The Weight Upon Our Shoulders

Embracing Conviction

These shaky hands
Could never hold
The weight of this
Broken world

So I fall at your feet
Recreate me

John Van Duesen - “A Prayer of Surrender”

“It’s not your fault” has been a refrain in my church experience that has felt, at times, unceasing.

Perhaps in retaliation to the fire and/or brimstone of the prior generation, the southern-American flavor of evangelicalism I came to faith in often worked to put a soothing balm on my conscience whenever bouts of self-flagellation rise up. My mentors (and wife) would say to me, “you’re really hard on yourself, Phil. Give yourself some grace.”

Their words are always well intentioned. Sometimes, they’re right.

But there often exists a great confusion in our culture between conviction and condemnation. A follower of Jesus who weeps and beats their chest, desiring a change in themselves that they can’t bring about in their own power… that isn’t a sign of condemnation, but conviction.

Condemnation molds our self-image and tries to drown out thoughts of God entirely.

Conviction draws our thoughts towards God, revealing both the depth of our sin and the holiness and grace of God. It leads us to cry with Isaiah, “Woe to me, for I am ruined! Because I am a man of unclean lips, And I live among a people of unclean lips; For my eyes have seen the King, the LORD of armies.”¹

A Godly Shame

When we, like Isaiah, see our sin uncleanliness in light of a holy God, it is right to feel shame. Isaiah knew that he was unclean — literally impure — and God does not contradict Him.

God’s response to Isaiah is not, “don’t feel so bad, dude, you couldn’t possibly be perfect.”

God didn’t coddle Isaiah, nor did He provide shallow comfort. Instead, God responded to Isaiah’s cry by purifying him. Specifically, the LORD sends an angel with a burning coal, making atonement for Isaiah’s sin.

He touched my mouth with it and said, “Behold, this has touched your lips; and your guilt is taken away and atonement is made for your sin.”²

Recently, I applied for a job that, in my conscience, I knew I shouldn’t have applied for. Thoughts of encroaching bills and the fear of the future had me coming back to this job posting over and over again. I had connections, so I knew I could get an interview at least.

I had no other prospects, but I really felt the LORD did not want me to apply. I applied anyway.

An initial interview was set up within the day and that went great. I appeared to be a strong candidate, meaning this season of financial stress may be coming to an end.

But my spirit was jacked up. I was hoping God would “close the door” if He didn’t want me to walk through it, but that very idea isn’t inherently Biblical. God wants a speaking relationship with His kids, not one where we play some weird “Shut the Door” game.

I withdrew my application and burned with shame. I knew I had done wrong, and it led me to tears and repentance.

A few days later, I told all this to Iven, a friend and mentor of mine.

Now, when things like this have happened in the past, advice from loved ones and mentors almost certainly sounds like, “It’s okay, Phil. You didn’t sin and God understands what you’re going through. Really, you’re being to hard on yourself.”

The idea is, I didn’t “sin” and so this is just one of the bumps in life..

But Iven didn’t do that.

He listened, then asked why I was sharing.

“I just felt like I needed to confess,” I said. “I know it was wrong.”

“You’re forgiven,” Iven said. “And if you had gone through with the job, you still wouldn’t have been too far from God’s forgiveness.”

Iven didn’t try to comfort me, not in the sense that most people would. He, simply and lovingly, pronounced over me the truths of Scripture. I am forgiven. Not because Iven says so, but because God says so. Yet hearing those words from a brother is so healing.³

I allowed fear and anxiety to lead me to do something that went against my conscience — even if it wasn’t a “sin” in the traditional sense — and I felt shame because of it. That shame wasn’t a “problem”. It isn’t a sign of a guilt complex or of not understanding God’s love.

It’s a sign that my spirit is sensitive enough to know when it has hurt God, and a sign that I understand (in some small way) the holiness of the Creator.

But I knew this was a healthy form of shame because it was tied to a specific action and not my identity.

When I feel ashamed of “who I am”, or of sweeping elements of personality/background/past events/etc. those are signs of condemnation. Satan desires for us to feel condemned, and thus try and steer clear from God.

Condemnation gives us the sense that we cannot be around God lest we die. But conviction knows that when we come around God it is our sin nature that dies, not us.

If we have confessed with our mouth that Jesus is Lord and we believe that God has raised Him from the dead, then when we approach God it is only our sin that is burned away by the coal of purification. What remains is the real us, the co-heirs who will rule with Christ in the coming Kingdom.

Therefore there is now no condemnation at all for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death.⁴

In Reflection

I wonder how many in our churches today do not endure the burning of purification because of our deep focus to “give ourselves grace”.

Of course, we should not “beat ourselves up” for our wrongdoings, berating and condemning ourselves as “worms” or “bad people” or whatnot — and I recognize this is the past experience some have with church.

We must learn to discern what is (and therefore what isn’t) our “fault” in this world. We must learn to sense when the Spirit is convicting us, and learn how to lean into the purifying work He is doing in us. And we must learn when Satan is condemning us… and we gotta kick those thoughts in the teeth.

The truth is, there are a great many things in my life that are — very much — my fault. And there are many that are not. And yet, I don’t hold the weight of my own failures. I couldn’t even if I wanted to. They would crush me, grind me to dust beneath depression and self-hate — an experience all to familiar to some of you reading this.

Confronting, head on, the truth about my shortcomings doesn’t mean that I bear the weight of them, no more than Isaiah had to bear the weight of his uncleanliness. I confess my short comings, both my sins and all other sorts of human failures, and I cry out to God.

In the most backward logic imaginable, conviction draws me into the consuming fire of God, and condemnation would seek to keep me away. Conviction leads to repentance, and in repentance Jesus Christ my Lord takes the weight of all my guilt and shame and carries it to the cross and then the grave.

If I try to lessen the weight of my own sin and failures, I not only tell a lie, but I cheapen Jesus’ death.

Oh, and when Jesus rises from the grave, He doesn’t bring my shame and sin with Him. It is buried and conquered. And the risen Christ looks and me and calls me righteous, not because my sin didn’t exist in the first place, but because I’ve been invited to follow Him to the cross, the grave, and into the resurrected life.

Condemnation — which involves telling myself a story about who I am based on my failures (real and perceived) — would have me running far away from the Tabernacle and all that is closeness and intimacy with God.

But conviction — which is truly seeing and grieving my specific failures and yet knowing I am forgiven because of the works of Jesus on the cross — has me running to God and feeling the burn in my spirit as the coals of His holiness burn away my unrighteousness. And after God purifies us, we become eager and willing participants in His work of redemption on earth.

“Then I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, ‘Whom shall I send, and who will go for Us?’ Then [Isaiah] said, ‘Here am I. Send me!’ And He said, ‘Go, and tell this people[…]’”⁵

We do not need to create our own words of comfort when we feel the weight of our shame and sin. We only need to run to God and we can trust that God will cleanse us and lift the burden of our sins from us.

If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous, so that He will forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.⁶

Featured: Renewed Mind

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1. Isaiah 6:5 NASB

2. Isaiah 6:7 NASB

3. See James 5

4. Romans 8:1-2 NASB

5. Isaiah 6:8-9 NASB

6. 1 John 1:9 NASB