Dear People who Keep Company with God,
Recently, the Lord reminded me to deal with any remnants of shame which may still be lurking in my mind and heart. To properly discern if we are being influenced by shame we must differentiate between shame and guilt. The Holy Spirit will bring a sense of guilt into our lives to protect and convict us so that we might repent when we are wrong (see 2 Corinthians 7:9-10). Guilt simply means I did something wrong. Shame is another matter entirely. Shame is a feeling of worthlessness, it is a sense that there is something wrong with me, not simply I did something wrong. Thoughts such as,” I do not measure up” or “they do not want me around nor need me” are rooted in shame.
Every human being on this planet has to deal with shame as we are born under the influence of the orphan spirit. I have seen in the parable of the prodigal son in Luke 15 how we respond to shame apart from the grace of the Lord. The prodigal son dealt with it by withdrawing himself from his family, he gave up trying to deal with his feelings of worthlessness and inferiority and fell into rebellion. He lived up or really down to what he felt about himself on the inside. The elder brother never left the house, but withdrew himself from the family emotionally and tried to prove to everyone he was not worthless or inferior. He developed an attitude of ‘I will show you’. The parable also reveals that in both cases a revelation of the Father heart of God is necessary if we are to be freed from the stronghold of shame.
I began to pursue the Lord about how we can not only help people get free from the stronghold of shame, but how do we cultivate the opposite spirit in our lives and church. The Lord answered me with one word,“honor”. I began to get more clarity on this when I heard John Arnott speak about the story of Jesus visiting Nazareth. The people in the town were offended at Jesus’ teaching, wisdom and power. They only saw him as the carpenter who grew up and worked in Nazareth and thus refused to even honor Him as a prophet which was the minimum honor they could have given Him. Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor except in his hometown and among his own relatives and in his own household.” Mark 6:4. The thing that stood out to me was that one of the root causes of unbelief is our lack of honor for the anointing or spiritual authority that rests on another person’s life. “And He wondered at their unbelief.” Mark 6:6. I heard Bob Jones say it like this, “Your opinion is keeping you out”. The Apostle Paul pointed out in 2 Timothy 3:5 that lack of honor toward others is one of the causes of powerlessness in our lives.
John also spoke about how those we are most familiar with are the ones we can easily dismiss and dishonor just as Jesus was by His hometown friends. There is a lady in our church who would not be considered the most anointed or spiritually gifted person, however the Lord revealed to me a secret about her. He told me she is the most honoring person in the church. As I thought about it, I have never heard her disrespect or dishonor anyone. It is not that she is oblivious to the faults and failures of others; she simply has the grace to be able to speak of others weakness and faults without dishonoring them. I believe the Lord told me this about her because He wants me to learn from her example.
At the end of the service John led us in a prayer of repentance. First, he had us pray and ask for forgiveness for any time we had ever dishonored the Holy Spirit. As a sincere believer I spent years dishonoring the Holy Spirit. Every time He would touch someone and they would have an emotional reaction or a manifestation I would immediately be put off and offended. Second, he had us pray and ask for forgiveness for dishonoring others like Jesus was by His hometown friends. I have been guilty of dishonoring people and being resentful when I saw God using them. Finally, he had us pray and ask for forgiveness for dishonoring ourselves by discounting the anointing and authority that God has placed on our lives. Jesus said, “If anyone serves Me, the Father will honor him.” John 12:26.
Many Blessings, BW