In you, Lord my God,
I put my trust.
I trust in you;
do not let me be put to shame,
nor let my enemies triumph over me.
No one who hopes in you
will ever be put to shame,
but shame will come on those
who are treacherous without cause.
Psalm 25:1-3

The Poet begs that God deliver him from shame.

I find it interesting that he does not ask outright for success. He doesn’t beg God for a win. He says don’t let me be ashamed.

The Fear of Shame

What is it about shame that is so terrible it sends us begging for God’s help?

What he’s describing here is a public humiliation. Think Hawthorne’s The Scarlett Letter, where the protagonist Hester Prinn gets pregnant out of wedlock and is marched down the street with a red letter A sewed to her bodice. Perhaps a more relevant example comes from dogshaming.com.

The poet is begging God for victory so that he won’t be humiliated.

Shame begins as a social construct. It’s used by families, communities, churches, schools and anywhere you can find a group of people to respond when someone behave the wrong way. But it doesn’t stop there.

Shame buries itself deep in our psyche. The scars of previous shame experiences can cause us to avoid opportunities of lead us down dark road.

Fear of being shamed leads to lying. We withhold our opinion or desires because of the fear of shame that someone will disagree and ridicule us.

Fear of shame leads us to isolation. I knew a woman who was very involved in a church community until she lost her job. She stopped showing up because she was afraid of the shame of having to answer the question “what do you do?” Fear of shame leads to inaction. I’ve known single men and women who were afraid to ask someone out on a date for the fear of the shame of rejection. I’ve known married couples who avoid sharing their true selves for the same reason fear of the shame of rejection.

Finally, shame and the fear of shame lead to numbing. We get sucked into wasteful behaviors and addictions to avoid the quiet moments where we hear the voice of shame.

Defining Shame vs. Guilt

If you can’t tell, I’m leaning hard on the work of Dr. Brené Brown, a well-known shame researcher.

Here’s how she defines shame:

“Shame is the intensely painful feeling or experience of believing that we are flawed and therefore unworthy of love and belonging.” Illustrate

The fear of shame has shaped much of my own life. I have felt ashamed to talk about my youth or my college experience, because I some of it was difficult or embarrassing. I’ve often been ashamed because of my finances. Throughout my 20s, I accumulated debt, had a hard time finding jobs or keeping them. I survived on beans and rice and the grace of strangers who took me in off the streets. I struggle with the shame of relationships. Making close friendships and romantic relationships have never come naturally to me.

While the poet speaks of being publicly shamed by his enemies, you only have to be marched through the streets once for this feeling to stick with you the rest of your life. My shame is often triggered when I’m alone. A memory of a failure or embarrassment pops into my head and I find myself reliving the shameful moment, mumbling aloud what I wish I had said. My heart races and blood rushes to my head. It can be worse than the actual moment of shame.

For me though, the biggest problem with shame is that I avoid risk. Any good opportunity requires risk, risk means becoming vulnerable to the shame of failure. Therefore, risk and vulnerability become a problems to be avoided and managed.

I find myself ducking around corners because I’m not up to talking to people. I don’t apply for jobs I should. I avoid building friendships that I need. Over time, I start to even avoid things that would bring me joy, because as Brené Brown says, When we lose our tolerance for vulnerability, joy becomes foreboding.

The Power of Absolution

Because shaming is a social response to certain behaviors, we need a social mechanism to counteract it.

The alternative to shame is not to avoid judgment or take on some “anything goes” attitude. The alternative to shame is guilt.

Brené Brown describes the difference between shame and guilt this way:

Shame is a focus on self, guilt is a focus on behavior.

Shame is, “I am bad.”

Guilt is, “I did something bad.”

How many of you, if you did something that was hurtful to me, would be willing to say, “I’m sorry. I made a mistake?” How many of you would be willing to say that?

Guilt: I’m sorry. I made a mistake.

Shame: I’m sorry. I am a mistake.

So what does it mean for Austin Mustard Seed to be a community that addresses shame? There’s a tradition of the church called absolution, that goes all the way back to Jesus. In one of the books about Jesus teachings called Matthew, he says this: “If your brother or sister sins, go and point out their fault, just between the two of you. If they listen to you, you have won them over.

A little later he says:

“Truly I tell you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.”

It’s a crazy thought, but Jesus is saying that you and I have the ability to address, and somehow absolve others of their shame! Brené Brown has an absolution of sorts that she mentions in her book Daring Greatly.

“You are imperfect, you are wired for struggle, but you are worthy of love and belonging.”

Many churches traditions incorporate absolution into their liturgy. My favorite is this one:

First, there is a confession, maybe a public one, like the one we did earlier. Or perhaps this is in a private conversation. After the confessor finishes, they use the following dialogue:

Listener:The Lord has put away all your sins.

Confessor: Thanks be to God.

Listener Abide in peace, and pray for me, a sinner.

Shame is a social construct, and we have the capacity to release others from it.

The post Can Humans Absolve Shame? appeared first on Chris Morton.

This is the one who patiently endured many things in many people:

This is the one who was murdered in Abel, and bound as a sacrifice in Isaac,

and exiled in Jacob, and sold in Joseph,

and exposed in Moses, and sacrificed in the lamb,

and hunted down in David, and dishonored in the prophets.

This is the one who became human in a virgin,

who was hanged on the tree, who was buried in the earth,

who was resurrected from among the dead,

and who raised mankind up out of the grave below to the heights of heaven.

The one who hung the earth in space, is himself hanged;

the one who fixed the heavens in place, is himself impaled;

the one who firmly fixed all things, is himself firmly fixed to the tree.

The Lord is insulted, God has been murdered,

the King of Israel has been destroyed by the right hand of Israel.

This is the lamb that was slain. This is the lamb that was silent.

This is the one who was taken from the flock, and was dragged to sacrifice,

and was killed in the evening, and was buried at night;

the one who was not broken while on the tree,

who did not see dissolution while in the earth.

who rose up from the dead, and who raised up mankind from the grave below.

Bishop Melito of Sardis 

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to loose the chains of injustice
and untie the cords of the yoke,
to set the oppressed free
and break every yoke?
Is it not to share your food with the hungry
and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter—
when you see the naked, to clothe them,
and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood?

Then your light will break forth like the dawn,
and your healing will quickly appear;
then your righteousness will go before you,
and the glory of the Lord will be your rear guard.
Then you will call, and the Lord will answer;
you will cry for help, and he will say: Here am I.

Isaiah 58:6-9

Welcome to Lent, friends.

The post The Kind of Fast I Have Chosen. appeared first on Chris Morton.

I am suggesting that the only answer, the only hermeneutic of the gospel, is a congregation of men and women who believe it and live by it.

I am, of course, not denying the importance of the many activities by which we seek to challenge public life with the gospel– evangelistic campaigns, distribution of Bibles and Christian literature, conferences, and even books such as this one.

But I am saying that these are all secondary, and that they have power to accomplish their purpose only as they are rooted in and lead back to a believing community.

Lesslie Newbigin, The Gospel in a Pluralist Society

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Fleming Rutledge from The Bible and the “New York Times”

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