Shame, another form of Pride

Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus,
because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of sin and deathFor what the law was powerless to do in that it was
weakened by the sinful nature, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful man to be a sin offering. And so he condemned sin in sinful man,

Romans 8 again ladies and gentlemen. One of my favorites.

You know we "good Christians" can often times forgive ourselves for isolated incidents that have occur ed in our past-no matter how bad they are. But we can't get over habitual sins and attitudes. I'm prideful by the way. Maybe people who know me should know that. And even though I might actually be less prideful this year than I was last year I am far more AWARE of the depths of my pride than I ever was before. So sadly, despite my growth in Christ over the past year I feel more prideful and arrogant than I ever have in my life.

Tough stuff. Especially because our Christian walk means trying to become more Christlike but continuously becoming more aware of just how desperately un-Christlike we are. It's a bit like climbing to the top of a mountain and only then realizing that you are still in the foothills.

Oh the shame! How Prideful is man! How selfish, how wicked, bent and cruel, how destitute. If you are being honest with yourself you are an ugly person on the inside. And while a shallow person is blind to these things it is the soul searching seeker of Christ that finds them within and is crushed.

But continuing to be ashamed of what has already been forgiven is to elevate the power of your own sin over the power of Christ's forgiveness. A very good friend of mine said that he spent years trying to get over a particular sin in his life and finally it hit him as if God said "Who are you to not forgive someone that I have already forgiven?" (see Job 38)

I once met a man who said that he would not become a Christian because he didn't feel right about the idea of some guy just forgiving him. He BELIEVED in Heaven and Hell. And he looked me in the eye and told me that if I wanted to go to Heaven that was fine, but it wasn't for Him because he was the kinda guy to settle his own accounts. He didn't deserve to be forgiven. That is the most distressing and the most arrogant statement I have ever heard. '

None of us like the idea of "cheap grace." But guess what, it aint cheap, Jesus died for it, and it would be narcissistic in the extreme to think for even a second that it didn't redeem every little part of us and make us holy. You can't make dirty what God has cleaned, and you can't make cleaner what God has cleaned. So stop being embarrassed by the "mess" and stop trying to clean up after him, that's insulting.