Cornerstone Mission Church, Sunday Sermon February 22, 2009
I am going to continue to tackle hypocrisy, the disconnection in knowing the biblical truth and not living it out consistently and faithfully. One of the traps of hypocrisy is the way we deal with shame.
1. When you compensate shame with hiding, shaming and blaming…
When I was a teenaged boy, I begin to notice a trend in my family. Each moving led us to a smaller home, going from a four bedroom house with a second floor balcony with nice big front garden, to a three bedrooms condo, and finally to a basement unit with two bedrooms shared by a mother, a grandmother, and three teens with an outdoor bathroom with no seat.
Along with this downgrading trend in housing, I also noticed a trend of diminishing number of friends who came to my home and diminishing disclosure about my family to my friends. An absence of my father who lived in the U. S., poorer living arrangements, my mom working so hard to make ends meet running a tinny bar serving barbeque chicken as anju for Korean soju and beer, I didn’t share what was going on with my family to anyone, not even to my close friends. God knows how much I loved my mom, but I wasn’t too keen on talking about what she did for living.
Shame is a powerful force that affects the fabric of human relationships. There is this subtle difference between guilt and shame. While Guilt is judicial in character, shame is relational.[1] Or, put it another way, I quote, “While guilt occurs when an absolute standard is violated, shame occurs in a relational context.”[2] Shame can be caused by guilt, but it doesn’t always. Did I feel shame because I did something wrong and caused hardships in my family? No, I felt shame not because I did anything wrong but because the image of my family didn’t seem to fit an image of a good and socially acceptable family. So, I remember growing up feeling shame about my family and even myself. So, I hid it. I did it very well.
Then, there is a way of relating to others through shaming. Often parents are masters at this sadly. You give a child this look of disappointment, rolling of eyes, shaking your head side to side, or yell at him in front of the whole world with your disapproval and disdain. It is to convey a clear message to a child that his behavior is embarrassing to parents and to him and this is the reason why he should stop behaving badly. When we learn to deal with shame caused by wrongdoings in healthy ways, it will result in doing what’s right for the sake of living with integrity and clear conscience.
But, shaming is an unhealthy and destructive way of dealing with shame. Shaming conditions us to avoid doing things that might bring shame to our family and us. So, if you grew up in shaming culture, you might have become very good at avoiding getting caught doings things that may shame and embarrass your parents and yourself; and if you are good at learning and excel in school, yours parents would love you and you feel like you are doing just fine, but beneath the iceberg of appeasing your parents, you are blinded to your ugliness. If you are not good at school, then, you live with this nagging feeling of shame; and you are convinced you are no good. This is what shaming does.
Another unhealthy, sinful response to shame is blaming. Consider Adam and Eve. When they didn’t listen to God, but instead trusted the serpent’s lies, they experienced shame which was good thing. If they didn’t feel bad about not trusting God and breaking trust with him, what we have here is two sociopaths. No, their initial sense of sin, shame over their guilt of distrusting God was good thing. The problem was not they felt shame, but how they responded to their shame. When they heard the sound of the LORD approaching them, in Genesis 3:9 we see them responding to their shame by hiding from God. That’s what sin does; we hide from God. When God confronted Adam and Eve about their sins, they didn’t come out clean with sincerity and remorse and shame, instead Adam blamed Eve and God for his sin, Eve blamed serpent for her sin (Genesis 3:11-13). Instead of dealing with their legitimate shame over guilt, they hid from God, shamed and blamed each other; their interest was not dealing with their own sins, but saving face.
Here are “Signs of Toxic Shame in Us” according to Paul Tokunaga.[3]
- When someone tells us, “What a great job you did!” we fire back, “No, no, I messed up with several parts of it.”
- When our personal piety seems “too good to be true” to others because it probably is. There is no shame that our “spiritual cosmetics” attempts to hide our true spiritual condition.
- When we are reluctant to talk candidly about our family, especially our relationship with our parents.
- When we have a hard time looking our spiritual leaders in the eye.
- When admittance to grad school at Cal or the University of Michigan or Columbia feels like a rejection of our personhood because Harvard and Stanford turned us down.
- When our public prayers are “I’m such a warm” offerings: filled with remorse, guilt, shame, and total unworthiness. Translation: “How can God stand me? He probably can’t.”
- When there is a reluctance to “own” our ethnicity. “I’m American (period, end of conversation, how’s the weather?).”
In the domain of relationship, we need to watch out for the temptation to deal with shame by hiding, shaming and blaming others to save our own face.
2. Acknowledge your legitimate shame over your crucified and buried flesh of sin.
There are ways to ensure we don’t become subject to toxic shame of hiding, shaming and blaming.
First, we need to learn to acknowledge our legitimate shame. Jesus said in Revelation 3:16, “So, because you are lukewarm-neither hot nor cold- I am about to spit you out of my mouth.” What is that lukewarmness that Jesus was so bothered by and couldn’t stand it? It’s hypocrisy of disconnection between what we know as truth and how we do not live it out consistently and faithfully. We need to acknowledge the legitimate shame over hypocrisy of disconnection.
Laodicea was famous for being important center of trade and communication. Its wealth came from the manufacturing a high quality of glossy black wool. And, it was also a famous for what was known as “Phrygian powder,” with potency to cure eye defects.[4] Wealth, fashion, and medicine… they seemed to have it all. What else did they need? Indeed, many lived as though they needed nothing else. When you live this way, you are going to be prayerless and dry because you lack sense of need before God.[5]
But, Jesus broke news to them. “You say, ‘I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing.’ But you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked.”
Some of you may say, “Well, this isn’t something I struggle with since I already feel like a worm and worthless.” I want you to know that there is a real difference between acknowledging legitimate shame and feeling sorry for yourself. Acknowledging legitimate shame requires seeing your self at the cross, where Jesus crucified your worthless self with him, put it to death; it requires you to see your own self remain dead at the tomb where Jesus was buried. Thereby, it seeks to understand your self having no power to govern or rule you any longer. What you have is the habits and memories of sins that must remain dead. But, self pity, feeling sorry for yourself, refuses to see your self crucified at the cross and buried at the tomb.
Ken Fong says this about healthy shame: “Healthy shame is an intermittent, proper awareness of being a limited flawed human being. It leads to the acknowledgement of your need for help from a higher power. It is the source of creativity. It is the core of true spirituality. It is the healthy sense of sin that led many of the tax collectors and prostitutes to Jesus to receive forgiveness.[6]”
How do we deal with hypocrisy of disconnection? We deal with it by going back to the cross and to the tomb and seeing our self crucified and buried, remained dead. There at the cross, at the tomb, we need to see with clear judgment the ugly and hopelessly dark and evil, completely bankrupt, wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked flesh of sin.
3. Fight to respond to Jesus who pursues relationship with you.
When you take each daily moment to see with clear judgment and with honesty your crucified and buried sinful flesh, it is then time to fight for relationship with Jesus.
Jesus said in Revelation 3:18, “I counsel you to buy from me gold refined in the fire, so you can become rich; and white clothes to wear, so you can cover your shameful nakedness; and salve to put on your eyes, so you can see.”
Whether you wake up from engrossed in the false promise of wealth, fine fashion and health to satisfy you or wake up from lost in self-pity of rejecting Jesus’ death on the cross for you, the battle that you must fight is fighting for relationship with Jesus.
Jesus says, “You don’t need to hide in shame any more. You don’t need to shame others or blame others any more. Look at the cross where I died, look at the tomb where I died, your shame is crucified, buried, and remain dead. Come to me because it is I who can cover your shameful nakedness.
Jesus says in Revelation 3:19, “Those whom I love I rebuke and discipline. So be earnest, and repent. Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him, and he with me.”
Jesus doesn’t stop at dealing with our shame by covering our shameful nakedness with his death. That’s not the end goal he had in his mind when he took up the cross and died. He wants to go further. He wants to dine with you. He wants relationship with you. He pursues you. Do you know that he’s been pursuing you? Do you know that he’s been knocking at your door? Do you hear his voice calling your name? If you would acknowledge your shame at the cross, at the tomb, there you will hear the knocking from your Savior and there you will hear his voice calling you.
[2] Stan Inouye, The True Samurai of God: Christ, the Cross and Culture, The Kaki See, winter 1984, p. 1.
[3] Paul Tokunaga, Invitation to Lead, IVP, 2003, p. 42.
[4] Johnson, Alan F. “7. To Laodicea (3:14-22)” In The Expositor's Bible Commentary: Volume 12. 456. Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House, © 1981.
[5] Keener, Craig S. “Contemporary Significance” In NIV Application Commentary, New Testament: Revelation. By Craig S. Keener, 164. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, © 2000.
[6] Kenneth Vyeda Fong, Isights for Growing Asian-American Ministries, Rosemead, California, Evergrowing, 1990, p. 95.
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