God’s Word is powerful.  It is greater than our shame. It is stronger than our fears and unbelief.  It can speak to us even when we aren’t yet ready to trust it.  God speaks to us through His Word because He wants us to know Him.  Shame can distort our interpretation of God’s Word, but as we read and meditate on it, we come to know what is true, rather than what our fear and unbelief can tell us.

When an artist feels freedom of expression, it ignites their creativity. They fear the judgment of others less. This is what happened for Anna.  Through God’s grace, she experienced healing from the hurts in her past.  She could offer forgiveness toward those who misjudged her.  She began to enjoy God for who He is, instead of who she feared Him to be.  

Growing up with a pragmatic father and a busy mother, Anna felt unknown and misunderstood as an artist.  It became easy, then, for her to believe that God would respond to her in the same way. As she began to be affirmed and released into her artistic expression, she began to believe that God delighted in her design.

We, as humans, will never fully comprehend God and His ways in this life.  Only when we are face to face with Him in eternity will we see Him as He is.  Until that time, sin and the shame that accompanies it, distorts our perspective of Him. As we stand in the truth of what God says about Himself in His Word, we can live with greater confidence of His goodness and faithfulness to u

Ongoing hardships and our own repeated sins can cause us to draw the conclusion that God is disappointed in us.  There must be some reason why circumstances don’t change.  And He knows that we can’t stop sinning, no matter how many times we try to repent.  John Lynch, speaker, author, and former pastor, teaches about the gift God has given us in repentance, so that we can live in hope and freedom.  He also shares the hope that God is not punishing us by our trials, but instead wants to walk with us through them.

Believing what God says about me and what He has done for me breaks the power of shame. Evil would like nothing more than for me to believe God is disappointed with me.  Even on my worst day, my identity is Christ in me.  John Lynch, speaker, author, and former pastor, vulnerably shares the story of how shame was birthed in him.  He swore no one would ever know. When he learned the truth of his identity in Christ, the lie shame hissed at him lost its power.

In shame, we interpret the way God moves in our lives to mean that He is disinterested in us, or is upset with us.  We may believe that we haven’t met His expectations, therefore our relational issues and painful life circumstances are our fault.  God, in His Word, reveals that He is intimately acquainted with us, and is nearer to us than we can imagine.  By trusting truth, we can begin to stand in His loving care for us, resulting in peace, hope, and joy

Prayer is such an important part of the Christian life, yet Believers can run into challenges that can be discouraging.  Some of those challenges, like shame, are internal. Others are external, from Satan’s schemes, to the issues that arise regarding public prayer. Paula Walberer, intercessor and prayer leader for an international outreach ministry, shares her insights in these areas of prayer, offering direction, insight, and hope.

 We can get caught up in the technical pieces of prayer as if it were a duty to perform, rather than a relationship to foster. Past teaching and experiences can hinder us from understanding this reality.  Paula Walberer, intercessor and prayer leader for an international ministry, shares her expertise on intercession and God’s heart for us in prayer.

God’s answers to our prayers can confuse us.  When we wait years for Him to move in our situation, or when He denies our requests, it can bring up shame.  We can blame ourselves for His answers that are difficult for us as people.  The more we understand God’s heart and ways, it can help us trust Him through the journey, knowing He is for us and cares about the details of our lives. 

Bringing a secret to light is a beginning step toward healing.  The Holy Spirit knows exactly what we need to grow and become fully free.  Patty Barry shares some of those steps that God led her through as she brought the secret of her abortion to light. God’s grace through friends, her husband, and spiritual leaders strengthened her and moved her toward the redemption and calling of her life.

An unplanned pregnancy led to a secret kept for many years.  The secret brought great shame.  Patty Barry shares her abortion story, telling about the effects of it at the time and in the decades after.  God’s grace began to break her free from the prison she created for herself.  She took her first steps of living in the light of His love

Keeping an unhealthy secret fuels our shame. It holds power over us. It defines us in our minds. It tells us that we are unworthy. Once we bring the secret to light before God and with safe and trustworthy people, the secret becomes part of our history and not what defines us.  We can learn the difference between privacy and secrecy, and live in healthy freedom from shame.  

The challenges of life can make us bitter, or they can mature us if we let God have His way in us.  They can also open the door to joy.  Mark and Sherri Tanner share how Mark’s stroke grew them in emotional intimacy as well as intimacy with God.  God’s strength in their weakness was proved over and over again.

  It is possible to move through life without shame, even after disability becomes a daily reality.  Mark and Sherri Tanner share about God’s faithfulness to them after Mark’s massive stroke.  The losses affected them and the stroke took spontaneity away, but they learned to lean on the promises of God to strengthen them for each day.  

Encountering the vulnerabilities in others can trigger shame in us.  When we’re not comfortable with our own weaknesses, we can avoid engaging with others in their vulnerabilities.  As we meet people with physical differences or disabilities, those with mental challenges, addictions, and experiencing homelessness, the encounter can bring up responses that reveal our own fears. By God’s grace, we can respond with humility and compassion, offering hope to a hurting world.

 If I haven’t processed the pain in my history, I will not have the tools to enter with empathy into the pain of others. Those in emotional pain will become a problem to fix, rather than a person to draw close to.  Growing in emotional literacy is a process. It takes time to walk through the losses we’ve experienced.  As we do, we become people who can offer the comfort of God, because we’ve felt it and know the power of it.

Shame hinders us from integrating with our emotions, which results in a breakdown of relational intimacy.  As we gain understanding and self-awareness, we can share that part of ourselves with others, creating connection. The more we experience comfort with our God-given emotions, the more we experience emotional security, which frees us to relational depth.

Our emotions are a gift from God, but we often enter our adult lives without a healthy way to respond to them.  They can overwhelm us, making us try to stuff them, deny them, or be out of control with them. We are made in God’s image and he is an emotional God.  By His grace, we can learn to submit our emotions to Him to have healthy intimacy with Him and others. 

Shame messages delivered through racism create deep harm.  They communicate unworthiness.  They rob hope. Through Jesus and His grace, healing can happen. When we know Jesus, our identity is in being one of His own.  It changes everything.  David Tso shares how coming to know what God thought of him began to lift his shame and freed him to return to his Navajo people with excitement for the future.