Psalms: Shame

Good morning, Christchurch.

I you other there's certain days in your

life where you can't remember all of it,

but it's just like there's polaroid pictures that

live in your imagination.

My wedding day is 1 of those days

where I don't remember everything throughout the course

of the day, but I can remember, like,

certain pictures

at different points through the day. So I

remember staining up front, the door open and

my my soon to be wife standing at

the back in the the first vision of

her in the dress. 1 of the things

I remember. I remember just after the service,

the minister who appreciated our wedding. Forgot to

tell us that we could kiss the, you

know kiss 1 another. And so we're walking

down the aisle, and he's saying, hold everything,

You know, just pause everything and and stop

right there and you may now. Kissed your

bride.

I remember,

I remember going outside and so much rice

being thrown in my face.

I don't think her face, but in my...

There's like, an

directed towards me.

I can imagine some reasons why

I remember the reception and,

dancing friends laughter,

I can remember sitting at a table.

With my new wife and

and little cousins, younger cousins coming up and

being like, Matt, Matt, you just got married.

Like, how do you feel. How does it

feel to be married? Just these little kids

coming up in all the excitement?

I remember later that night. Carrying Lexi over

the threshold of our hotel room, and I'll

never forget what happened next. While we're still

dressed in our formal attire Tuxedo wedding dress

we took out the Bible and read Genesis

Genesis 2:25

2 verse 25.

Such a powerful verse and for anyone who's

preparing to step into marriage I would commend

this practice to you The first thing you

do together is a newly wed couples to

read this passage.

Genesis 02:25 says this.

Genesis 2:25

The man and his wife were both naked

and they felt no shame.

And I thought about that moment many times

is a profound way to enter marriage because

here is god's original

intention in marriage that 2 people

would somehow become 1 and that there would

be such an intimacy, such a vulnerability,

such a revealing of a self, not just

a physical nature this, but a total person

naked this, a a sharing of the whole

with another that you could stand in front

of another person

and not turn away in shame.

That you could be in relationship with another

and not experience shame.

And I've wondered for many years why has

God put that particular description as the hallmark

of marriage, not feeling shame

in the most vulnerable moment in the presence

of another.

I think it's part in part because of

what happens next, why this is included in

scripture because you know the story of Genesis

3.

You know of the serpent deceiving eve, eve

listening to Satan's deception of Adam's failure to

act of just his complacency sitting

beside her. Of Adam and Eve together not

trusting God, trusting their own desires and disobey

God. And for the first time, the consequence

it's not just sin itself, but the concept

of sin come into humanity? 1 of the

first things that happens?

What do they experience? They experience shame.

Where they just went from

their in a vulnerable position with 1 another

feeling no shame now. They feel shame. They

noticed their naked this there, they remove themselves

from 1 another. They actually hide from 1

another. They take fig leaves. We've all seen

the pictures before of their own making to

try and cover their naked inadequate. They're not

able to cover themselves, but there's a a

rejection of 1 another. There's a blaming that

happens. God says, what happened here? Well, the

wife... She told me to do it Well

it the serpent told me there's this blaming

game that that goes on all of this

happens

as a consequence of sin.

Adam and eve were together and felt no

shame, and suddenly, the first consequence,

isolation,

separation, isolation from god fear hiding exposure,

feeling

posed.

Has to be 1 of the most important

spiritual lessons that we realize is that shame

is not a part of God's original creation.

The man and woman were naked together and

felt no shame is only in our fallen

world that shame enters as the emotion we

feel

when we feel exposed.

So we're gonna continue this summer series we've

been in today called crying upwards and crying

upwards. It's how we think about the psalms.

The rest of the scriptures kind of god's

word to us, but the psalms are god's

appointed words

crying up from humans perspective,

us crying up to the lord, and we've

been going this summer

through all sorts of different emotions, and it

does seem like we are spending more time

in some of the darker and more negative

emotions. We've gone through anger and loneliness and

isolation and envy,

and greed, and these kind of emotional responses.

And we will... Next week, we'll get to

talk about glad. So there is some relief

on the horizon. But today, we're are gonna

talk about the emotion of shame.

And remember, our big thesis is that spiritual

with maturity

and spiritual formation is directly connected to your

emotional mature idiot. And the reason for that

is if if you have an emotional response

towards something, and you just deny it or

you're not aware of it, you can't invite

the holy spirit to come and meet you

at that place.

So your emotional life is directly connected to

your own spiritual formation so that you can

invite god into all areas of your life.

And shame is 1 area, none of us

wanna touch.

It is an emotion we want to avoid.

It's 1 that when you think of it,

I just think of the word shame I'm

like I wanna push at it at a

distance. I don't want it to get too

close to me. But you remember emotions reveal

our soul. Like a check engine light on

the car, emotions reveal something is going on.

And so even though shame is painful and

scary. This is what I want us to

talk about today. And it's what next to

our psalm.

And the reason especially I wanna talk about

it is I believe shame is not just

something to be avoided, but shame is actually

a gift

that allows us to experience a fresh

the gift of the gospel.

Shame, here's where we're gonna go today. Shame

is a gift that allows you to experience

a fresh the power of the gospel.

Let's pray together and and then we'll talk.

Heavenly father, would you send your holy spirit

to us right now. This is a, scary

topic to discuss. But we also believe

You love us.

As we just heard in ephesians, you love

us more than we can imagine.

You love us more than shame would cause

us to believe.

You love us.

So as you come and send your spirit

and speak through your word that we would

receive a fresh.

Power of

Jesus cleansing blood. We asking in your name,

lord. Amen,

Okay. I think Shame might be 1 of

the biggest motivator in all of our lives.

We do everything we can to avoid it

we don't want to experience it, but it

runs across every single human who's at least

a couple of years old. You can see

this up close. If you've ever spent time

with kids, maybe your parents or your god

parents or you're an answer or an uncle,

you spend some time with kids. That moment

when a kid finds out,

that they... They've... Like, you've been paying attention

while they're fighting. Like, you know, you've been

watching them, you know the whole situation that's

going on? They told you they were gonna

do something. They're gonna put it their clothes

or or do... Or put at the toys

or something like that, and they get found

out that they didn't do it or you

catch them in a lie.

What little kids often do is they react

back They scream. They yell. They deny it.

They run away, they have this strong emotional

reaction to being found out to being exposed.

By the way, adults, did you do the

same things.

You're just better at covering it up, than

the kids are. The kids so you have...

And you see it with kids this everyone

has immediate emotional reaction to shame.

As a quick aside, parents and god parents,

especially, how you respond to a child

or a young teenager when they're in a

moment of shame is so significant

because you parents and you god parents are

often,

you're playing the role of what kids think

God is. What God's love is like. So

if a kid is in shame and and

sharing that they're in some form of shame

with you and you were respond by piling

more shame onto them. They'll grow up with

such a warp perspective that they think shame

must be avoided at all costs. And they'll

never have the opportunity to receive the gift

of shame, which is to receive the power

of how Jesus heals us from our shame.

So careful as you're as you're responding to

a child and shame, not to respond in

anger or resentment, but to stay connected,

even in these difficult moments.

I wanna talk about,

a book called the soul of shame. It's

by Kurt Thompson.

And Kurt Thompson, he is a psychiatrist and

he's

Christian, and he's written this book a soul

shame. The whole thing. It's pretty short, about

200 pages, and it... It's just an an

exposition on shame.

And he list some of the common ways

we as as

teenagers as young adults and as older adults

experience shame, And I'm gonna give you a

number of examples, but there could be countless

more, but see if any of these resonate

with you. As you think about, how you

felt shame before.

He says sometimes you get rejected from a

job, even though you're qualified for the job,

and now you have to tell others Hey

I was excited about this, and it it

didn't come through. I got the rejection.

Maybe you have a family member whose

alcoholism is on display in front of your

friends. You're at a gathering or party, and

this family member is behaving in a way

that brings shame towards you.

You lose a major account or a project

at work. You have a breakup of a

marriage, especially if you're in the church, a

breakup of a marriage. You have a child

or you have an adult child who is

dis interested in God, but you're known as

the holy couple.

You're aging and you're losing your looks or

your figure or your hair or your smile.

You have a chronic illness that that you

believe defines you because you're constantly asking for

help.

You're at a family or reunion and everyone

wants to know come you're not married or

how come you don't have kids.

And the list could go on because almost

any situation is liable of producing shame in.

So what is shame? I wanna offer this

definition. This is just my own as I

prayed and and thought and thought about this

topic this week. Here's what I I put

together

I think Shame is the emotional response to

feeling exposed. Think again of Adam and Eve.

The emotional response. I feel suddenly exposed especially

morally. You feel caught in something or exposed

in some kind of way.

It creates shame creates a vulnerable moment where

judgment looms leaving us, feeling humility, not just

judgment from God, but judgment from another person.

Leaving us feeling humiliated un worthy or disgusted.

Shame is associated with pain, and therefore, our

response to shame

often is

just disguised is anger or fear. You might

respond in anger. You might respond in fear,

but maybe underneath shame is what's going on.

And to speak a little bit more about

shame, it's often talked about that guilt. When

we think about the difference between guilt and

shame, guilt is something I did. I feel

guilty for this act action that I did.

Shame is I feel un about myself.

Shame is at the level of your identity.

Shame strikes our identity. So you might think

of the cluster of things that make up

your identity for me, example... For example, how

I think about myself. I'm a Christian.

I'm a white male. I'm an American. I'm

intelligent.

Shame strikes at your identity. The central part

of you to say, 1 of these this

parts of you. 1 of these clusters of

you is un is flawed is discuss testing

is repulsive in some form of way.

And every human experience is shame, even those

who don't know God. Everyone experiences shame in

some way because at our core level, we

were made by loving God to live in

a relationship with him. And when we become

out of alignment with him. That disconnect, we

will feel exposed and will feel this

of shame. Remember, Shame is not

introduced to humanity until after sin is in

the world.

So shame is a response of soul of

being exposed and out of alignment to how

God made you. You can think of it

like this shame is an uncovering

It is is feeling like I did not

want to be uncovered and yet I am

uncovered to other people or to God. I'm

uncovered in a way that is uncomfortable for

me. That I wasn't wanting to be.

It can over us as the fear of

being found out or of maintaining the disconnect

between our public and private life's begin to

grow. Where everyone sees a public version of

us, but a private life where secrets are

kept. That's this this growing rift that she

makes in our lives.

And because of this unchecked shame

is very dangerous.

It's actually quite dangerous. If you think you

hear stories of pastors

or of Christian leaders to have moral failings.

And it comes to light that,

behind the scenes, you thought they were a

certain way. You thought they had this appearance,

but behind the scenes,

they... There was a an affair that happened

or porn addiction, or, they were abusing alcohol

or medicine some kind of way. And you

thought how in the world did that happen?

Almost every time it is because there is

an identity of them a public identity and

then there was a private life.

There was shame that was growing, and they

were unwilling to ask for to seek help

to share with others what was going on.

And as this gulf gets wider, it becomes

harder and harder to cross. Unchecked shame is

actually very dangerous.

Shame prefers to keep us hidden and isolated

again to of Adam and eve, hiding and

isolating from God and from 1 another.

So our song today

our song today describes a moment of shame.

And the Psalm, he's writing in the first

person, but he's kind of writing on behalf

of the whole nation. This is a moment

where it seems like on the nation of

Israel has been taken over and

and the the the Psalm can't understand really

what is happening, but feels personally

shamed in this moment.

You can look at versus 15 and 16.

He writes my humiliation is daily before me.

Shame has covered my my face because of

the tau of the markers and the bla

fevers. He's describing the face. Think about shame

connected to your face. Often when you feel

ashamed. You can see it that a person's

face. I know my face. I I turn

beet red when I feel

embarrassed or shamed in some kind of way.

You feel flushed. You're red... We even have

a saying. You're red faced.

You can see shame on the face. Someone

feeling ashamed often won't look you in the

eyes.

They'll avert their gaze because there's a a

humiliation that they feel in the moment.

People are making fun of the Psalm because

of the tau of the markers and the

bla femur. They're mocking him again attacking at

the level of identity. This who you are?

I'm attacking that very. I'm mocking, who... What

you hold your identity and you think you're

a special chosen person and of God and

look at you now, there's a making fun

of a core identity aspect.

As you read on through the psalm,

it becomes clear actually that God has allowed

this shame to happen.

He's actually allowed it in the life of

Israel, the life of the Psalm. So the

Psalm is upset because he wants to know,

all this has come upon us,

but we haven't forgotten you.

Though you thrust this down into a place

of measure you've covered us over with the

deep darkness. So something has happened that causes

this shame.

The Psalm admits guide you knew about it

You knew what was going on and you

allowed this to happen.

You allowed this shame to happen in my

life. It you're forcing us down into the

darkness. Maybe you're even putting some of the

shame on right now, God.

And the question is that you wanna ask

as you wrestle with this is

Why?

Why would a good and loving God allow

this nation of Israel or this particular person

to experience shame. Why does he allow them

to go through this process of shame? To

answer this question, you have to think about

how do you respond when name comes.

When you feel overwhelmed by shame, how do

you respond and there's really only 3 options

that we'll think about. Option 1, when shame

comes, you can deny it and you can

associate from shame.

And you just deny it. You... It feels

so painful. It feels so bad. You push

it away and deny this part. You can

try to out run it, ignore, dis associate

from it, avoid it because shame is painful.

This is often the role that many Christians

take.

Too afraid to to let others see our

dirty laundry too afraid to make changes. Where...

What what often happens for Christians is you

have a vision of yourself as a a

holy moral good person.

And we're not often as good or holy

or as moral or as we think that

we are.

And so we don't wanna confront this part

of our life, so we we push or

we we push... I know I've done this

for years, and I've shared stories before. Of

how as a young minister, I was addicted

to success and addicted to

whatever it took to keep rooms filled with

people because I was acting out of shame.

I couldn't bear the thought that I'm not

a good enough minister to to minister to

others.

She denied associate that your your identity that

you're running from a shame.

The problem with this approach

is remember that your spiritual maturity in your

emotional maturity are often link

So if you can't invite God into this

area that's causing great shame in your life.

You're missing

how God actually wants to change you. How

he wants to grow you, How he wants

to empower you, How he wants to bless

you, How he wants to move you to

make you into a new person to give

you the identity of Christ. If you can't

invite him into the area of your shame.

You're missing out on the holy spirit actually

interacting in your life.

So this process of

denying or dis associating from shame,

it doesn't actually work and helping you grow

closer to God. Actually, it's quite dangerous as

many of you know,

what'll eventually happen anyway is it'll always come

out.

As as much as try to make a

difference between your public and your private life,

the private life will always come out because

there is no such thing as private sin.

Sin is always public because it's always before

God and it always affects others. So you

can't maintain the image even that you're trying

to maintain anyway. This way doesn't work. Option

1. Option 2,

you can accept and embrace shame. So if

option 1 is deny it, then option 2,

the pain of shame is so shame is

so great. You just step into it and

say well, Embrace it. This is who I

am. This is my identity and I'll live

in this kind of way.

This is often the position our culture takes.

Things that might breathe in shame. You think

of particularly greedy lifestyle or another lifestyle, You

embrace it and just say this is who

Am. I don't care.

This is my identity. And if you don't

like it, that's your problem them.

And maybe some of you saw the opening

of the Paris Olympics, and I know a

lot of people are talking about this this

moment of Mock

of Christians at the last supper by men

dressed women.

And just kind of this moment of of

degradation and just shame of saying, this is

who I am. And I will be this

way and you must accept it.

And I know there's different cultural commentary going

on around this moment.

For me it's 1 of sadness,

actually,

because to embrace shame still doesn't actually deal

with the core... The poor problem of I

feeling un worthy.

Right? Like, III

can stand and dress however I want, and

I can do whatever I want, but I'm

not actually solving the I do feel un

at core.

Now idea for this, the the problem of

this approach though,

here's the problem of this 1. Is

you have to silence your conscience

in order to do this.

And your conscience is 1 of the primary

ways God calls you to himself, begins to

call you to himself. Because as you first

enter into a relationship with God, 1 of

the first things you realize is he is

holy I am not. It's like the starting

point and he often does that through our

conscience.

So in order to embrace shame, you have

to silence your conscience.

So neither denying shame nor embracing shame can

lead you closer to god, and isn't that

what every human wants

is to stand closer to who is ultimate

reality? Who's the god who made? I wanna

live closer to him in some kind of

way.

This is where I wanna say this is

a third option.

This is

what I would call the gospel option. This

is why I would say shame is actually

a gift because when you experience shame, rather

than denying rather than embracing,

you can actually repent of shame. And what

do I mean by repent of shame.

Remember that every

emotion is revealing something about our soul. It's

revealing. You have a belief about something going

on here.

Shame, what is shame reveal? Shame reveals our

idol.

Shame shows where we're trusting something other than

God to make us happy or secure or

to protect us in some kind of way.

The most sync definition of an idol, again,

not like, a little stone statue that statue

that you worship, but a belief, a false

belief that you're holding on. The most distinct

definition I've ever seen comes from this, the

new city cat

Tim and Kathy Keller put this out a

number of years ago. And,

it is really fantastic for just short question

and answers. I know kids have used this

before families have used it before. I... There

was a point in my life where I

was trying to memorize all 52

questions and answers. And I'm I made a...

I made a dent, maybe the first 10,

But

but question 17 asked the question is

what is idol tree, and this is its

answer.

Idol tree or an idol is trusting and

created things

rather than the creator

for our hope, and our happiness,

our significance

and security.

Trusting in something

other than God for hope happiness significant security.

Shame in that feeling of being exposed, and

you feel that exposure

in shame.

It's the realization

that because you feel so uncomfortable. There there's

something else that you're also expecting to fill

your hope your happiness your significance your security.

It doesn't mean you don't trust in God.

It just means and this is part of

spiritual formation. It's constantly learning God. Where are

my idol every day of my life. It's

saying, in addition to Loving God, I've also

been trusting in this other thing, this other

identity about myself to bring me hope, happiness,

significant security, maybe my intelligence,

my artistic ability, my looks,

my work ethic, my reputation.

We go back to the question. Why does

God allow you to experience shame And I

would say God allows you to experience shame

in hopes,

you will see your idol and be drawn

closer to him.

Though shame makes you feel uncovered

The process of shame actually uncover your idol.

Let me say that again. Shame makes you

feel exposed.

But if you dig into why you're feeling

exposed, it exposes your idol, shame makes you

feel covered, but it gives you the opportunity

for you to uncover what you're still trusting

to uncover your idol.

This is now the gift of shame because

when you have the feeling of being found

out or being exposed,

You say there's something internal in my heart

that I'm trusting in besides God to cover

me right now to bless me to protect

me to make me feel important.

And the invitation of the gospel is to

be covered fully

by Jesus

and his work on the cross.

And what he did for you as the

final defining word

on your identity and on who you are.

So when you feel shame, the first step

is to investigate and say God, what am

I believing now about my identity to bring

hope or happiness to bring significance or security?

Can you help me to see it? Can

you help me to see what image of

myself

am I am I trusting in and you

want to you wanna to pull that back

so that I will be exactly who you've

made me to be a truly flourishing person

that you have made me unique

as only you can do. This is what

Paul says you do in the new testament

when you notice the sting of shame or

sorrow. He says this in second Corinthians.

He says, even if I caused you sorrow

by my letter, his first letter, there's a

lot of things he told them to do.

In in first corinthians, if you read through

it, they were getting it wrong.

And he says, even if I cause you

Sorrow by telling you to do these hard

things, I don't regret it.

I'm happy now, not because you were made

sorry, but because your sorrow, your shame. It

led you to repentance and godly sorrow brings

repentance that leads to salvation.

You can be made to look more fully

like Jesus. Shame invites us to re receive

the love of Jesus.

How does that happen?

Well remember the paradox, Jesus, who is God

who is beauty and glory itself. He takes

off his glory He's the 1 who climbs

up upon the cross upon the tree, and

he takes shame into himself. He drinks our

shame on our behalf. Maybe you've never thought

about it this way, his crucifixion is a

drama of shame.

He's executed publicly

He situated at a major crossroads. There's all

these titles above his head, the king of

the Jews written in every language so that

everyone who passes by I can see and

mock and humiliate him. He doesn't have any

clothing on is subject to ridicule. The meaning

of the cross is not just Jesus physical

suffering

but especially in his rejection and shame,

rejected and shamed by humans,

rejected in that moment by God.

Suffering a consequence that he himself did not

deserve. He was rejected so that you and

I could be accepted,

could be brought in.

Could have his glory, his beauty.

The pastor and theologian fleming rut in her

marvelous book, her home, the

She writes it this way.

When we say that Jesus Christ took upon

himself the sin of the world,

it means quite specifically

he suffered the shame and the degradation that

human beings have inflicted on 1 another and

that he above all others had done nothing

to merit.

And this is the great exchange that begins

to happen where he takes on and becomes

our shame and he gives us an exchanges

his glory and his beauty.

Hebrews verse 12 2 says Jesus, he climbs

up on the cross scoring its shame for

the joy set before him to honor the

father

and for the joy of redeeming his brothers

and sisters, being able to cover our shame.

Jesus en engulfed shame into his being. That's

what the cross is. Across is a covering

of all of our shame.

It's an invitation when you experience shame.

You're invited to rip off the fig leaves

for how you've been trying to cover your

self and to re receive his covering power,

his healing power, his his promise that his

identity, his work on the cross is sufficient

for you

that his work on the cross puts you

into relationship in into presence with his father,

and this is the greatest identity marker and

everything else is ordered underneath that.

The prop the process of noticing shame and

responding with

investigation and repentance, it's a crucial part of

spiritual formation a daily part. I suspect for

most of us most days, each of us

experience some measure of shame. There's something happens

that we feel some measure of shame towards.

And this process of saying, God, what is

what is going on here? What what identity

am I attached to right now? What do

I have a longing towards that you're wanting

to heal me of that you're wanting to

bring deeper healing into my life towards

or think about it this way?

Is there anything that you're hiding right now?

That you would not want

someone to know about, that you wouldn't want

me a pastor to know about.

Think about moments in your life where you've

experienced shame.

And when you have 1 of those moments

in your head,

realize this that what you're thinking about right

now?

God wants to send his holy spirit exactly

to that point. He wants to cover you

of shame. He wants to take what you

consider your greatest weakness, and he wants to

remake you exactly at that point from the

inside out, not just so you are covered

by the blood of Jesus so that you

take on the very character of Jesus.

The work is to invite the spirit into

your deepest points of shame,

making you brand new totally new. From the

inside out.

That's the promise. That is the gift when

we experience shame. It is the invitation to

re receive

the powerful love of God his healing power

and to believe again that the cross is

actually

sufficient

for bringing you into his presence.

So I'm wanna close and just offer

maybe just something that you do

this week.

There's 2 questions

that you could sit with, you could wrestle

with, or you can make just a daily

habit of of practicing.

It's are there any areas in your life

where you feel shame right now. Small areas,

larger areas, Are there areas where you feel

shame?

And if so, is there any area where

god might be calling you to pent a

fresh.

We're repent to him, telling others, you know,

some of the people I admire most in

life are those who have

have something in secret that no 1 else

ever knows about, but they do the hard

work of repent and confessing

and being healed of what they've what they've

done.

The healing cannot come apart from repentance. You're

only left with the options when you hit

shame of denying it or embracing it, and

this is the only way through.

It's actually to repent of it and to

allow god to remake you precisely at this

point.

Let's pray together.

Lord Jesus, we we do we never wanna

grow stale at the power of the cross.

That you are the god who

doesn't abandon us in our shame, doesn't leave

us wall in pain, but you step down

into it becoming shame itself on the cross

and then you're resurrected,

showing us that there is a new way

offering us a new way,

or for so many in here, Shame is

a daily reality

for anyone who needs to be set free,

I pray you holy spirit to come to

their hearts.

For everyone who is carrying just different pieces

of shame,

show us our idol.

We want to be more like you, Jesus.

We wanna be made in your character fully

free, fully loving the father fully loving others

around us.

Be asking him pray all this and the

name of the father, the son and the

holy spirit. A amen,

By the way, we go to comm today,

I wanna just make a note, every comedian

service, there are healing prayer ministers around the

room. And if there's anything that you feel

like

I'm just... I'm carrying shame in this way.

I would encourage you to go and spend

some time praying with them inviting the spirit

to come, trusting Jesus blood covers you precisely

at that point.

Alright. If you would now, please stand.