Leading People Through Their Shame
by Viv Thomas
Shame is a painful emotion resulting from doing something dishonourable and unworthy.
So shame is concerned with what we think, feel and do in response to our sins and
inadequacies. It is a very powerful emotion which deforms identities if not dealt
with properly. Shame is a right response in certain circumstances. If I have behaved
dishonourably and unworthily then it is appropriate that I feel a sense of personal
and social embarrassment. The Holy Sprit brings conviction of sin so we know what
we have done or avoided. This conviction surfaces in an uneasy sense of something
being wrong through to prostrate weeping before God. Our sins do bring us appropriate
shame but this sort of shame is a gift which is intended to lead us towards repentance,
forgiveness and freedom.
Shame is a wrong response in other situations. For shame is not just to do with
my sins but also to do with my inadequacies and the sense of guilt placed on you
by others. It is when you feel shame in response to your inadequacies or guilt imposed
on you by others that it is at its most viperous. Shame in this sense is the devil’s
work. Much of Western society runs on this sense of inappropriate shame. Capitalism
depends on my sense of inadequacy. For to sell me something I need to know that
without it I am inadequate or embarrassing. Advertising works hard at telling us
that baldness, fatness, singleness, ageing, etc. are all sources of shame of which
we should be embarrassed. The solution is then sold to us so that we can transcend
the shame which they themselves have induced. So what can leaders to help people
through this inappropriate, devilish and often crushing sense of shame?
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Articulate Gods Yes
To positively engage with inappropriate shame leaders need to bring to the people
they lead God’s celebratory yes! The whole point of the gospel is this ‘yes’ of
God. ‘Yes’ I made you, ‘yes’ I love you, ‘yes’ you are worth the agony of the cross
and ‘yes’ you will be forever with me. The gospel articulates the grip that people
have on the heart of God. Nothing articulates the glory, value and magnificence
of the church more than God’s response towards it. For all its flaws and occasional
ugliness the church is the most beautiful thing on the planet. Why? Because is has
Christ right at the centre doing his work of transformation through the power of
the Spirit.
Perhaps the story in scripture which captures this ‘yes’ most clearly is the Prodigal
son. This is the son who receives the yes of his father even though his decisions
have been of the most stupid and sinful kind. We are a church of prodigals. But
the Father still welcomes us and our return causes him to celebrate. But there are
people who have not wandered off through stupidity and sin and still need to hear
the affirmation of love from God. These people who are often locked in shame and
feelings of inadequacy but they need to constantly have God’s ‘yes’ poured into
their lives. The leadership challenge is how to ensure that these people are continually
hearing and engaging with the love of God so that bogus feelings of shame have no
soil in which to flourish. The prodigal sons shame was approprieate for he had rejected
his Father. How much more should we seek to help people who have shame which is
rooted in false ideas, cultural bullying and devilish plots.
There is one obvious issue which has to be addressed if you are going to minister
this ‘yes’ and it is you the leader. You need to know God’s ‘yes’ over your own
life and have to be ready to do almost anything to obtain and possess the affirmation
of God.
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Focus on incompleteness
It is difficult for some Christian leaders to live with the flawed nature of their
own lives and by extension the flawed nature of the church they build. The church
is a contingent community moving through history in broken reflection of her Lord.
In the world at any one time the church is making huge strides forward in one country
and committing terrible sins in another. This expanse is often reflected within
local church communities. This is able to happen because the church while being
‘complete’ in Christ is still on a journey to the fulfilment of that completion.
This is important when dealing with shame. For if we set up the idea that only sorted
and complete people come to my church there will be no room to process shame. Rather
than living their shame in the community – and seeing God do something with it -
people will go elsewhere. These days this probably means seeking out some sort of
isolated temporary oblivion through alcohol, anti-depressants and mechanical sexual
encounter.
The reality for leaders is that if we are going to do this well we will have to
live our own humanity out before the community. People have to be introduced to
our incompleteness and vulnerabilities. This is somewhat scary for both the leader
and the led but it is important if we are going to deal with shame and rob it of
its power. You cannot tell everyone everything but you can indicate some of you
struggles and it will be a great relief to most sincere Christians if you do.
All this means we have to consider what it means to live victoriously. I don’t think
living victoriously means that everything is fine. I does mean that when there are
problems and defeats I am able to bring them to God, repent and in the power of
the Spirit move on. Victory is not found in an idealised powerful perfection but
in love, struggle, courage and humility.
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Engage the world
The tendency for any type of community is to live only in self-reference. Once you
get a group of people together they are able to develop their own way of speaking
and relating which can exclude people from outside. We can sometimes build communities
with walls but no windows, no doors or fresh air. This is how irrelevance enters
and cults develop. The fungus of inappropriate shame is attracted to this sort of
enviroment in the same way as –to mix the metaphors - cockroaches love dark damp
places. So to deal with this the doors have to be opened, the light let in and the
air has to circulate once again.
This can happen in a thousand different ways. But critical is listening to the real
stories of peoples lives. This can be done through conversation, reading great books,
watching great films, building relationships with other churches, living out your
creativity, engaging with church history and reading the Bible well. All of this
gives a wider context in which we can place our lives and deal with our shame. We
are able to see where God is at work and where he is not. In short we are able to
receive wisdom and light. This will not need to be a one off attempt but a process
of continually engaging the world around us so we may understand ourselves and notice
the work God is doing. If we are to face shame and in the end face it down this
sort of process will be vital.
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Lead people to Jesus
It is Jesus who dies on the cross and shows us how to take the shame and deal with
it. He endures the shame of sin and curse in his own body on the cross. But he is
not defined by shame. His shame is temporary. Resurrection and victory is ahead
and the shame of the cross is eaten up in resurrected victory.
Our shame is temporary and transient. It is not our primary identity. Shame either
goes at an encounter with Christ now or it goes later on in the new heaven and new
earth. Our identity is gathered from our relationship with Father, Son, Spirit;
being members of Christian communities; our gene pool and the gifts given to us
by the Holy Spirit. Shame is just a tiny part of our lives and Jesus came to the
cross to deal with it confirming our new identity. So we lead people to the cross
and let them hang around at its foot and work out what this means for them. It means
shame is defeated.
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Restore shamed people
The gospel is about restoration. So as leaders we are always seeking out ways to
restore people who have done shameful things. We are in the retrieval business constantly
working out how this shamed person can come back to integration into the community
and live well for God. If people are going to be able to deal with their shame they
will need to see models of restoration. This does not mean we need to pretend that
nothing happened which caused the shame but it does mean that we will seek to restore
wherever possible.
For those with inappropriate shame there will always need to be constant invitation
to come and engage in whatever way possible. It is likely that they will need more
encouragement, more words and works of afermation which lets them know that what
they have to offer is worth the bother.
So to lead people through shame we articulate God’s ‘Yes’ over their lives, focus
on incompleteness, appropriately engage the world, lead people to Jesus on the cross
and restore shamed people. This is not a perfect scheme but a project we need to
take on. For in our so called cultural freedoms there are endless encounters with
shame and guilt.
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