Guilt and Shame

How would you answer the following questions:

Do you live with a simmering sense of guilt?

Do you consistently feel inadequate?

Are you overwhelmed?

Are you afraid to take on new challenges?

Do you avoid people?

Are you defensive when corrected?

Do you assume you know other people’s motives?

Do you feel like you’re being set up by God?

My answer is…

“Yes”.

To all of them.

Today at church the sermon was once again about the good news of Jesus Christ.

Sunday after Sunday we gather together to hear our elders preach the same thing.

Sounds boring, huh? But it’s exactly what preaching should be.

It’s exactly what we need from our pastor/shepherds – to point us to The Good Shepherd.

This morning we were taught from the Old Testament book of Judges, chapter 13.

This chapter is awesome.

Manoah and his wife, the parents of Samson, get to see the angel of the LORD.

From the text it seems that this is a pre-incarnate appearance of Jesus.

Jesus gives them a promise, and then Manoah and his wife offer him a burnt offering in faith.

This is what it says.

Verse 15 Manoah said to the angel of the Lord, “Please let us detain you and prepare a young goat for you.” And the angel of the Lord said to Manoah, “If you detain me, I will not eat of your food. But if you prepare a burnt offering, then offer it to the Lord.” (For Manoah did not know that he was the angel of the Lord.) And Manoah said to the angel of the Lord, “What is your name, so that, when your words come true, we may honor you?” And the angel of the Lord said to him, “Why do you ask my name, seeing it is wonderful?” So Manoah took the young goat with the grain offering, and offered it on the rock to the Lord, to the one who works wonders, and Manoah and his wife were watching. And when the flame went up toward heaven from the altar, the angel of the Lord went up in the flame of the altar. Now Manoah and his wife were watching, and they fell on their faces to the ground.

The angel of the Lord appeared no more to Manoah and to his wife. Then Manoah knew that he was the angel of the Lord. And Manoah said to his wife, “We shall surely die, for we have seen God.” But his wife said to him, “If the Lord had meant to kill us, he would not have accepted a burnt offering and a grain offering at our hands, or shown us all these things, or now announced to us such things as these.”

I should die. But in Jesus Christ, I have an answer to my sin, and guilt, and shame. He became my burnt offering. Through faith in Christ I can gaze upon the glory of God and believe His promises are sure.

The Apostle Paul put it this way in Romans 8.

Verse 31 “What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died—more than that, who was raised—who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us.”

This is what I need to hear every moment of every day.

It is only this kind of grace that can free me from my guilt and shame. This grace fuels holiness.

If holiness begins with me just doing “righteous deeds” as my way to earn God’s favor…

Well, then I have just eliminated grace altogether.

And without the grace of God…

I would never be saved.

*I know I’ve been posting songs by these guys a lot lately, but their music just continues to blow me away.