Guilt and shame banished! (III)

If anyone ever found out what I did, I would just die! Shame, in some ways is more powerful, more debilitating than guilt. Guilt says “You did something wrong!” Shame says “There's something wrong with you!" As I mentioned last day, the cure for guilt is to be forgiven, and in the end God is the only one who can truly forgive. Thank God he is ready and willing and able to forgive, in fact He is even just to forgive (1 John 1:9).

But what can be done if I am defective, if there’s something wrong with me? In fact, we are all a mixture of good and evil, right and wrong, sinner and saint. There is some truth, in the silly characterization of a red suited horned devil on one shoulder, and an angel on the other. The truth is that there is something noble about mankind, this is because we are all made in the image of God (Genesis 1:26). On the other hand we have all inherited the sin nature, and we have all sinned (Romans 3:23), so we all need to be saved, to be “ransomed, healed, restored, forgiven” as the hymn writer puts it! But I have found that shame often exists even after we have received His forgiveness.

This series of three posts on guilt and shame banished, was in fact prompted by my meditating on public testimonies of those who have completed principle 4 of the 8 principle alternative to a classical 12-step program. The 4th principle reads “Openly examine and confessed my faults to myself, to God and to someone I trust.” For many, while confessing to someone they trust was the most difficult, it was also the most liberating.

The scriptural basis for this part of the 4th principle comes from James 5:16 which says “Confess your faults one to another, and pray for one another that you might be healed.” And one of the more notable healings, is the freedom from shame. I have known this verse for many years, and had sought to put it into practice, but it was only after I joined and began to work the program I am referring to (Celebrate Recovery), that I found healing from shame. Up until that point I had been able to find people who were willing to hear my confession, but not who willing to be vulnerable about their own faults. And this left me feeling vulnerable!

In the above Scripture from James it says “confess your faults to one another.” The point is that it needs to be mutual, “to one another,” implies give-and-take, back-and-forth, and it was only when I was receiving back, that I found freedom from shame. Normally the “someone you trust,” is your sponsor, and when I confessed my deepest darkest secret to my sponsor, his response was “I did that too!” And now, that deep shame I had felt for so many years, has simply gone.

Father, it really is important to find a safe place, that safe person or persons, who will not judge you, and this is rarer than it should be. But thank You that I finally found such a place, and that I can now truly sing “ransomed, healed, restored, forgiven.” And indeed “Who like me Your praise should sing?” I do, and I will sing Your praise. Hallelujah, in Jesus Name Amen