This is Day 2 of a five-day study on overcoming the shame of failure so you can put the past behind you. Missed a day? No problem! Click on the menu below to jump to any day of the devotional.
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Overcome failure and put the past behind you by working through the five stages of recovery: Denial/Ducking, Shame, Repentance, Grief and Recovery. Let’s dive into day 2, where we explore the good, the bad, and the useful about Shame.
Day 2
Stage: Shame
Read: 2 Samuel 12, Psalm 51
David should have known that a prophet wouldn’t approach him about a judicial case.
The prophet Nathan was smart, though. He knew that directly accusing David of adultery and murder would drive David into defense mode, so Nathan sidled in the back door.
He bypassed denial-and-ducking head mode and went straight for the heart. You can take the shepherd out of the flock, but you can’t take the flock out of the shepherd.
Shepherd-turned-king David listened with growing ire to the story of the rich man stealing the poor man’s one precious lamb and cooking it for a visitor. As a former shepherd – and usually a man of justice – David pronounced harsh judgment:
“As the Lord lives, the man who has done this shall surely die! And he shall restore fourfold for the lamb, because he did this thing and because he had no pity.”
2 Samuel 12:5-6
Nathan went straight for the heart: “You are the man!”
And this is the power of shame: it leaves us nothing to say before God except what David replied to Nathan: “I have sinned against the Lord.” 2 Samuel 12: 13a NKJV.
- No more denial, no more ducking. Humility. Honesty. Shame.
Later, David found more words to reveal the depth of his grief over his sin. And that’s what shame is: grief for a decision that was evil or painful in its consequences.
David’s heart saw what his head denied, and he was ashamed. Psalm 51 is David’s cry to God. Few other biblical figures express such personal conviction and vulnerability before God, except for Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane on the night before His crucifixion.
- If David was in denial/ducking mode before, now David swept into shame at the words of the prophet. David penned these words:
For I acknowledge my transgression,
And my sin is always before me.
Against You, and You only, have I sinned,
And done this evil in Your sight –
That You may be found just when You speak,
And blameless when You judge.
Psalm 51:3-4
Shame was exactly where David needed to be.
When he was in Denial/Ducking mode, David was trapped. Sin had its claws around him and driven the king away from the King of Kings.
- Truth cannot enter a heart that has its back turned to God.
When Nathan confronted David, we saw the first cracks in David’s armor of self-denial. Shame was the first honest cry David’s heart uttered since he took another man’s wife and slaughtered the betrayed husband.
It must have been music to God’s ears.
Shame agreed with God that He was right, and David was wrong. It’s the feeling that accompanies conviction of sin.
While shame is an emotion we want to eliminate, it serves a purpose in realigning our hearts with the truth. Shame leads us to repentance. That’s it. Once shame has done its job and led us to repentance then, and only then, is it time to say goodbye.
Shame that hangs around after we’ve moved through the first four stages – Denial/Ducking, Shame, Repentance, and Grief – keeps us from moving through the final step: Recovery.
Chances are, you’re working through this devotional because you’re stuck because you’ve given shame more power than it deserves – or requires.
If you’ve worked through Denial/Ducking or Confusion, then grab those answers from your worksheet and plow through these next questions.
- David cried to God “For I acknowledge my transgression, And my sin is always before me.” Name your sin, or the deep cause of your failure. What is it? For example, maybe you had an affair, so you could write “I betrayed my husband and our family. I ignored what I knew was right so I could feel excited, accepted, worthy, and beautiful. I disobeyed God and chose temporary happy feelings over holiness.” Or “I chose that college and major to impress my parents and prove I was an independent adult. I wanted to feel capable, strong, and independent. I chose to ignore my misgivings so I wouldn’t look weak or vulnerable.” Confess this to God in a short prayer.
- At some point, you acknowledged that you’d taken the wrong path, whether sin or a decision that didn’t work out favorably. Shame is a sign that something is wrong, and its job is to lead you to repentance. What did your shame teach you? David finally saw that he was the rich, pitiless bully who stole his poor neighbor’s one precious, beloved lamb. What did shame help you see about yourself? How have you used this new knowledge?