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Shame, whose first cousin is perfectionism, also impacts our children.  Instead of allowing for vulnerability and failure, we try to perfect ourselves and others.  Dr. Brown puts it this way:

And we perfect, most dangerously, our children.  Let me tell you what we think about children.  They’re hardwired for struggle when they get here.  And when you hold those perfect little babies in your hand, our job is not to say, “Look at her, she’s perfect.  My job is just to keep her perfect — make sure she makes the tennis team by fifth grade and Yale by seventh.”  That’s not our job.  Our job is to look and say, “You know what?  You’re imperfect, and you’re wired for struggle, but you are worthy of love and belonging.”  That’s our job.  Show me a generation of kids raised like that, and we’ll end the problems, I think, that we see today.

Reflect

We will take a more in-depth look at perfectionism in 2 weeks, but what do you think about the interplay between shame and perfectionism?  How could fasting from shame impact your relationship with yourself, your children or grandchildren?  How does God’s love as seen on the cross speak to shame and perfectionism – not as a concept but as an influence on your daily life?  How do you think our schools would change if they focused on exploration (which includes failure) instead of pushing for perfection and performance?

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Matthew 19:13-15

Then little children were being brought to him in order that he might lay his hands on them and pray.  The disciples spoke sternly to those who brought them; but Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not stop them; for it is to such as these that the kingdom of heaven belongs.”  And he laid his hands on them and went on his way.

Pray

Let us pray:

Lord God, you gathered children into your arms, blessing them and praying for them.  Bless all parents, grandparents, teachers, and all those in parenting relationships with your wisdom and grace.  Make our homes a safe haven for your children, helping them to know that they are loved even in their imperfection.  We pray in the name of the one who blessed the little children, Jesus Christ our Lord.

Amen.

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While shame is more of a hidden factor rather than named player, its impact on our lives is vast.  It inhibits our ministry, damages our relationships, and keeps us in a constant state of avoidance; actively numbing our emotions so we don’t have to feel it.  In the words of Dr. Brené Brown, it is costly.  “We are the most in-debt, obese, addicted, and medicated adult cohort in US history” – using shopping, food, drugs, and alcohol to numb out unpleasant emotions.  We could also add frantic schedules, screen time, and overwork to our list of avoidance techniques.

Dr. Brown continues:

The problem is that you cannot selectively numb emotion.  You can’t say, here’s the bad stuff.  Here’s vulnerability, here’s grief, here’s shame, here’s fear, here’s disappointment.  I don’t want to feel these.  I’m going to have a couple of beers and a banana nut muffin.

You can’t numb those hard feelings without numbing the other affects, our emotions.  You cannot selectively numb.  So when we numb those, we numb joy, we numb gratitude, we numb happiness.  And then, we are miserable, and we are looking for purpose and meaning, and then we feel vulnerable, so then we have a couple of beers and a banana nut muffin.  And it becomes this dangerous cycle.

Reflect

Do you find yourself numbing your emotions?  In what way?  How does that impact your experience of the abundant life promised by Christ?  How does the devil use shame to hold you back?  How could you grow in faith and service if you embraced your vulnerability?

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II Corinthians 12:9-10

The Lord said to me: “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.”  So, I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me.  Therefore I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities for the sake of Christ; for whenever I am weak, then I am strong.

Pray

Let us pray,

Lord God, you freed people of demons, healed the lame, opened the eyes of the blind.  We pray that you would free us from the demons which imprison us, help us embrace the broken places in our lives, and give us a vision of the wholeness only you can provide.  We pray in the name of the one who said, “if the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed,” Jesus Christ our Lord.

Amen.

Please contact the church office if you’d like to receive the daily devotions through email.

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One reason Christians struggle with shame is that we value the call to humility.  To embrace one’s worth might feel like the sin of pride.  Arrogance runs rampant in our society.  We see the damage it does to relationships on all levels, from the personal to the national to the global.  We don’t want to be like those people.

But humility is not a matter of accepting shame as an ever-present force.  Sober judgement, when applied to self-image, embraces that we have been “fearfully and wonderfully made,” while at the same time recognizing that we are “in bondage to sin and cannot free ourselves.”  Humility involves letting go of the shame that says “I am not enough” and focusing instead on the gift of guilt through which God fuels repentance and the amendment of our sinful lives.

This is not a new concept.  St. Augustine in 211 CE wrote “Love the sinner but hate the sin.”  Martin Luther’s concept of being simultaneously saint and sinner offers the same truth.  We are enough by virtue of our Creator’s love and grand design, even as we are also eternally broken and unable to achieve perfection to earn God’s love.

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Romans 12:3-4

For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think of yourself more highly than you ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned.

Pray

Let us pray:

Lord God, fill me with sober judgement to recognize those ways I fail to live as your beloved child, those areas of my life in which I need to repent, and the many opportunities to serve your people.  But also fill me with the knowledge that you designed me, just as I am, and that you love me, just as I am.  We pray in the name of the one who handed bread to Judas, saying “This is my body, given for you.”

Amen.

Please contact the church office if you’d like to receive the daily devotions through email.