So Jesus was saying to those Jews who had
believed Him, "If you continue (abide) in My word, then you are truly
disciples of Mine; and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you
free." (John 8:31-32)
And a lawyer stood up and put Him to the test, saying, "Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?" And He said to him, "What is written in the Law? How does it read to you?" And he answered, "YOU SHALL LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART, AND WITH ALL YOUR SOUL, AND WITH ALL YOUR STRENGTH, AND WITH ALL YOUR MIND; AND YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF." And He said to him, "You have answered correctly; DO THIS AND YOU WILL LIVE." But wishing to justify himself, he said to Jesus, "And who is my neighbor?" Jesus replied and said, "A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell among robbers, and they stripped him and beat him, and went away leaving him half dead. "And by chance a priest was going down on that road, and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side. "Likewise a Levite also, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. "But a Samaritan, who was on a journey, came upon him; and when he saw him, he felt compassion, and came to him and bandaged up his wounds, pouring oil and wine on them; and he put him on his own beast, and brought him to an inn and took care of him. "On the next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper and said, 'Take care of him; and whatever more you spend, when I return I will repay you.' "Which of these three do you think proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell into the robbers' hands?" And he said, "The one who showed mercy toward him." Then Jesus said to him, "Go and do the same."
And a lawyer stood up and put Him to the test, saying, "Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?" And He said to him, "What is written in the Law? How does it read to you?" And he answered, "YOU SHALL LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART, AND WITH ALL YOUR SOUL, AND WITH ALL YOUR STRENGTH, AND WITH ALL YOUR MIND; AND YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF." And He said to him, "You have answered correctly; DO THIS AND YOU WILL LIVE." But wishing to justify himself, he said to Jesus, "And who is my neighbor?" Jesus replied and said, "A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell among robbers, and they stripped him and beat him, and went away leaving him half dead. "And by chance a priest was going down on that road, and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side. "Likewise a Levite also, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. "But a Samaritan, who was on a journey, came upon him; and when he saw him, he felt compassion, and came to him and bandaged up his wounds, pouring oil and wine on them; and he put him on his own beast, and brought him to an inn and took care of him. "On the next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper and said, 'Take care of him; and whatever more you spend, when I return I will repay you.' "Which of these three do you think proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell into the robbers' hands?" And he said, "The one who showed mercy toward him." Then Jesus said to him, "Go and do the same."
(Luke 10:25-37)
In order to live as a disciple of the Lord, we have to abide in
His Word. His Word is His truth. It becomes a house that we live inside of.
Our heart is where the beliefs exist that shape our lives. What we believe to be true in our hearts is
where act out of.
But what does it say? "The word is near you, in your
mouth and in your heart" (that is, the word of faith that we proclaim);
because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your
heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart
one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved.
(Rom 10:8-10).
Our salvation is based on a belief transformation in our
hearts. We are justified before God on
the basis of heart-belief. This is NOT
the same as our minds agreeing with the Word.
No, there is a totally different process that occurs in the heart. We can be convinced in our minds of a truth
and still not embrace it in our heart.
"'This people honors me with their lips, but their heart
is far from me; (Mat 15:8).
Repentance is not a mind change but a heart transformation, an
actual change of belief.
1. Shame entered into mankind because of a heart-believed lie.
“Genesis 3:5 - “God
knows that in the day you eat of it – eyes opened – be like
God”.
· Adam believed lies: God is not good;
God can’t be trusted to meet my needs; I must act on my own behalf
to establish my own identity!”
“· When Adam sinned –
guilt, shame, fear, ‘hiding’ all entered.
· Adam experienced: 1) Loss of identity
(mask) 2) Loss of intimacy”
2. God’s Provision for Shame:
a) In the Garden – Skins.
· Genesis 3:21 - “Also
for Adam and his wife the Lord God made tunics of skin and clothed them”.
· God demonstrated His kindness and
goodness to Adam.
- Innocent animal slain by God.
- Skins to cover were provided by God.
- Adam had to remove his own covering.
- Adam had to receive and put on God’s covering.”
b) At the Atonement on the execution stake, the cross –
Righteousness.
and may be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own
derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the
righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith,
(Php 3:9)
· Matthew 27:50-54 - “God
accepted Jesus as the offering for sin”.
And
Jesus cried again with a loud voice and gave up His spirit. And at once the
curtain of the sanctuary of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom; the
earth shook and the rocks were split. The tombs were opened and many bodies of
the saints who had fallen asleep in death were raised [to life]; And coming out
of the tombs after His resurrection, they went into the holy city and appeared
to many people. When the centurion and those who were with him keeping watch
over Jesus observed the earthquake and all that was happening, they were
terribly frightened and filled with awe, and said, Truly this was God's Son!
(Mat 27:50-54)
Significance:
(1) Veil of the temple rent – All may have access to God. Hebrews
4:16
(2) Earth shook, rocks split - The devil’s
power over creation broken.
· Earth = the entire earth, all of the
land, entire creation shook in violent response to the shedding of the Savior’s
Blood.
· Shook = to agitate, tremble, come in
cosmic disturbance, throw into tremor.
· Rocks split = to divide, rend, tear,
split apart.
· A power confrontation in the spirit
realm – Colossians 2:14-15 - cause of the devil to loose his hold
on creation. “having canceled out the certificate
of debt consisting of decrees against us and which was hostile to us; and He
has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross. When He had
disarmed the rulers and authorities, He made a public display of them, having
triumphed over them through The cross. (Col 2:14-15)
(3) Bodies arose from the dead - Jesus offering accepted,
consequence of sin overcome.
· Romans 3:21-26:
But now apart from the Law the righteousness of God has been
manifested, being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets, even the righteousness
of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all those who believe; for there is no
distinction; for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, being
justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ
Jesus; whom God displayed publicly as a propitiation in His blood through
faith. This was to demonstrate His righteousness, because in the forbearance of
God He passed over the sins previously committed; for the demonstration, I say,
of His righteousness at the present time, that He might be just and the
justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. (Rom 3:21-26)
God’s provision for Shame is to clothe us
with righteousness and put His Spirit (His Glory) back within us.
Now, knowing this in your mind will not probably erase shame
because it lives in our heart. No. We need a different kind of “knowing”
this truth for us to become free of shame.
This kind of knowing is called: “Yada” knowing. This is an intimacy birthed
out of transparency. There is a dropping
of our own covering and exposing our heart to the truth, knowing that we will
lose something in the process. As much
as we want to be free of shame and its bondages, there is a fear that is
generated along with it that makes us hesitate even at the gate of
liberty!! This hesitation factor is the
sign that shame has infected our heart.
We are so afraid to fail that we hesitate even at the opportunity for
freedom.
David knew this torment of heart.
Most of the Psalms display the conflict between the voice of shame and
its lies which perpetuates iniquity from generation to generation, corrupting
the image of God, His Glory and the breakthroughs of truth and light that bring
us into our true identity. In the psalms
this is laid out. Like Genesis, Chapter
1 is more than the first chapter. Psalms
1 is actually the key to the whole revelation. Let’s look
at it:
How blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the
wicked, Nor stand in the path of sinners, Nor sit in the seat of scoffers! But
his delight is in the law of the LORD, And in His law he meditates day and
night. And he will be like a tree firmly planted by streams of water, Which
yields its fruit in its season, And its leaf does not wither; And in whatever
he does, he prospers. (Psalms 1:1-3).
At first this looks like a question of what people we listen
to. But the thing to notice is there are
voices, wicked voices who counsel or direct a person. These are the lies of the enemy and are
designed to produce shame and drive us off course in our lives into paths that
are of sin. Sin, or chet means to miss
the target. Sin is a measurement of being
off base. It means that a voice has
deceived us into a heart-belief that is causing us to be inauthentic, to be
less than ourselves, to wear a fig leaf, a deception to cover our shame. The seat of scoffers is the authority of
satan. When we sit in his seat, we are
driving his vehicle. We have yielded to
his paths and his methods. This is what
Yeshua described when He said:
"But the things that proceed out of the mouth come from
the heart, and those defile the man. "For out of the heart come evil thoughts,
murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, slanders. "These
are the things which defile the man; but to eat with unwashed hands does not
defile the man." (Mat 15:18-20).
Now, returning to Psalm 1, the solution is to delight ourselves
in the Torah of God, or Word of God.
Delighting is a receiving of pleasure from the Word. The key to this is meditation. The Hebrew word for meditation is “hagah”
which means to ponder, or murmur something over and over, or even to sing it
softly. Included in this an intense
focus on the object of meditation.
Meditation begins with receiving a Godly truth into our
mind. Then begins the process of
transferring or embedding the truth into our heart. This is a little trickier and requires some
work on our part and the grace of God, which he releases into our
humility.
John 6:63 (NASB)
[63] “It is the Spirit who gives life;
the flesh profits nothing; the words that I have spoken to you are spirit and
are life.
The pattern is given to us in Deuteronomy 6:4-6
"Hear, O Israel! The LORD is our God, the LORD is one!
"You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your
soul and with all your might. "These words, which I am commanding you
today, shall be on your heart. (Deu 6:4-6)
This is meditation explained:
1.
Hear the Word of the Lord as the Words of our
God, who alone is God.
2.
Love the Lord, become one with the Word of the
Lord.
3.
Then the Words are “on our
hearts”.
Now some key truths which when embedded onto our hearts with
transform our relationship to shame and thus to God and our fellow man:
“i) God loves me - “I
am loved!”
· 1 John 4:7-10
· The major remedy for shame is to know
the love of the Father.
· God loves you passionately and
desires connection with you.
ii) God has made me righteous in Christ - “I am
accepted!”
· Ephesians 1:3-6
· Because of what Christ did I am
totally accepted.
· Acceptance becomes reality as I trust
and lean on truth.
iii) God is good and can be trusted - “I am a
child of God!”
· Exodus 33:6
· Romans 8:15-17
iv) God has made me a unique ambassador - “I am
an ambassador of Christ!”
· 2 Corinthians 5:17,20
· Shame causes us to focus on self.
· Now – new focus = God –
representing Him, serving people.”
OK Let’s practice the first one, God loves
me. Receive this truth first as a
hearing. Hearing, opening our ears to
the truth begins the process of embedding, of faith. Now, let’s open the eys of our heart to the
truth. Ephesians 1:18 tells us: I pray that the eyes of your
heart may be enlightened, so that you may know what is the hope of His calling,
what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints,. The eyes of our heart is our
imagination sanctified by opening up to the Lord. This is the “love”
piece. The object of our imaginations is
our love object. So, now close your eyes and imagine Yeshua
looking at you with eyes of love. feel
His Presence and drink of how special you are to Him, This is living water that flows from
Him. As you open up more and more to His
flow you become more and more unashamed, accepted as His Beloved. Allow His Word, He who is the Word to love
your heart.
Practice His Presence this way each day.
Printable Meditations to Eliminate Shame
This weeks offering teaching: Living in the "Grace of Giving"
One New Man ministry is committed to causes of healing the sick, setting the captives free, binding up the broken hearted and bringing the good news of the Kingdom of God. Please partner with us.
You generous donations are appreciated.
One New Man ministry is committed to causes of healing the sick, setting the captives free, binding up the broken hearted and bringing the good news of the Kingdom of God. Please partner with us.
You generous donations are appreciated.
For additional study about abiding in His love in the times we live in, obtain and read the book "Love versus Law, or BOTH!" by David Mitts.
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