From Shame to Security: The Gospel Truth That Sets Us Free
I stood before a crowded sanctuary, the heat of shame slowly filling my face as I realized what I had done. The looks women were giving each other across the room brought sudden realization to my mind as I subconsciously heard my words repeated back to me.
I had used the exact words that another Bible teacher used when teaching on this message. In the same tone. Not her content but her delivery of it.
Without even realizing it.
It wasn’t that my message was the same as hers. I had taught on this passage many times before, and it was my own content from study and research of God’s Word. I love to learn the historical and cultural context of familiar Bible passages, bringing clarity and nuance to how we interpret its meaning for our lives.
It’s something I have studied as part of my own education for a Master of Arts in Theological Studies. It’s something I have taught numerous times through online courses, Bible studies, and books.
These historical and cultural facts do not change, no matter who shares the content.
But part of my knowledge base included watching this teacher’s video series, and as I shared a portion of what she also covered in her video, for some reason, I articulated it exactly as she had, without mentioning her at all.
I don’t know why. I certainly didn’t intend to.
I had never done that before, and I’ve certainly never done it since. But I also have never experienced such deep shame as I felt at that moment and for quite a while following that event.
Why would I now copy someone else’s words and mannerisms in such a way?
I cannot explain it, yet it created a deep-seated shame that has taken me years to overcome. But as I began praying about the topic of shame this month, this event immediately came back to my mind.
If you have ever dealt with the powerful emotions that shame creates, you probably are aware that past mistakes and failures are a familiar soil in which shame grows. And sometimes shame results from things done to us that were outside our control.
The enemy knows this truth, and he will do whatever it takes to cause us to dwell on those thoughts, deepening our sense of shame. He whispers lies that we may internalize, such as “I am what I’ve done” or “I am what was done to me.”
Or, in my case, “I am just a fraud and not a real Bible teacher.”
These roots of shame keep us trapped, immobile, afraid to move forward for fear of what others think of us (and, ultimately, what God thinks of us.)
The Garden Where Shame First Grew
Picture Adam and Eve in the Garden, enjoying relationship with their Creator. God had given them the freedom to eat of any tree in the Garden except for the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. They had freedom, relationship with God and with one another, dominion over everything God created in the Garden.
Genesis 2:25 reports “Adam and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame” (NIV).
But the enemy lied to them and tempted them toward the one tree they knew they should avoid, and they chose to partake.
Genesis 3:7 tells us, “Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves.”
We read this and tend to think of physical nakedness, and that was certainly part of it. But I believe this nakedness is also in a spiritual sense, the idea that they had been exposed. They were desperate to cover this exposure and hide it behind the fig leaves.
That’s what shame does. It creates in us a sense that who we really are needs to be hidden because we are what we have done. Or if our shame is rooted in what was done to us, we live with the sense that we will always somehow be the sum of what was done to us.
But Genesis 3 continues.
Because God is both just and good, He cannot lie. He holds them to the consequences of their choice; sin and death have now entered the Garden and human existence. Yet, they are not without hope.
The Gospel That Covers Our Shame
In one of the most stunning and beautiful foreshadowings of the gospel, God “made garments of skin for Adam and his wife and clothed them” (3:21).
God sacrificed an animal, shedding its blood, covering the shame of their sin, and pointing thousands of years into the future to His Son, shedding His blood for the forgiveness of our sins, clothing us with His righteousness, and thereby covering our shame.
This is the good news of the gospel! Jesus took our sin upon Himself and paid the price of death promised in the Garden to fallen humanity. And in a divine exchange, He placed on us His righteousness that we cannot earn or achieve; it is a gracious gift.
“God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Corinthians 5:21).
This truth is seemingly paradoxical to our reality, however. We are now dead to sin and alive in Christ; yet, we live in this flesh and are still tempted and sometimes succumb to sin.
How do we live in a way that holds this tension between our status as the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus and our sinful nature that still sometimes wins?
Romans 8:1 declares, “Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.”
In other words, we are now justified before the Father and stand covered by the blood of Jesus and His righteousness. When we sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ, the righteous One (1 John 2:1).
Conviction of sin (the realization that we have broken God’s commands and hurt Him) comes from the Holy Spirit. That conviction should then lead us to confession and repentance.
“If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9).
Condemnation comes from the enemy. And shame flows from that idea that we are condemned before the Father and therefore no longer deserving of love or forgiveness. We have been exposed for our sinfulness and are now condemned. No longer worthy to be called God’s child.
But this is where the gospel confronts our wrong thinking and exposes Satan’s deception!
We were already condemned before the Father, unworthy of His forgiveness, and exposed for our sin when we first came to Him.
The Father Who Runs to Meet Us
Picture another father and child—a son who wanted his inheritance before his father even died, took the money and ran. Wasted it on wild living until it all ran out and he found himself hungry enough to eat pig slop. This wakeup call was a reminder that he had sinned against his father and was no longer worthy to be called his son.
And it was true.
The father owed him nothing else.
And yet, his father was filled with compassion for his son and ran to him, welcomed him home, and celebrated his return.
The father didn’t even address the son’s feeling of unworthiness; he demonstrated his love through His actions.
That’s what the Father has done for us.
When we come in sincere repentance, acknowledging our sin against the Father and our unworthiness to be called His child, He responds with Romans 5:8.
“But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”
You see, guilt says: “I did something bad” (and the gospel addresses this.) Shame says: “I AM bad” (and the gospel destroys this!)
Our True Identity in Christ
When we are in Christ, we are given a new identity. We are not what we once were.
We are chosen, adopted, dearly loved, redeemed, forgiven, restored—not because of what we do but because of what Christ has done.
“Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ. For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love he predestined us for adoption to sonship through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will— to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace that he lavished on us” (Ephesians 1:3-8a).
Paul wrote these words to remind the Ephesians and us today that we were created and chosen to be holy, and that is our aim in Christ. And because we are adopted as God’s dearly beloved children, we have been redeemed from the condemnation our sins deserve and brought into the grace and forgiveness of Jesus because He already paid the price.
We aren’t worthy in ourselves, but we are worthy through Christ.
We aren’t blameless, holy, or perfect on our own, but we are righteous in Him.
We are not the sum of our mistakes or of what someone else has done to us.
We are who God says we are.
Speaking Truth over Shame
Maybe you, too, have felt the sting of shame. Maybe you have said or done something that left you rooted in regret and unable to move forward. Maybe someone else has hurt you and left you with the fear that you are unworthy of love.
Don’t deny the gospel truth that speaks to your shame.
The Holy Spirit’s conviction will lead you to repentance, toward grace, peace, and joy in Christ’s forgiveness. The enemy’s condemnation is what leads you to shame.
When those feelings of shame rise, speak gospel truth over the enemies’ lies. Remember these words in Romans 10:
“But what does it say? ‘The word is near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart,’ that is, the message concerning faith that we proclaim: If you declare with your mouth, ‘Jesus is Lord,’ and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you profess your faith and are saved. As Scripture says, ‘Anyone who believes in him will never be put to shame’” (8-11).
Speak these words aloud until your soul begins to believe them.
It’s been several years since that night I embarrassed myself as a speaker. I have allowed that shame to stay with me for a long time, often listening to the lies that I have nothing worthy to share, that Christ didn’t really call me to this ministry, that I am just a fraud.
But I have learned to take those wrong thoughts captive and make them obedient to Christ (2 Corinthians 10:5). I know who I am in Him because I trust in His Word. I know He called me to this ministry because we are all called to share the gospel with whatever gifts He has given us. And I know that my sins don’t disqualify me from His calling because it’s His grace that enables me to serve Him.
Now, when I hear that shame voice that tries to discourage me, I respond with “That’s not who I am in Christ. Shame doesn’t define me. Grace does.”