Do you carry any shame? Is there shame for what you have done? Shame for your past? Shame for your failures?
Shame is a feeling of worthlessness. Shame is a disgrace you assign to yourself. It’s a fear of the worst of you being exposed, and that fear makes you hide. But don’t you realize there’s absolutely NOTHING you can hide from God. He sees it all and knows it all. You don’t sneak behind God and get away with things. He’s fully aware of that secret.
One of my best friends has a coffee mug that’s a picture of Jesus peeking over a pair of sunglasses he’s wearing and it says, “I saw that.” My friend, Jesus saw that. More than anything he wants to say about it, he wants to DO something about it. Jesus wants to cover your shame.
In Genesis when Adam and Eve are disobedient and ate the fruit they were told not to eat, their very first feeling was of shame. Shame caused them to hide. But do you know what God did in response to their shame? Chapter 3, verse 21 says, “The Lord God made clothing from animal skins for Adam and his wife.” I’ve never noticed that before. God himself made the first real clothes to cover their shame.
God doesn’t desire his sons and daughters to walk around in shame. Shame separates us from him and all he ever wanted was a close relationship with us.
This is exactly why the enemy works so hard to cover you in shame. Shame separates us from God. We naturally hide in our feelings of worthlessness and self-assigned disgrace. The devil wants to poke at those unhealed wounds within to make that shame ooze from you. It’s all an attempt to keep you from God.
But know this – Jesus saw it and he did something about it!
God made the first clothes to cover the first shame in preparation for the coming covering for ALL shame. Notice what God used for the clothes. He used the skin from animals. Those animals had to die, they were sacrificed. Adam and Eve had originally made coverings from fig leaves in the garden to try and cover their shame, but that wasn’t good enough. God sacrificed animals and used their skins to cover them. That sacrifice was required.
Shame is only covered by sacrifice. And there’s nothing we could ever sacrifice enough to make us righteous. We can’t change ourselves to be good enough. You could spend every day for the rest of your life trying to perform and earn your righteousness, but you would still fall short. A sacrifice beyond you is required. A sacrifice made by God. God made a covering for shame of Adam and Eve – and God has made a covering for your shame.
That covering is the blood of Jesus. His sacrificed life is what makes you forever good enough.
Yes, Jesus saw what you did and in response, he did something about it. He died for you.
Now girl, you have absolutely zero right to be walking around in that shame. That’s already been bought. It’s already been covered. The high price was paid for you to feel love instead of worthlessness. A huge sacrifice was made for you to be covered in grace where there was once disgrace.
That grace will radically change your life. RECEIVE IT! But then, don’t waste it.
Don’t waste the grace offered to you. Don’t keep replaying the story. Don’t allow the enemy to poke at those wounds – no girl, bring those wounds to Jesus and let him completely heal you.
Grace isn’t a bandaid to just get you through. Grace heals you perfectly. Grace takes your absolute worst and turns it into a testimony. My friend, you have a testimony of how God can meet you in your pit of shame, save you and change you – now what are you doing with that testimony? Are you telling it? Are you using it to help others? Is God getting any good out of the grace he has offered you? Or are you wasting that grace?