HOW DO WE LIVE UNASHAMED?

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In Christ, Mark

The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.

Blessed are those whose ways are blameless, who walk according to the law of the Lord.

Blessed are those who keep His statutes and seek Him with all their heart — they do no wrong but follow His ways.

You have laid down precepts that are to be fully obeyed. Oh, that my ways were steadfast in obeying Your decrees! Then I would not be put to shame when I consider all Your commands.

I will praise You with an upright heart as I learn Your righteous laws. I will obey Your decrees; do not utterly forsake me.

Psalm 119:1-8

This ends this reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.

As I have ministered to people through the years, one matter that seems to be commonplace is a person’s inability to move past a mistake they have made in the past. There are many people living in shame, ashamed about the way their actions impacted another person or persons, ashamed of how their actions disappointed the God who made them. For whatever reason, they are unable to detach themselves from the things they have done.

So how can we live unashamed in life? How can we avoid being unable to move forward because we’re anchored in our past?

Well, first of all, let’s address the second question first.

Why can’t we move beyond our past mistakes? Because we lose sight of who our true judge is.

You see, we can judge ourselves and deem ourselves unworthy of forgiveness. We do it all the time.

We can also allow others to judge us and determine our forgiveness off of another person’s willingness to forgive us.

Either way, there’s a danger of never finding pardon unless everyone is willing to allow bygones to be bygones. This is what happens when we allow the world to be our judge.

Compare this now with our God who is the only One qualified and worthy to judge us. Our God will forgive the repentant sinner each and every time, not harboring ill will but rather giving a person a fresh start, right with the Lord who is ready to guide their steps and keep them from having to come for pardon again.

So the first step is understanding you are forgiven when you ask the Lord for it. The second step is to then allow God to lead and guide you in His righteousness.

This is where we come to the following words found at the beginning of the longest Psalm in the Bible, the 119th Psalm:

Blessed are those whose ways are blameless, who walk according to the law of the Lord.

Blessed are those who keep His statutes and seek Him with all their heart — they do no wrong but follow His ways.

You have laid down precepts that are to be fully obeyed. Oh, that my ways were steadfast in obeying Your decrees! Then I would not be put to shame when I consider all Your commands.

I will praise You with an upright heart as I learn Your righteous laws. I will obey Your decrees; do not utterly forsake me.

When we allow the Lord to lead and guide us in righteousness, seeking Him and obeying His statutes with all of our heart, then and only then can we even start to approach blamelessness. For when we follow the ways of the Lord, we are walking a path that will not lead us wrong.

Our scriptures tell us that the Lord did not establish His precepts so that we might choose to ignore them. No, His direction was given with the expectation that it would be fully obeyed. There is no other option.

When we fail to understand this, our lives will be underscored by sin and that sin will draw us to feeling shame when compared against what God has commanded. If we find ourselves there, it only takes a prayer of sincere repentance to put us back on good standing with God and we can start walking His path of righteousness once again.

So given all this, how can we live unashamed?

1. We need to understand that we are forgiven when we offer heartfelt repentance and seek divine forgiveness.

2. We need to commit ourselves to walk according to the law of the Lord.

3. We need to obey and keep all the Lord’s statutes.

4. Ultimately, we need to seek the Lord with all our heart.

For in the end translation, He doesn’t desire a part of our heart. He wants all of it, fully committed to Him as He is fully committed to us.

 Amen.

In Christ,

Mark

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