Seeing with Different Eyes

The apostle Paul spoke of seeing with different eyes. “From now on, therefore, we regard no one from a human point of view” (2 Corinthians 5:16).

“From a human point of view” (literally: according to the flesh) refers to how the world the world trained us to view and think about others. We view others through the lens of some (generally unrecognized) set of expectations—religious belief and practice, moral codes, societal norms, social standing, economic status, political position, group identity, ethnicity, cultural traditions, etc. Using these expectations, we evaluate how the other conforms to them as well as how well they measure up to them. This way of viewing the other is a merit-based, deserving-oriented way of viewing others. It produces us-them, better than-less than thinking and relating.

Paul said he once viewed Jesus “from a human point of view,” that is, from his religious and cultural training. Paul considered Jesus to be someone who broke the law and failed to live by religious cultural norms. In his association with those who were ritually unclean and those who were social outcasts, Jesus challenged and undermined the clean-unclean distinctions upon which Paul’s religious culture was based. Jesus was a threat to Paul’s law-based identity and way of life. Even more, Paul saw Jesus as a threat to the nation’s security.

As a Pharisee, Paul understood the nation’s failure to live by the law as the reason for their experience of exile in Babylon. The exile was viewed as God’s judgment on the nation for their failure. Along with his fellow Pharisees, Paul was committed to keeping the law in order to avoid another experience of God’s judgment. They were determined to “get it right” this time. In Paul’s mind, Jesus and his followers, in their disregard of the law and Jewish religious traditions, once again put the nation at risk of God’s judgment. Thus, he was determined to eliminate that risk by destroying Jesus’s followers (Acts 9:1-2).

Paul viewed Jesus “from a human point of view”—through the lens of how his religion and culture had trained him to think.

How we view the other determines how we treat them.

 Paul viewed Jesus as one who disregarded the Jewish law and taught his followers to do the same. He viewed him as a threat to the nation. Thus, he persecuted the church.

All of that changed when Paul encountered the Risen Christ. Paul became a new creation in Christ (2 Corinthians 5:17). In this new creation, “everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new! All this is from God” (2 Corinthians 5:17-18). That old included viewing Jesus and others “from a human point of view.”

Being in Christ led Paul to see with different eyes. Through his encounter with the Risen Christ, Paul now knew Jesus to be the long-awaited Messiah—the Christ. This shift in how Paul viewed Jesus naturally led to a change in the way Paul treated him. Paul went from persecuting the church to serving Jesus as Lord. Paul’s identity became tied to being “in Christ” rather than to his obedience to the law. With the intensity with which he had previously persecuted the church, he lived as an apostle, proclaiming the good news of Jesus’s death and resurrection. He proclaimed the grace and forgiveness of God that is ours in Christ. Paul proclaimed Jesus as Lord.

How Paul viewed others changed, as well. In Christ, “there is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus” (Galatians 3:28). Old social distinctions yielded to the greater identification of being “in Christ” and beloved children of God. “In Christ, you are all children of God through faith” (Galatians 3:26).

The world has trained us how to think. That merit-based, deserving-oriented thinking shapes how we view others which, in turn, determines how we treat them. Being “in Christ” calls us beyond the way the world trained us to think. “Stop letting the world squeeze you into its mold,” Paul wrote. Rather, “be transformed by the renewing of your mind” (Romans 12:2). Transformation comes as our thinking, under the guidance of the Spirit, is shaped by the character of God and the ways of God that Jesus taught. That Spirit-orchestrated transformation results in a shift in how we view others. We, like Paul, see with different eyes—eyes that see beyond social and cultural and ethnic distinctions; eyes that see others as beloved children of God.

What would it take for us, like Paul, to “regard no one from a human point of view?” As those who are “in Christ,” what is needed for us to see with different eyes?  

God's Eternal Redemptive Purpose and God's Strategy for Achieving It: A Word for Today's Polarized World

The writer of the book of Ephesians tells us about it—what I refer to as God’s eternal redemptive purpose and God’s strategy for achieving it.

God’s eternal redemptive purpose is what God is working to bring to reality in the world. This purpose—one might call it God’s dream, the biblical writer refers to it as God’s will (Ephesians 1:9)—grows out of and is a logical expression of God’s self-giving love. The objective of God’s efforts is to bring unity to all of creation—“things in heaven and things on earth” (Ephesians 1:10)—under the lordship of Jesus. “He made known to us the mystery of his will . . . to gather up all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth” (Ephesians 1:10). The term translated “gather up” is a military term referring to the bugle call signaling the troops to regroup around the general in command. Those soldiers fighting in hand-to-hand combat individually or in small groups were to regroup around the general, restoring the army’s strength as a single unit.

God is at work to restore unity and wholeness to God’s creation. God’s eternal redemptive purpose addresses and seeks to resolve the rebellion that occurred in the heavenly realms and spilled over onto earth (Revelation 12:3-4, 7-9, 13-17). All things in heaven and on earth are to be reunited in unity through the redemptive work of God in Christ Jesus.

Each member of the Godhead plays a different role in this eternal redemptive purpose. The Father chose us before the foundation of the world and adopted us as beloved children (Ephesians 1:3-6). Through the work of the Son, we have redemption and the forgiveness of sins. We also gain insight into the mystery of God’s will—i.e., God’s eternal redemptive purpose—as well as an inheritance in that work (Ephesians 1:7-12). The Spirit marks us as God’s beloved children and is God’s guarantee of the inheritance that is ours in Christ Jesus (Ephesians 1:13-14).

God’s strategy for restoring the oneness of creation is to model the surpassing beauty and wisdom of God’s ways of grace. The self-giving work of each member of the Godhead demonstrates that beauty and wisdom. The work of the Father is “to the praise of his glorious grace” (Ephesians 1:6). Through the work of Jesus, the Son, we who are the beloved children of God and the followers of Jesus “live for the praise of his glory” (Ephesians 1:12). The work of the Spirit is “to the praise of his glory” (Ephesians 1:14). God’s glory is God’s character of self-giving, servant love.

God’s eternal redemptive purpose is a demonstration of the beauty of the way of life in the Godhead. It is an expression of God’s character of self-giving, servant love.

The strategy of the Godhead centers around the beloved children of God who are followers of Jesus, living “for the praise of his glory” (Ephesians 1:12). God’s intent is for us, the church, to live together in a Spirit-based unity, modeling the unity the Godhead is seeking to restore to creation. Through the work of the Godhead, we become a new expression of humanity—“that he might create in himself one new humanity” (Ephesians 2:15). We are a holy temple, “a dwelling place for God” on earth (Ephesians 2:22). We demonstrate the surpassing greatness of God’s servant ways of grace by how we live in together in unity and oneness.

The strategy of the Godhead for achieving God’s eternal redemptive purpose depends upon the church. We, the followers of Jesus, are called to be God’s partners in doing God’s work and achieving God’s eternal redemptive purpose. Living the ways of God that Jesus taught, we are a demonstration of the surpassing greatness of God’s servant ways of grace.

This strategy calls us beyond how the world trained us to think and live—“following the course of this world” (Ephesians 2:1). In the world’s way of thinking and living, differences—diversity—are a source of division and alienation.

Differences trigger a pattern of thinking and relating that has been repeated in seemingly every culture and country throughout the centuries. Differences trigger a comparing and competing mindset. We compare, identifying how we are different. Such comparing naturally leads us to us-them thinking—those who are like us, those who are different from us. Comparing also leads to competing. We seek to identify whose way is right and whose way is wrong. Comparing and competing lead to better than-less than thinking. “Since our way is right, we are better than them.” A large part of our sense of identity is unconsciously constructed out of this comparing and competing. “I am not like them. I am better than them.” Our sense of being “better than” them produces an egocentric identity. It is expressed in our condemnation, judgement, and rejection of them. Every time we judge another, we unconsciously say “I am better than them.”  

When we allow differences to trigger a comparing and competing mindset, leading to us-them thinking, we seek unity in sameness. Unity is only possible with those like me—those who think like me and agree with what I believe. Any inkling of disagreement becomes the occasion for conflict, leading to alienation and division.

In the strategy of the Godhead for accomplishing God’s eternal redemptive purpose, diversity is viewed as God’s design and gift. It is a source of strength for the community as each contributes their differing gifts and abilities (Ephesians 4:11-16). The church finds its unity in the midst of the diversity. This understanding is reflected in the apostle Paul’s image of the church as a body (1 Corinthians 12-13).

In the strategy of the Godhead for accomplishing God’s eternal redemptive purpose, unity is a gift of the Spirit that is to be protected with conscious intentionality (Ephesians 4:1-6). It calls for humility and gentleness, for patience, for bearing with one another (Ephesians 4:1-4). The unity of the Spirit is rooted in God and God’s eternal redemptive purpose (Ephesians 4:5-6; 2:18-22). Those things that divided and created hostility are set aside through the work of Christ (Ephesians 2:14-16).

The strategy of the Godhead for accomplishing God’s eternal redemptive purpose calls us, through the work of the Spirit, to put off the old self and its ways. It calls us to put on the new self “created according to the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness” (Ephesians 4:22-24). The Spirit leads us in this putting off-putting on transformation by training us to think differently—“be renewed in the spirit of your minds” (Ephesians 4:23). The Spirit moves us beyond the way the world trained us to think by teaching us the ways of God that Jesus taught. As the Spirit teaches us, our thinking begins to be shaped by the character of God and the ways of God. The constructed egocentric self, based on being better than others, is set aside. This egocentric self is what Jesus referred to when he said, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves” (Mark 8:34). We are to die to this egocentric way of thinking and living—“take up your cross.”

As the Spirit moves us beyond the defensiveness of the egocentric self, we set aside social distinctions. “In that renewal (of the mind) there is no longer Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave and free; but Christ is all and in all” (Colossians 3:11). “There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female, for all of you are one in Christ Jesus” (Galatians 3:28). The dividing wall with its hostilities is pulled down in Christ. He is our peace (Ephesians 2:14).

We live in a time of widespread polarization—politically, socio-economically, religiously, ethnically. The polarization is rooted in and reflects the thinking of the world in which differences stir fear. That fear leads to the alienation and division we experience all around us.

This fear-based, us-them thinking doesn’t seem to be working very well. All it can produce, it seems, is chaos and destruction. Might there be a better way? Might it be time for the church to model a different way that reflects the manifold wisdom of God (Ephesians 3:8-11)? Might it be time to try the ways of God that Jesus taught—the ways that lead to peace, not polarization? 

Our Ugly Underbelly

We saw it again this past week—the ugly underbelly of our human nature. We like to ignore it, pretending it is not there. Then it surfaces in ways that strip us of our self-deluding pretense, in ways that no longer allow us to deny its reality—like it did this past week in the Hamas-led attack against the villages in southern Israel.

People around the world were caught up in a whirlwind of emotions and reactions at the atrocities that were committed against Israeli citizens—men and women, children, infants, young adults at a music festival, the elderly. Some were quick to condemn while others danced with joy in the streets. Many reacted with horror, appalled by what they saw and heard, describing it as evil. Not-this-again dread and fear stirred in the hearts of Jewish people all over the world.

Of course, many were quick to lay blame at the feet of one group or another—Hamas, Israel, Iran, the US, Biden, the Democrats, the dysfunction of the U.S. House of Representatives, some present-day Axis of Evil. Their words of accusation reflect their own alliances and loyalties and priorities, not necessarily reality.

We may never know the deep, festering cesspool of motives behind the attack or the complex network of alliances that planned and financed it. Few of us can understand the convoluted historical, political context which produced and fuels the seemingly unending, life-threatening tension between the Israeli and Palestinian peoples.

As with our experience of 9/11, people are dividing into us-them groups. The focus is on “the other.” Blame is attributed to “them.” “The other” is being demonized, robbed of their humanity. One Israeli leader spoke of the Hamas as “human animals.” Such demonization does not just express our anger and hatred, it validates it, freeing us to retaliate in kind. It allows us to feel superior to the one we view as our enemy.

As with our experience of 9/11, a retaliatory eye-for-an-eye reaction is at play. Israel has declared war against Hamas with the stated objective of wiping them off the face of the earth—not unlike what Hitler sought to do with the Jewish people in the Holocaust. Their objective moves beyond the biblically based eye-for-an-eye retaliation. It reverts back to the practice of unlimited retaliation (Genesis 4:23-24) which the eye-for-an-eye law was designed to replace.

As with our experience of 9/11, we fail to acknowledge that unlimited retaliation—even eye-for-an-eye retaliation—breeds more retaliation. It keeps the cycle of retaliation whirling in constant motion.

Again, as with our experience of 9/11, our anger, hatred, and desire for revenge blinds us to ourselves. We fail to recognize that when we retaliate, we do to “them” what “they” did to us. We become like those we demonize as our enemy. We become the mirror image of those we hate. In condemning and attacking the ugly underbelly of our enemy, we fail to see that our own ugly underbelly is exposed.

Jesus addressed this recurring human pattern in multiple ways.

Jesus taught “do not judge” (Matthew 7:1, Luke 6:37) and “do not condemn” (Luke 6:37). He spoke of judging and condemning another as focusing on the speck in the other’s eye while being blind to the log in your own eye (Matthew 7:3-5). His teaching reinforces the truth that focusing on the other blinds us to ourselves. Judging another is an unconscious effort to avoid seeing what we do not want to see in ourselves—in the language I’m using in this blog, our ugly underbelly. Jesus called us to deal with the log in our own eye—those things about ourselves that we don’t want to see or acknowledge, those things we don’t want to believe we are capable of doing, those things that express our ugly underbelly.  

Dealing with the log in our own eye does two things. It positions us to understand and help the other with the speck in their eye—“then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your neighbor’s eye” (Matthew 7:5). It moves us beyond judging and condemning to understanding and compassion. We can never help another from a posture of judging and condemning. Helping another requires understanding and compassion.

Moving beyond judging and condemning to understanding and compassion is the first step, but not the last. Jesus also taught nonretaliation.

The nonretaliation Jesus taught and practiced was not a passive, let-them-run-over-you response. His language of “turn the other cheek” and “go the second mile” (Matthew 5:38-41) taught nonviolent resistance. The nonviolent response was intended to expose the abuse of power by people in positions of authority and the unfairness of the system that perpetuated the abuse. The nonviolent resistance Jesus taught called for a sense of personal power and dignity that would not react to the indignity embodied in the abuse. It called for personal strength to live out of who we are as the people of God and the followers of Jesus. Such strength resists the inclination to react, doing the same kind of thing the other did, becoming like the other.

Jesus taught a third principle. He taught “love your enemies” (Matthew 5:44, Luke 6:27), that is, “do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you” (Luke 6:27). Even more, using the language of unlimited retaliation, he taught unlimited forgiveness (Matthew 18:21-22). He taught us to live as children of our heavenly Father, loving as he loved (Matthew 5:43-48).

Living the ways that Jesus taught is only possible through the power of the Spirit at work in our hearts and minds. Foundational to being able to love our enemies is acknowledging the ugly underbelly we seek to deny—the proverbial log in our own eye. As long as we deny its reality, pushing it out of our awareness, it lurks in the shadows (what Jung called “the shadow”). It wields power in our lives, shaping how we view others. Its presence is seen in our judging and condemning them. Its power is broken when we name the log in our own eye. Acknowledging our anger, bitterness, hatred, and desire for revenge—our ugly underbelly —allows the Spirit to cleanse what is in our hearts. (The old fashion word for this acknowledging of our ugly underbelly is “confession.”) Acknowledging it positions us to see the other with different eyes. It positions us to respond to the other with understanding and compassion. It positions us to love as Jesus loved. It positions us to be a part of ending the seemingly never-ending cycle of eye-for-an-eye retaliation. It allows us to escape the power of our ugly underbelly.  

 

More than Sinners Saved by Grace

It’s a not-so-subtle theme in most worship services. Preachers commonly attack it in their sermons—if not explicitly, then implicitly. In traditional liturgical worship, we confess it as a reality in our lives. Even our affirmation and praise of God’s grace and forgiveness are painted against this backdrop.

This pervasive theme is sin. Our religious training has taught us to think of ourselves as sinners. We readily declare “I’m just a sinner saved by grace.”

Indeed, all of us fall short—the original meaning of the word sin. Falling short, not measuring up is a normal part of our human condition. None of us are full grown, emotionally-relationally-spiritually mature. We are still in process, learning and growing and changing (hopefully) in pursuit of ever-increasing maturity.

In addition, there is within us an independent spirit that trusts our own thinking over someone in authority, that follows our own way rather than that which has been prescribed for us. That independent spirit translates into a self-focused, self-serving, what’s-in-it-for-me spirit. This reality is reflected in the story of the garden in Genesis 3. In interpreting this story, we commonly speak of sin even though the word sin is not used in the story itself. The word sin is first used in the next story—the story of Cain and his brother Abel. The garden story is based upon our ability to choose—what we call free will—represented in the tree of knowledge. The story teaches us that choices have consequences. It also reflects that we, like the couple in the garden, struggle to live in faithful obedience to, in glad dependency upon God.

These realities—falling short, trusting our own thinking, following our own way, not living in faithful obedience to God—are defined in religious life as sin. Guilt, condemnation, and the fear of judgment are tied to these realities. These realities feed the shame-based identity at the core of our being. (See again the last two blogs.)

The apostle Paul goes beyond speaking of sin as behavior to speak of it as a power that controls us. He spoke of being a slave to sin (Romans 7:14). Paul also wrote that Jesus, in his death and resurrection, broke the power of sin and death (Romans 8:2). In him, we have been set free from condemnation and the fear of judgment. “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1). Through the indwelling Spirit, our hearts and minds are transformed. The self-focused, self-serving, what’s-in-it-for-me spirit is overcome through the transforming work of the Spirit. A Christlike servant spirit is engrained in its place.

All of this, of course, is the work of God through Christ Jesus and the Spirit. It is an expression of God’s steadfast, faithful love that never waivers, that never gives up on us or abandons us. It is a gift of grace. As the writer of Ephesians said, “for by grace you have been saved through faith; it is the gift of God, not the result of works” (Ephesians 2:8-9).

Sadly, many of us who have opened our lives to this grace and the transforming work of the Spirit continue to live out of a sin-based identity. “I’m just a sinner saved by grace.” We continue to let sin define us. Our focus continues to be on how we fall short and on our struggle of trying harder to do better. We fail to claim our identity in Christ as a beloved child of God. We fail to recognize, much less live into and out of, our identity in Christ.

Is “a sinner saved by grace” all there is to us?

The scriptures bear witness to our dignity and worth as the children of God and the followers of Jesus. Consider what the scriptures teach in addition to defining our sin.

·       We were created by God. “For it was you who formed my inward parts; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; that I know very well. My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret, intricately woven in the depths of the earth. Your eyes beheld my unformed substance,” (Psalm 139:13—16a).

·       We were created by God, in the image of God. “So God created humankind in his image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them,” (Genesis 1:27). “In the image of God” suggests we were created for relationship with God. A Divine Spark was planted within each of us so that we might participate in and share God’s life of love.

·       Because we are God’s creation, we along with all of creation are innately “good,” not sinful or evil. “God saw everything that he had made, and indeed, it was very good” (Genesis 1:31).  

·       We have been claimed by God in Christ Jesus as God’s beloved children. “See what love the Father has given us, that we should be called children of God; and that is what we are. Beloved, we are God’s children now” (1 John 3:1—2a. Also see Ephesians 1:3-5, Romans 8:14-17, Galatians 4:4-7).

·       We have been called to be the followers of Jesus, learning and living the ways of God Jesus taught and lived (the ways of the Kingdom). 

·       The Spirit of God dwells in us. “And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate, to be with you forever. This is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, because he abides with you, and he will be in you” (John 14:16—17).

·       God’s Spirit is at work in us, recreating us into the likeness of Jesus. “And all of us … are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord, the Spirit” (2 Corinthians 3:18).  “Beloved, we are God’s children now; what we will be has not yet been revealed. What we do know is this: when he is revealed, we will be like him, for we will see him as he is” (1 John 3:2).

·       God’s Spirit has given each of us special gifts and abilities to use in ministry to others. “To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good. All these are activated by one and the same Spirit, who allots to each one individually just as the Spirit chooses” (1 Corinthians 12:7, 11).   

·       God’s Spirit empowers us to live the ways of God, using our gifts to make a difference in the life of another in Jesus’ name. “You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you” (Acts 1:8).

·       As the children of God and the followers of Jesus, equipped with the Spirit’s gifts and power, we are God’s partners in the world, doing God’s work in the world. “Very truly, I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these” (John 14:12). (These ten characteristics are from Chapter 14 in my book Discovering Your True Self: A Guide for the Journey.)

A Christ-based, Christ-shaped identity moves us beyond our sin-based identity along with the shame-based identity it perpetuates. It frees us to live as beloved children of God, learning, growing in, and living the ways of God that Jesus taught. It frees us to deal differently with our natural human limitations in which we fall short. Claiming God’s gift of forgiveness, we deal honestly with how we fail so that we can learn and grow from the experiences. We break free from the toxic power of guilt, shame, and the fear of judgment. Living out of a Christ-shaped identity, we deal differently with our struggle to live the ways of God. We learn to live in glad dependency upon God, trusting the Spirit’s power to do what we cannot do in our own strength (2 Corinthians 12:8-10). A Christ-based identity frees us to live out of our gifts, using them to make a difference in the life of another in the name of Jesus. It allows us to live as God’s partners, bringing the kingdom to reality on earth as it is in heaven.

Thanks to the grace of God, we are more than sinners saved by grace. We are beloved children of God. We are the followers of Jesus who are learning and living the ways of God he taught. We are God’s partners who are led by the Spirit to love as Jesus loved.

Breaking Free from the Toxic Power of Shame

It lies beneath the surface of our awareness, carefully hidden and ignored. We push it outside our awareness so we don’t have to deal with the pain it causes. In spite of our efforts to pretend it doesn’t exist, it is very much alive in the depths of our being, wielding its sinister, destructive power. Ironically, it is our efforts to deny it that gives it its power.

Once again, I am talking about the issue of shame.

Guilt and shame were the focus of last week’s blog (“Dealing with the Toxic Power of Shame,” September 24, 2023). In that blog, I dealt with the shame-based messages that create a shame-based identity at the core of our being: “You are no good—flawed—worthless. You’ll never amount to anything.” After identifying some of the ways we attempt to avoid this deep-seated message and the pain it causes, I ended the blog with a question: How does the message of Jesus address and resolve these shame-based messages and our shame-based identities?

Does the good news Jesus proclaimed have the power to set us free from our shame-based identities? Can it heal the emotional wound that we carry deep in our being? Can it set us free from the emotional pain with which we live? Can Jesus heal our shame?

The scriptures clearly address the issue of guilt.

Guilt is the emotional pain we experience whenever we fail to measure up to the demands of some societal, moral, or religious code. Guilt is about wrong behavior—what in church life is called sin.

Forgiveness is the way to resolve guilt.

Forgiveness is the way God deals with our failure to measure up, i.e., with our sin. It is a gift freely given. God forgives freely, unconditionally, lavishly, even joyfully. Before we ever recognize our sin—much less acknowledge it, confess it, or repent of it—God forgives our sin. God does not judge or condemn us. God forgives—period, end of story.

We have a difficult time dealing with the unconditional nature of God’s forgiveness. Because we naturally live out of merit-based, deserving-oriented thinking, we want to put conditions on God’s forgiveness. “God will forgive us if we confess our sins. God will forgive us when we repent.” In this way of thinking, God’s forgiveness is conditional. We have to do something before God will forgive us. In this way of thinking, forgiveness is no longer a gift. It is a bartered exchange.

How God relates to us is not determined by what we do—i.e., confess and repent of our sins. Rather, God relates to us out of God’s steadfast, faithful love. God relates to us out of grace—out of love that is unconditional. Forgiveness is the primary way God’s grace is expressed. I would go so far as to say God delights in forgiving. It reflects who God is at the core of God’s being. It expresses the heart of God.

Forgiveness—claimed and accepted—heals the pain of guilt. It sets us free from self-condemnation. It positions us to learn from our failure. It allows us to grow through our experience of sin.

While forgiveness is God’s cure for guilt, it—by itself—is not the cure for shame. It contributes to the healing of shame, but something more than forgiveness is needed to set us free from the toxic power of shame.

As I said in last week’s blog, shame stirs on a much deeper level than guilt. Guilt is about wrong behavior. Shame is about who we are at the core of our being. Thus, it operates and resides in the depths of our being. In our formative years, shame was used to condemn our wrong behavior. Those shaming experiences trained us to think of ourselves as no good—flawed—worthless—as someone who cannot measure up—as someone who will never amount to anything. Our experiences of shame inflicted a deep-seated emotional wound—a shame-based identity that governs how we live.

Because of the depth of this emotional wound, we need an experience of grace that pierces to the depths of our being. We need an experience of God’s love that will reshape our sense of who we are at the core of our being.

Forgiveness is a vital part of this healing.

Our wrong behavior often triggers our sense of shame. We use it as evidence that we are indeed no good—flawed—worthless—someone who cannot measure up—someone who will never amount to anything. We view our sin as validation of our shame-based identity. To escape this self-condemnation—which reinforces our shame-based sense of self—we must learn a different way of dealing with our failure to measure up. That different way is embracing God’s way of dealing with our sin. We claim God’s forgiveness.

Forgiveness heals our guilt and relieves its pain. In addition, it defangs our habit of self-condemnation. It breaks the cycle of using our failures to reinforce our shame-based identity. It opens the door to developing a new, different identity—one rooted in God’s unconditional love.

When we experience forgiveness, we experience God’s unconditional love. We are exposed to a different way of thinking and relating—God’s way of unconditional love and grace. Our experience of forgiveness plants the seed that we are loved—deeply, unconditionally, just as we are, with all our weaknesses, failures, and sins. The Spirit nurtures that understanding, helping it take root and grow in our deep mind. (Experiencing forgiveness and/or unconditional love from another person translates the concept of unconditional love into personal experience, making it more believable.) Over time, the seed bears fruit. The Spirit leads us to a new, Spirit-shaped identity as a beloved child of God (Romans 8:14-16, Galatians 4:4-7, Ephesians 1:3-5, 1 John 3:1-3). A beloved child of God—claimed by God’s grace in Christ Jesus—is who the Spirit says we are. That’s who we are.

As with forgiveness, we have to claim this spiritual truth, embracing it as a reality in our lives. As we learn to live out of this reality, the toxic power of the shame-based identity is broken. The emotional wound begins to heal. We move beyond how the world trained us to think about ourselves (Romans 12:2). We claim our identity in Christ Jesus—a beloved child of God.

God’s forgiveness is the cure for our guilt. God’s unconditional love is the cure for our shame.