Spirit is life because of righteousness.”(Rom. 8:1-2,10)

Ask Christ Jesus to show you His scars. We know how He got them. We also need to remember that we were the reason why. And since He does not condemn us, no one else can. (John 8:11, Rom. 8:33-34)