Have you ever noticed how we are the hardest on others where we are the hardest on ourselves? Judging myself makes me judgmental of others. What I don’t like in me, I see clearly in you. Self-hate, self-doubt, self-loathing…all lead to hating ourselves and others, doubting our worth we doubt their worth, and looking down on us makes us look down on them. Shame starts with me and is contagious. Shame is a spiritual chemical weapon. Silent but deadly. Killing everyone and everything in its path.
Shame condemns the person along with the sin, because of the sin. In contrast, guilt convicts us of sin but does not choose to leave us there. Godly guilt does not chain us to our sin, but separates the sin from us by lifting us out of the sin. Shame, in contrast, leaves us in our sin and in essence says that we are that sin. We are not sin. We do sin, in fact all of us have fallen short of God’s glory, but His grace washes away our sin and we become sinless because Jesus takes on our sin.
Jesus wore your addiction. Jesus took on your abortion. Jesus put on your secret struggle. Jesus chose to bear your shame so that you can be free. He does not want you to die in your sins. He doesn’t want you to go to your grave tied to your sin. He wants you to come clean so that His perfect love can cleanse you of all unrighteousness.
Jesus does not wait to condemn you. His mission is not to say, “A HA!!! I knew you were no good! I was just waiting here to catch you in your sin and make you a public disgrace.” NO!!! He takes on our DIS-grace and gives us HIS grace.
Conviction of sin does not have to be the final word on your life or mine. Jesus came into the world not to condemn us, but to free us from the consequences of our sins. Now, He won’t ignore our sin, because He loves us. But, He won’t damn us for our sins either.
Jesus comes to you and me in the most convicting way because He does not hate us. He loves us…in spite of our sins. I would even go as far to say that He loves us because of our sin. Sin is what brought Him here. Sin is what nailed Him to the cross. Sin is what keeps Him interceding for us to the Father even now.
Sin is what His grace covers, dissolves, eliminates, dismantles, destroys, eradicates, and defeats. So where there is sin, there is opportunity for grace. Where there is hate, there is a chance for love. Where there is doubt, there is room for surety.
Whatever evil you and I have done, whatever good you and I have refused to do – that is where HIS grace is applied. Let us not refuse His grace today. We all need it. Let this be the day that you and I allow the love of God to make peace with your soul and mind by admitting our sins and letting His love separate us from our sin forever.
Kristi Smith Author
