Imagine for a moment that you are sitting alone in a dark room, with little to no light coming in. The room, in this moment, feels as though there is no exit, no hope for rescue, and no perceived solution to this prison-like confine. Within this room the longer you stay put, the more accepting of your circumstances you become. The more accepting you become, the more certain you are that your feeling of ineptitude is indeed accurate. Paradoxically, your attempts to escape the room create such intense fear and anxiety that you begin to believe the lie that it is in fact better to accept your fate as a hostage of the dark room. As time continues to pass even the very thought of considering escape creates worry enough to feel overwhelmed, directionless, and unable to deal with and organize these thoughts. The result becomes a further acceptance that you will inevitably spend the remaining days of your life trapped hopelessly in this inescapable and unilluminated confine. You may be tempted to think the above description is an analogy of depression or perhaps even other mental illnesses like schizophrenia or bipolar disorder. But in actuality, it describes the feeling of something much closer to home, something most humans will experience to some degree in their lifetime. This description is that of shame.

Shame is one of the most vile, villainous, vindictive, and vicious lies we face as humans. That is to say that the very concept of shame is in fact a lie, and yet one which virtually all humans succumb to at some point in their lives. Shame attacks the very truth of who we were created to be, and does so in a manner that often convinces us that it is in fact the truth. Shame corrupts our hearts by holding us captive to the darkness, and convincing us that if the truth of who we are were ever to come to light, we would never be accepted, understood, or loved. Shame is, in my opinion, the most powerful lie our enemy uses to keep us hostage to our sin and away from an honest and forthright relationship with Christ. Shame grows the longer we allow it to exist within us; it amplifies, intensifies, and magnifies as time passes. The more we allow shame to remain within our hearts it establishes roots that feel irremovable. In fact, left to grow long enough we can be convinced that our very identity is in fact one of shame. But the truth under all of these heavy descriptors is that shame is in fact a lie. If we are to expel this lie we must learn what shame is, how it works, where it has potentially existed within our hearts, and most importantly, follow the example of Christ to shine truth into the darkness.

Pastor and Counselor Brad Hambrick defined shame as “illegitimate condemnation”. Where guilt is a legitimate condemnation, something that alerts me to my sin and my wrongdoing, shame illegitimately condemns us, and thus can hold us hostage as it provides no forward path. Guilt can be a healthy response to wrongdoing when it brings my attention to my sin and informs me that I need to seek forgiveness, repentence, and reconciliation. Shame on the other hand, as it is not rooted in any legitimate condemnation, attacks my identity by speaking lies about who I am and therefore how others see me, and worst of all, how God almighty sees me. Guilt speaks the message to my heart, “I have done something wrong and therefore I feel bad”. Shame on the other hand speaks the message to my heart, '“I am wrong and therefore I feel bad”. I can resolve my guilt by an admission of my wrongdoing, an ownership and confession of my sin, and a repentence and a turning away from said behavior. But shame, through its deceitful lies, convinces me that I am broken, I am wrong, and therefore it leaves me with no solution and no place to run to for help. In fact, because shame speaks lies to the very core of what we believe about ourselves, it leaves us to turn inward, hence the dark room we may feel trapped in.

Shame speaks many lies to our hearts, and all too often we fall prey to accepting those lies. Shame may convince us we are unlovable, unworthy, unfixable, or even broken or blemished in some way. Shame may say that we have no inherent value, that there is no purpose to the life we live, or that we are some kind of accident. Shame may say that we need to hide our past, our actions, or even what has happened to us, for fear that if others knew what really goes on in our hearts and minds, we would never be loved, accepted, or forgiven. All of these messages of shame are lies, and the only way we can expose a lie is to shine the truth onto it. In the gospel of Matthew chapter four, we see an interesting passage in which Jesus is led by the Spirit into the desert to be tempted by the devil. In this passage, the devil attempts three different times to speak lies to the son of God, and all three times Jesus refutes these lies with truth. If we look closely we can see in this example, set forth by Christ himself, exactly how we are to refute the lies of shame and of the enemy. First, Jesus recognizes the lie of the enemy each time. Each lie is a cleverly conceived attempt to veil a small truth behind an enormous lie. If we are to expose shame in our lives, we must recognize first that these lies begin with a small half-truth, and are quickly wrapped up in lies. Secondly, Jesus responds immediately with the truth of the word of God. Jesus does not defend himself, argue, or debate; he simply speaks the truth of scripture to the enemy and in doing so, refuses to allow the lies of the devil to take root in his own heart and mind.

So what truth do we have that might refute or otherwise expel shame from our hearts? I would direct us to the book of Psalms. It is here that we find the poetry of David as he endures hardships, celebrations, joy, pain, strength and weakness, all while praising God. In Psalm 139:1-3 David writes, “O Lord, you have searched me and known me! You know when I sit down and when I rise up; you discern my thoughts from afar. You search out my path and my lying down and are acquainted with all my ways.” The truth presented here informs us that God knows our thoughts before we speak them, knows our actions before we execute them, and knows our decisions before we make them. You and I are known by God, we are not hidden from Him or from his ways. David continues in verses 11-12, “If I say, ‘Surely the darkness shall cover me, and the light about me be night,’ even the darkness is not dark to you; the night is bright as the day, for darkness is as light with you.” That dark room of shame that holds us captive and feels hopeless for rescue, that room is not hidden from God’s sight, for darkness is as bright as day for God. In fact David describes in detail that wherever we go, we cannot escape God’s vision and sight, nor can we escape being known by him. But what about the message that shame convinces us of, that we are somehow flawed or broken beyond hope and beyond repair? Consider verses 13-16:

For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my

mother’s womb. I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.

Wonderful are your works; my soul knows them very well. My frame

was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret, intricately

woven in the depths of the earth. Your eyes saw my unformed substance;

in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed

for me, when as yet there was none of them.

We are told this truth very clearly in the Psalms, that God has made us, each of us, individually, uniquely, woven us together (a process that infers time, commitment, intention, and purpose) and saw our days and our substance before they existed. How could it be then that the lies of shame are accurate? How could it be that I lack purpose, value, or worth, if, in fact, God took the time to handcraft me? Shame is a lie. Shame uses our fears against us and ensnares us into its dark prison. But the reality is, all we need to do is examine the truth of scripture in order to expel the lie of shame from its grip of control on our identity. Counseling is a great place to begin to expose the lies of shame and the wounds we carry from it, in order to live a more fulfilled and peaceful life free from the fear of hopelessness that shame presents us with.