October 26th, 2022

I Can’t, But God did

Sermon by: Pastor Harrison Chokka
​Summarized by: Aajah Sauter

Romans 8 
1 Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus,  2  because through Christ Jesus, the law of the Spirit who gives life, has set you free from the law of sin and death.  3  For what the law was powerless to do because it was weakened by the flesh, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh to be a sin offering. And so he condemned sin in the flesh.

Guilt and shame can suffocate us if we let it. We can be our biggest critics, and that often leads us to feel guilt and shame for an extended period of time. Sometimes, we experience so much shame that we hide from God, fearing he won’t love us the same. Today, I want us to recognize Jesus’ love for you doesn’t stop at your mistakes. I want to encourage you and affirm that it is quite the contrary.  

We are in part four of our “Untangling Emotions” series here at Kingdom Church, and Pastor Harrison had a heart-opening message to share. The theme of this series is as follows: “You can’t be spiritually healthy while remaining emotionally immature.” This idea comes from Christian author Pete Scazzero and his Emotionally Healthy book series. What does this statement mean? You can act like you have it all together when it comes to your relationship with Christ, but when it comes to evaluating your emotions in a healthy manner, you’re at a loss and, instead, choose to resort to old and unhealthy ways.  

Pastor Harrison encourages us to use this series as a mirror and not as a window. Use this series for some much-needed self-reflection. Not as a mechanism to point fingers at the problems of others. 

​Pastor Harrison takes us to Genesis 3, where we see “the fall.” This story speaks to the heart of who we are as people and sheds light on our natural inclination to hide when we feel we have done something wrong. 

Genesis 3
​6  When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. 7  Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves. 8  Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the Lord God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and they hid from the Lord God among the trees of the garden.

When Adam and Eve’s eyes open, they realize they have done something wrong and begin to feel guilt. Guilt communicates that “I have done something wrong,” and shame communicates that “something is wrong with me.” As a result, we internalize this guilt. Adam and Eve hide because they feel guilty. They knew that they had not lived up to their standard, so they felt ashamed.

One of the amazing qualities of God’s heart is that he always wants to call us higher and closer to him. What is meant for evil, he turns for good. So instead of using the feelings of shame and guilt to condemn us, he uses them to draw us near. Let’s break this down further. 

Shame is NOT a result of sin. Viewing shame as a result of sin paints shame in a negative light and shame is not always a bad thing. Shame came BECAUSE Adam and Eve sinned. Additionally, shame does not come from Satan, but rather, it is a result of listening to him. 

If you don’t take anything else away from Pastor Harrison’s sermon, please remember this. Shame and guilt are the proper response to falling short of God’s standard. God wants to use those emotions to guide us back to him. Feeling no shame at all is what's worse because that means we are comfortable living in sin and constantly falling short of God’s standards. When Jesus comes into our lives, there should be practices that make us feel guilty and shameful. God USES our emotions of shame and guilt to take us somewhere far better than where he finds us.

Luke 5
8 When Simon Peter saw this, he fell at Jesus’ knees and said, “Go away from me, Lord; I am a sinful man!”

This scripture calls us to recognize that “I am not God, and I fell short of His standard.” The proper response to the light that is Jesus is to feel a tinge of guilt. This vital takeaway is that Jesus does not cause these emotions, but He uses them. He uses them not to keep us there but to call us somewhere. 

The intrinsic fear of reading the Bible comes from the worry that reading it will reveal something about our nature that we don’t want to see. For this reason, we sometimes stay out of the Word to avoid feelings of shame and guilt. The truth is, the Lord doesn’t want to bring you to this shame and guilt but wants to show us for a moment that he has something better in store for us. 

Conviction is from God. This calls us higher. Condemnation comes from Satan, and he uses that to call us inward, internalize our shame, and cause us to hide from God. Furthermore, conviction is God’s attempt to free you, and condemnation is the devil’s attempt to enslave you. Guilt gets our attention, but God does not leave us there.

Genesis 3
9  But the Lord God called to the man, “Where are you?” 10  He answered, “I heard you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid.” 21  The Lord God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife and clothed them.

When the devil says “hide” or “suppress,” God urges us to run to Him instead. Some of us are hiding because of real shame, real failures, leaving us naked and ashamed. But God clothes us nonetheless.

Thank you for being here! If this message resonates with you and you want to see more, here’s our YouTube channel, where we post live sermons every Sunday.  

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