Shame Interrupted: How God Lifts the Pain of Worthlessness and Rejection

by Edward T. Welch

Addiction, with all its humiliating behaviors and degrading consequences, perfectly depicts an addict’s ever-present shame.

you are sure there is something very wrong with you.

All it takes is a tradition of demeaning, critical words from the right person. All it takes is nothing from the right person. No interest in you, no words spoken to you, no love. If you are treated as if you do not exist, you will feel shame.

Do you ever boast, just a bit, in conversation with colleagues or friends? Boasting is a kind of cover-up to make yourself look more honorable—or at least acceptable.

Shame says, “You are not acceptable. You are a mistake.”

We might speak about forgiveness and no condemnation, yet shame is unmoved by such things.

When a judge says, “Not guilty,” and you still feel like scum, the verdict doesn’t bring much help or hope. You might even find it a little disappointing. At least a guilty verdict would give you a chance to make amends or atone for something.

In Scripture you will find shame (nakedness, dishonor, disgrace, defilement) about ten times more often than you find guilt.

Guilt lives in the courtroom where you stand alone before the judge. It says, “You are responsible for wrongdoing and legally answerable.” “You are wrong.” “You have sinned.” The guilty person expects punishment and needs forgiveness.

Shame lives in the community, though the community can feel like a courtroom. It says, “You don’t belong—you are unacceptable, unclean, and disgraced” because “You are wrong, you have sinned” (guilt), or “Wrong has been done to you” or “You are associated with those who are disgraced or outcast.” The shamed person feels...

Guilt and shame intersect when a particular sin is regarded, by yourself or others, to be worse than most sins. For example, get caught with child pornography and you will experience both guilt ...

Any sexual violation brings shame to the victim. In creation, there are God-given boundaries that establish where things belong. We all have a sense of this, even with everyday objects. For example, mud is fine by a pond but not on your hands or in a home. When sex happens outside its intended boundaries, it brings shame on the victim. It should bring shame on the perpetrator.

Unfaithfulness in marriage brings shame on the betrayed spouse. It should bring shame on the unfaithful spouse.

Any rejection, neglect, or demeaning words by someone who is supposed to love you, such as a parent or a spouse, brings shame.

If you carry extra body weight in a culture obsessed with thinness, you carry shame.

Sometimes shame comes because of what happened to you, but you can’t point to a particular event. Instead, it comes from the gradual accumulation of demeaning words and actions.

Daily criticism from those you respect will add up to shame. There might be offhand comments, perhaps even “joking” remarks about how you never measure up.

Were parents absent, preoccupied with their own problems, untrustworthy about their commitments, or inconvenienced by your presence? You felt shame.

Addicts live with shame, whether the problem is drugs, alcohol, food, or sex. No one tells you that when you fall in love with any of these, you also say “I do” to shame. Then, when shame strikes, it is so nasty you have to numb yourself, and what better anesthetic than your addiction? It is the perfect vicious circle.

What do you want to hide? That is a shortcut to identifying shame in your life.

Anything connected with nudity and genital contact outside God-given boundaries will bring shame.

Yes, the connection between shame and sex has already been mentioned, but it ...

If you have an overactive or scrupulous conscience, every wrongdoing or perceived wrongdoing will add to your heap of shame. Every sordid thought, however fleeting, causes...

Second, we can be bold in the face of shame because shame can be removed, though not by something we do. There is absolutely nothing you can do to detach it, which you already know. You might try bolstering your resumé, confronting your low self-esteem with positive affirmations, or even reciting to yourself the new identity given you by God. But all these strategies are like putting cheap paint over rust; they might work for a season, but the rust will win in the end.

The worst part of the stocks and pillory was the public spectacle of it all. The best part was that you were eventually released to re-enter everyday life. If people threw garbage at you then, they would end up in the stocks. The system sounds inhumane, but at least the person’s release acted as a public announcement that he or she was now socially acceptable. I don’t doubt that if people could be done with their shame today by spending a few hours in the stocks, we would see an endless line of volunteers.

Depression: What depressed person doesn’t think of himself or herself as a miserable, unredeemable failure?

Anger: As in “STAY AWAY or you will see me, and what you see won’t be pretty.” Look for the paradoxical combination of self-loathing and arrogant judgment. Men are specialists at this.

Fear and withdrawal: You might as well avoid other people since you feel like you don’t belong with them. You don’t want to be seen.

Addiction: This will both cause shame and cure it, at least temporarily.

Fears of being exposed: Among the socially or financially successful can lurk a persistent sense that they are only one misstep from being found out and humiliated.

Doubts that God could ever love you: Who could love something so gross?

“I can’t forgive myself”: You might be saying, “I believe God has forgiven me, but something is still wrong. I still feel dirty.”

“I’m just a failure”: Who hasn’t ...

The message is clear: you have fallen short, you don’t measure up. Other people are acceptable, you are not. They succeed, you fail. They are good, you are bad. They are important, you are disposable. It is all about value and worth. The shamed person feels worthless in the eyes of others and worthless before God.

Every culture has its worthless and esteemed, honored and rejected.

You don’t fit in. The world around you has some kind of standard for what is acceptable, and you don’t measure up. You are on the sidelines, and everyone else is in the game. You are off in the shadows while your friends are on the dance floor.

Here are some key words to go along with shame: Inferior Alienated Embarrassed Minority Ridiculed Weak Powerless Failure Different Insulted Rejected Inadequate Humiliated Ignored Loser

Sometimes with shame there are no words. Shame takes us to the extremes where words fall short, so we express shame by doing disgusting things. Intentional vomiting and degrading promiscuity can be part of it. Less degrading, though just as effective, is intentional failure in work or relationships. Yes, shame can deliberately undermine any possible success. If you catch a whiff of something good, you treat it as a threat. You run from it, drink at it, drug at it, sabotage it.

Don’t forget, there is a way to be cleansed from shame, and for that reason, shame can and must be confronted.

Yet even with these tragic forms of shame, humans retain inklings of hope. There is a resiliency in the human spirit that keeps us going even when we have no reason to continue. Hope is not a sign that you have failed to numb yourself.

The shamed person doesn’t want to remain unclean forever, and he or she doesn’t have to.

So instead of quietly tolerating shame until you die, get busy—there is a lot of good work to do.

If you think shame shouldn’t be part of the human condition, you are right. You were not intended to carry such a load. Shame is an intruder and, as such, maybe it can be dispatched . . . .

Shame can be removed, and you can still be you. Despite your feeling that your destiny and shame’s destiny are identical—that if shame no longer exists, you won’t either—the reality is that you will be more you without shame.

Let’s add a dash of the audacious to whatever spark of hope you might have. We can have something even better. Eden sounds very good—nakedness without shame, God’s presence, satisfying work, and sinless relationships. But Scripture reveals that we have something better than Eden after the death and resurrection of Jesus.

What is the way out of shame? It is the way of humility, not humiliation. It is the way of being known, not exposed.

One-by-one shame’s trinity of nakedness, rejection, and contamination invades humanity. Nakedness came first. For Adam and Eve, the sense of nakedness dominated. They hoped fig leaves would cover, but they had an uncomfortable feeling that the leaves might be invisible. So they hid too, just in case.

Hiding. Covering up. Self-protection. Feeling exposed. They are telltale signs of shame.

Not long after came the experience of being rejected, separated from, or cast out. This might be the most common description of modern shame, though wherever you find rejection you will also notice the sense of nakedness and contamination—the three go together. In this Genesis story each person felt separated from the other and both were separated from God. God “...

“Unclean” or contaminated, the third part of shame’s triad, came later. This description of shame might sound foreign at first, but these words will help you identify an important feature of shame that you could easily miss. “Unclean” appeared first in Exodus. In t...