Let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith. Much of the shame we may carry is our own doing, bad decisions, wrong choices, and their inevitable fallout.
But sometimes we carry guilt for things that are not our doing. Today, making an important distinction to help us get on the road toward a clear conscience. From the Moody Church in Chicago, this is Running to Win with Dr. Erwin Lutzer, whose clear teaching helps us make it across the finish line. Pastor Lutzer, as you continue teaching on the power of a clear conscience, it seems there's at least some good news.
Well, Dave, whether it's good news or not, it is news that helps us to understand reality. You know, three days ago, Rebecca and I had lunch with a woman because we wanted to hear her story. She was married in a very difficult marriage, by the way, but she told us about the abuse that she endured at the age of four or five.
I won't even mention it in detail. Horrible story. Now, here's the point. A young woman like that grows up feeling guilty, thinking that she's the one that caused the conflict between her father and her mother, so she might actually have a very troubled conscience. Now, this woman actually is dealing with false guilt.
Of course she's not responsible. So you see, sometimes, as you mentioned in your intro, sometimes our conscience bothers us because of things that we have done, but it's also possible for our conscience to bother us for things that we haven't done. How do we deal with these issues?
I've written a book entitled The Power of a Clear Conscience, and at the end of this message, I'm going to be giving you some contact info as to how this book, this resource, can be yours. We need to understand these issues. We need to understand it from God's point of view, from our point of view.
Why? I want to help you to overcome the barriers that are standing between you and a vibrant relationship with God. For now, let us listen. Sometimes I, as a pastor, preach messages that are filled with exhortation, what you should be doing. Sometimes there are messages of proclamation.
I speak on various issues and oftentimes just expounding one passage of scripture. But today it's going to be different. This message would be much more like counseling. I want you to visualize that we are together or across a table. Take a cup of coffee in your mind, of course, only. Shut off your cell phone, unless of course you're going to use it for the passages of scripture we're going to eventually turn to. And listen carefully because I am interested not just in challenging you.
I'm interested in transformation and change. And God has brought you to this moment, to this hour, to this message for a reason. And let us listen carefully to what he would say to us through his word and through his servant. The title of this series of messages is the power of a clear conscience.
And this is message number two. And there is a verse of scripture that kind of encapsulates everything that we're going to talk about in this series. It is first Timothy chapter one verse five. You need not turn to it, but I do want you to memorize it at some point. The apostle Paul makes this statement, the aim of our instruction.
So if you want to know what is it that I'm up to, what is the goal here in this series? There it is. The aim of our instruction, he says, is love that flows from a good conscience and a pure heart. You see, my friend, without a pure heart, you can't have a good conscience. And unless you have a good conscience and a pure heart, you really can't love.
Those three qualities are all connected. You know, conscience has driven many people to an early grave. You and I know that. And some of you are brought up in situations where you are carrying guilt that is really not your guilt at all, not your shame at all. And yet it has been imposed upon you. And today you bear it. And today I want God to show you that he is available to take your load of guilt from you. In fact, I want you to think of yourself walking along with this heavy backpack.
And today God is going to give us the opportunity of laying it down. I'm going to be using the word guilt and shame almost interchangeably. I know there are those writers who want to distinguish and all, but I think that shame is a subset of guilt and certainly the two of them relate together.
And that's why I will be perhaps using them within the same context. Well, my friend, it's not all your fault. A lot of it is, but it's not all your fault. Let me begin by saying, first of all, you and I oftentimes inherit shame and guilt. We inherit it particularly from our parents. It is passed on from one generation to another, and we know how debilitating it is.
Let me give you some examples. First of all, we are prone to accept false guilt because of harsh parents, harsh parents that have just devalued us. You know, I think to myself what I've seen in a supermarket where mother will yank her kid, you know, why are you so stupid? Don't you know how to behave and on and on, perhaps slapping the kid.
If that goes on in a supermarket, imagine what goes on when they get home. And I want to say to myself, don't parents know any better than that, that these tender children are treated in that way. But it's not just harsh parents. We now know, of course, the whole idea of abusive parents, abuse going on in the homes. You know, the whole world gets upset because a famous football player punched his girlfriend out in an elevator.
And I understand. Yeah, you can get upset. But my friend today, if there were security cameras or hidden cameras in the homes, perhaps even that are represented here and certainly that are listening in our wider audience, not to mention other people, we would discover that abuse exists almost everywhere, oftentimes behind locked doors and oftentimes even in church families. Who are we kidding? This is not unusual.
It's happening and it's happening probably right now. My wife and I were driving into the city this morning and I said to her, I wonder how much abuse took place in this city last night or this morning. It's all around us. And you and I, if we are victims like that, we inherit the shame, the guilt and the debilitating attitude. And then of course, we can think also of addictive parents. They're addicts and you've had to lie for them and you've had to keep all of these family secrets that have been kept so carefully.
And some of you bear that weight. And then when you get older, you discovered that these parents want to still manipulate you through guilt. I remember a woman was saying, you know, there are those who actually have a guilt franchise.
And she says it must be because she said, my mother has the whole Midwest distribution of guilt. And so, you know, they'll say, well, didn't we raise you? Don't you owe us money? Now I think we should take care of our parents.
The Bible says we should. But what I'm speaking about here is the fact that many of them manipulate, they are toxic. And the question that you always have to ask yourself is, do they own their own stuff?
Do they own their own stuff? And sometimes it's necessary for us to put boundaries in our family. I remember talking to one man who said that whenever my mother in law comes, she destroys the relationship. What she tries to do is to build a wedge between me and my wife. And she tries to even take the children and criticize us to them.
And I pointed out that there are times when you just need to put up boundaries. But all of the guilt that is inherited is unbelievable and it carries itself with us. So there's that which is heaped upon us. There's also guilt that happens as a result of our honest mistakes. This, of course, also is false guilt or some people might call it subjective guilt. Objective guilt means that I'm actually guilty. I have objective shame because I did something shameful. But we're talking today about that which is imposed upon us.
And sometimes it is because of our honest mistakes. My parents know a woman who convinced her husband to go to a concert one evening and he didn't want to go, but they went and they were involved in a car accident and he was killed. For 13 years, that woman made a trip to the grave, heaping upon herself all responsibility, all guilt for having convinced him to go to the concert with her. And I'm saying to myself, lady, God does not want you to live that way. Now if you had intended that he be killed, that would be a different matter. Like one woman said, you know, I'm having such a hard time settling my husband's estate that sometimes I wish he wouldn't have died.
That's, that's a different category. And then I think of the woman, oh, God bless her. Her little daughter, five or six years old, looks up and says, mommy, can I cross the street? And the mother says, yes, thinking she had looked and that there were no cars. The little one darts across the street and is killed with a car. Now I understand where you never really get over something like that.
I get that, but I also get the notes that almost blew away. If that happens, I'm going to have to ask Rebecca to come up here and finish this message. She may do a better job than I, but the simple fact is folks that as a result of that, God doesn't lay all that on you. And many of you are struggling today with guilt and with shame, but it's not your own. I want for a moment for us to turn to the 13th chapter of the book of second Samuel, second Samuel. And I want this to illustrate victimization, particularly sexually, since that is one of the hugest problems in our society.
And we want to talk here about shame. Now I'm not going to read the whole passage. I'll tell you the story and you can turn to it if you wish in the 13th chapter of Samuel, but here's what happened. Absalom had a beautiful full blooded sister. That is to say they were of the same parents named Tamar. Amnon was a half brother to Absalom and Tamar. Now here's Amnon and he is a man filled with lust.
David of course knew what his son was like because of previous engagements with him. And Amnon wanted Tamar sexually because the Bible says she was very beautiful. In fact, he even told a friend and says, you know, what do I need to do to get her?
And then that friend watched the friends that you have and the advice you give. You said, look, why don't you pretend that you're sick and then ask that your half sister Tamar come and bring you some food. And then when you're together in the room, you can do whatever you like.
You can overpower her and sexually assault her. And so it sounded good. And so he pretends that he is sick. Amnon does. And then David foolishly says to Amnon, says to Tamar rather in verse seven, go to your brother Amnon's house and prepare food for him.
And she does. And then when they are in the room alone, he says, come lie with me, my sister. She answered him, no, my brother do not do so and violate me for such a thing is not done in Israel. Do not do this outrageous thing, but mark my word, cries of help are not heard by abusers. The next message in this series, by the way, is entitled how to become an impossible person. We'll talk about the person whose conscience has been seared as with a hot iron.
They do not hear the cries of those whom they abuse. So what happened is this. She asked this question in verse 13, where could I carry my shame?
It's enough to bring tears to your eyes. What's she going to do with her shame? Where will she park it? How will she take her backpack that is going to be loaded on her as a result of something that wasn't her fault and how is she going to deal with it? Well, what happened is this Amnon did violate his half sister. And then it says in verse 15, he hated her with very great hatred so that the hatred with which he hated her was greater than the love with which he had loved her in abusive families.
What you find is particularly regarding sexual matters, hate and lust sort of go hand in hand and you know what she does and we'll hurry to the conclusion here. Now she was wearing a long robe, verse 18 with sleeves for this is what the virgin daughters of the king were wearing. So his servant put her out. She was cast out of the room. The door was bolted and Tamar put ashes on her head and tore the long robe that she wore and she laid her hand on her head and went away crying aloud as she went. And then I'm skipping now to verse 20 so Tamar lived a desolate woman in her brother Absalom's house and that's apparently where she lived for the rest of her life.
This beautiful woman ruined by shame not because of what she did but because of what someone else did. And what did David do about it? You'll notice verse 21 when King David heard about these things he was very angry well good for David. Why didn't he step in? Why didn't he begin to adjudicate? Why didn't he begin to defend her? Why didn't he take care of Amnon and all the evil that he had done?
I'll tell you why. The previous chapter is David having committed adultery with Bathsheba and then he murders Uriah. So he had lost all moral authority when it came to this issue and so he becomes angry but he doesn't do anything about it just like some homes today where the father becomes angry but doesn't know how to control his dysfunctional family. So that's the story now the question is how do people deal with guilt and shame?
If we don't deal with it biblically what happens? Well how do we manage these consequences? First of all there are those who become addicted to failure and addicted even to abuse. You find that abused women if they were abused as children they may indeed end up marrying an abuser and you say well how can they do that?
Well you can go online and you can study this and you'll find out that there's an addiction to abuse. In other words they feel to themselves I am so defiled I am so unworthy that I deserve somebody who's going to abuse me. Happens over and over again so they become addicted to failure. There is such a thing even as learned helplessness they have the opportunity to change they have the opportunity to walk away and they will not.
It's a terrible state to be in. Let me also mention that oftentimes the result is compulsive behavior. Compulsive behavior, blatant anger, always dissatisfied with themselves, unable to relax.
Let me just list a number of different consequences here. For example compulsive washing of hands. I think it's two or three weeks away but I'm going to preach a message entitled why Lady Macbeth didn't have to commit suicide and why you don't have to either. And we're going to give explicit instructions on the cleansing of the conscience but you remember she was the one who kept washing her hands and she said at one place even if she would wash her hands in all the rivers of Arabia the rivers would become bloody but still her hands would not become clean because she had murdered the king.
Wow. All of that now in her case of course that was objective shame objective guilt but God has an answer for that too. And so what you find is young people sometimes cutting themselves they feel so guilty they feel guilty for simply being alive. They feel as if they should not have been born because they have been so belittled and so devalued because of their upbringing or because of their relationships even as tamer perfectionism. What happens now the perfectionist wants everything absolutely perfect so that within him within his hollowness and his fear of being exposed and as being seen as inadequate or being seen figuratively speaking as naked everything has to be perfected but at the same time never happy with everything. And so on and on the cycle goes and then what you have is paranoia. You know a paranoid person and then you have those extreme examples of paranoia but you also have paranoia oftentimes in the most natural relationships you discover it because you see the paranoid person is saying to himself I expect to be betrayed and if you criticize me I assume that you're an enemy and your intention is to betray you and you're actually connected with other individuals and all of you are setting out to destroy me all of that because of the feeling of being empty or being seen as less than we want people to see us and as a result of that goes into paranoia. Creation of false worlds therefore a false world a world in which even they become the hero because they do not want themselves to be known by anyone so all of this denial all of these defenses are built with deep care and denial goes down deep into the roots and into the cellar of their lives and there they are.
I'm praying today that God will enable all of us to put down our defenses and to allow his grace to bring healing that no other relationship can really do and then what you have is the power addict the control freak what he is doing is he's making sure that there will be no further shaming in his life and so he wants to make sure that if he can control his environment if he can control other people then indeed he will be satisfied and never be shamed again. Now what does God have to say about all this? There are two passages I want you to turn to very briefly. One is found in the book of Isaiah chapter 61. Isaiah chapter 61.
You'll notice that God here is speaking to Israel and I understand that this application goes to Israel first but I think that this is what God does for his people even in this age. You remember that Tamar put ashes on her head. It was a sign of her humiliation. It was a sign of her helplessness and she felt herself locked into that lifestyle so she lived desolate for the rest of her life but notice what God says in verse three and this follows the words of Jesus. Most of these words were uh recited when he was in the synagogue about the spirit of the Lord being upon him to anoint him and then it says verse 3 to grant to those who mourn in Zion to give them a beautiful headdress instead of ashes. God says the shame of the ashes can be taken away and you have a beautiful beautiful garland to wear which is really what the Hebrew text means.
The oil of gladness instead of mourning. The garment of praise instead of a faint spirit that they may be called oaks of righteousness. The planting of the Lord that he may be glorified and goes on to say but you shall be called priests of the Lord. Verse 6 they shall speak of you as ministers of our God. Verse 7 instead of your shame there shall be a double portion. Instead of dishonor they shall rejoice in their lot. There you are the shame is taken away.
You know my friend my heart aches when I think of Tamar. She was sexually violated it wasn't her fault and yet she experienced the guilt and the shame and I can't help but think that there are some people listening to this message who can identify with her. Oh I want to give you hope I want to give you the hope of the gospel the hope that God does not condemn you the knowledge that he died for sinners and the ability to clear your conscience not only for things that you have done but things that have been done against you.
That's why I believe so deeply that the book I've written entitled the power of a clear conscience will really help you in your spiritual journey. We're making it available for you for a gift of any amount here's what you do go to rtwoffer.com that's rtwoffer.com or pick up the phone and I hope that you have a pen or pencil to write this down 1-888-218-9337. Let me give you that contact info again because I do believe that this book will be of such help to you.
Go to rtwoffer.com or pick up the phone and call us at 1-888-218-9337. In the place of your shame God wants to bring deliverance. You can write to us at Running to Win 1635 North LaSalle Boulevard Chicago Illinois 60614. When you bear shame for something you did not do the shame is still there. Thankfully the Bible gives us a way to be free of guilt we did not cause. Next time on Running to Win more about handling uncontrollable circumstances. Running to Win is sponsored by the Moody Church.
