Crucifying my Shame - How Faith Can Help Us Heal From Our Past

To be who God wants me to be means I have had to learn to keep putting myself to death so that I can find new life. Which feels absolutely rubbish! Because the process of being made new means confronting all the things we wish we could forget or try and justify.

Part of the reason why real Christianity, (that is Christianity that rooted in the Bible and in holiness rather than in emotionalism and reward), is so difficult to actually follow is because it means we have to die to self. Christ doesn’t give us space to pretend, to lie to ourselves, to justify ourselves, or to live in denial. Christ demands the truth from us because it is only in the truth that we are set free.

Easter Revelation

It began for me at Easter this year. The realisation that I had let me fears and my shame get between me and who God wanted me to be. As I waited for the service to begin I felt my disappointment and frustration building with so few people there. I blamed myself for not being good enough. I blamed them for not caring enough. Then people walked through the door. Then more came.

Then, half way through the service, whilst singing a song, I realised something. Our AV system had been broken for ages and our repeater screen at the back of the hall didn’t work. This meant that during the songs I needed to turn and face the screens at the front of the hall. I kept on telling myself and others that this meant I was making sure worship wasn’t about me, that I wasn’t distracting people, or making them feel looked at while worshipping. I found all kinds of justifications for why I had my back or my side to themm congregation during sung worship.

But as we were singing I realised that all of those reasons were my attempts at justifying my unwillingness to face the reality of my choice. I was looking away because I didn’t want to see how few people were there because I blamed myself. I felt fear and shame and anger and so I turned away because it was easier. Because it was safer. My heart burned.

And, I turned to face the congregation as we were singing. And it felt like something broke inside me. I saw their faces as they worshipped God. And I knew I had wanted them to be what I thought they should be. I had prioritised my ego. My desires. My idealised dreams. And I had to let it all go and meet them where they were. I saw their smiles. I met the eyes of a friend. And I knew I had failed. I had failed to be their officer. But I also knew, on that Easter, that I could begin again.

You Can’t Have New Life Without Dying First

I had to die in order to be able to live. That’s the hardest part of Christianity. New life comes through death. I need to keep on putting to death all the bits of me that I don’t need to have in my life. But that’s not just about stopping doing bad things or being a better person. Putting myself to death in order to live also means crucifying my shame, my fear, my regrets, my bitterness, my ego, my need for affirmation, my desire to be praised and loved. It means letting go of all the rubbish I’ve been carrying around and beating myself up for.

Over these last few months I have had to keep on learning that being a disciple, and being in ministry, begins with failure. It begins with death. I need to have the kind of radical self honesty which can address my own mistakes and failures and accept them for what they are without being broken by it.

For years I’ve carried around all the baggage of everyday brokenness that ice accumulated. Taking it out every now and again to beat myself up on my darker and more difficult days. I needed to be reminded that in accepting my failures and mistakes I was also finding healing and forgiveness and the start of transformation. Healing begins with accepting there is a problem, forgiveness begins by acknowledging our failures, salvation begins by accepting judgement. In each case, it means accepting that I am loved in a way which accepts me as I am but which also desires my transformation.

I needed to die to that stuff because carrying it around is like having a blocked sewer in my soul. It just backs up all the crap until it starts to flow the wrong way. That’s why Jesus says that it is not what we put into the body that defiles, but the it’s the stuff inside of us that hurts us. The shame of getting divorced meant I was scared to be loved and to love someone properly because I was scared they would leave me. Which meant I hurt people who didn’t deserve it by loving them out of my fear.

The sense of never being good enough in my officership candidacy process meant I felt I had to prove myself again and again. All I heard were the negative voices, I couldn’t hear the affirmations. The mistakes I made in officership meant I gave up on parts of my calling because they cost too much for me to live out because of my fear. Which just created more shame. Fear begets shame which creates more fear.

No Excuses – Try!

A friend called me out on this a couple of months ago. I was in London for some meetings and was speaking to someone who has been a mentor for me over the years. I was saying about the bits of officership I didn’t think I was very good at. She asked me whether I wasn’t good at them, or whether I found them difficult and so didn’t try because it was easier to say I wasn’t good at them.

She was right. Because I had let my fears and frustrations get the better of me and so I’d justified my actions rather than being honest about them and letting go of the fear that has driven my behaviour. Just like at Easter, I had to die in order to live. It’s a painful experience. But it’s the only way that growth happens, and it’s the only way to follow Jesus. This is part of what it means to take up our cross each day.

Being a disciple, and being in ministry, is hard. Not because of what the job requires or having to meet a certain standard. But because we need to be honest. I need to be honest. And Christ has a tendency to confront us with the truth in a way which means we can’t avoid it and we can’t justify it and we can’t hide from it. Sometimes this comes from words other people say to us. Sometimes it comes in worship. Sometimes it comes straight from God.

I’m A Child of God

For me, I have found these last months to be incredibly challenging but incredibly fruitful and transformative. I think this is the heart of being a disciple. Learning to be honest with ourselves. Accepting our failure, knowing it is redeemed and transformed, and that my mistakes are nothing compared to God’s grace. I know that there is nothing I can do that is beyond God’s love for me. Being a disciple means learning to accept that I am loved, accept my need to grow, and to let go of the burden of the mistakes I have made.

The things of my past no longer define me. I am more than I was. I can find new life. I can let go of my past, stop dragging all the shame and the fear around, and actually live the life God has called us to. Maybe you are in a similar place. Maybe you’re carrying around a load of rubbish and baggage that you don’t need and you just need to let go of. Maybe you’re struggling with guilt and shame and regret. Maybe there are things that other people did to you that you blame yourself for. Maybe you just can’t let go of your mistakes.

I promise you. You don’t need to carry it anymore. Who you are does not need to be forever rooted in your past. You are not defined by the worst things that have happened to you or that you have done. You do not need to live your life in the shadow of your past. New life is possible, as is freedom from the things that drag you down and hold you back.

All you need to do is accept that Jesus loves you as you are, for who you, and you will start to let go of all of the rubbish. Then you can start the journey to being who you were always meant to be.

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