Guilt/Shame/Condemnation

We watched a video about a young woman who had been raped while she had been passed out drunk. She said, “It was easy to forgive him but not so easy to forgive me.” Am I like that? Forgiving others but able to forgive myself?

Satan never misses the chance to remind us of what’s been done to or by us. He would tell us that we’re not worthy to go to God for forgiveness but God promises that if we confess our sins He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Many of us continue to carry our guilt even after we’ve been forgiven. I know that whenever I think of how I led Pearl into sin, it almost breaks me to think of how I opened the door to her and introduced her to a way of sinning that was closed to her before I came along. I know God has forgiven me but that doesn’t undo the damage I did.

The problem is that Satan gets our attention with feelings of guilt, shame and/or condemnation and then he pulls us in. Once he gets us even a little bit, he has us hooked. We begin to think that the blood of Jesus isn’t enough and we begin to focus on the dead thing (that which has been forgiven). He enjoys it when we heap self-condemnation on ourselves. It affects how we think and feel and how we receive or give love. But God doesn’t want us held back but rather released and set free from all sin in our past. No matter what we’ve done or what’s been done to us. Jesus covered it all on the cross.