I think shame and guilt might be the most common experience people have in their relationship with God.  There is a conclusion that God is up in heaven with a giant clipboard keeping track of everything we do wrong and and the few things we do right.  I don’t know if it is from parents, Santa Clause, coaches, but it is easy to feel like we have disappointed God and He is shaking his head at us and thinking, “I expected better.”

I have been meeting with people for over 12 years and have found that everyone has deep rooted layers of shame and guilt that drive our relationship with God and others.  It looks different for everyone.  Some of us are covered with so much shame and guilt we are trying really hard to make God happy.  As if there was a giant scale up in heaven and every time we do something “right” we feel like it tips the scales of God’s favor in our direction.  Some of us are covered with so much guilt and shame we end up hating God.  We resent Him for making us feel this way so we deny Him, block Him out, ignore, overlook, and ultimately end up hating Him.

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Most Christ-followers want to have spiritual conversations with other people because we believe in what Jesus has done in our life and we want others to experience that same transformation, but we don’t know how it happens.  We don’t want to be the crazy guy on the corner with a bullhorn.  We don’t want to be the angry guy that writes letters to the editor.  We don’t want to be the creepy guy that starts telling people what to do, and we aren’t really sure what it is suppose to look like.  How does it happen?

When we look at Jesus’ conversations in the gospels there are some similar themes captured blow:

OBSERVATION: John 3:1-2

In verses 1-2 we see Jesus is having a conversation with someone who is a man named Nicodemus who is described as a Pharisee and a ruler of the Jews.  Nicodemus was someone with a religious background.  It is easy to find people with a religious background today.  We turn everything into religion, however, Jesus continually spoke against religion because religion is about what we do to put ourselves in a relationship with God.  Religion is about being good people and doing good things, however, Jesus never calls us to be good people and do good things.  He actually calls us to be perfect people, yet that perfection was never to come from ourselves but through faith in Jesus’ work on the cross.

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Our culture teaches us God doesn’t exist, we can create our own morality, we can do whatever we want as long as it doesn’t hurt anyone else, and that isn’t true because our culture doesn’t know what to do with pain.

When we leave God out of the equation then we are just left with the pain in this world and we don’t know what to do with the lies, slander, gossip, pride, hate, rape, murder, natural disasters, and we don’t know what to do with the pain. How do we deal with the pain?
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In Genesis 12 God speaks to Abraham and calls him to walk away from everything and follow Him. Abraham ends up becoming probably the 2nd most well known figure in world history outside of Jesus Christ. His life is referenced throughout Scripture 300 times. 11 of the 27 books in the New Testament mention his name. His name comes up in all 4 gospels. Jesus talks about him. 3 world religions attribute their roots to Abraham and hold him in high regard; Muslims as the descendant of Ishmael, Jew as the descendant of Isaac, and Christianity as the picture of faith. Abraham is used by God in amazing ways, but he isn’t the hero of the story.
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When we hear Jesus described as the Son of God it immediately creates confusion. So if God get’s killed in a drive by shooting Jesus will be the first one to take his place, like Jesus is some kind of God Jr. who is second in command? This leads people to see Jesus as less than god and possibly why so many see Jesus as a good teacher or good person.

This especially becomes confusing for a child when they hear Jesus described as the Son of God. Their immediate context is family and in their mind God could have many sons and Jesus is just one of them. Why is such a confusing title referenced throughout Scripture?

Today we are too quick to assume the word “son” expresses relationship instead of essence and therefore leads us to see God the Father as one who existed prior to Jesus. This is the exact opposite of its intention. The title is to capture the essence of Jesus as God.
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Ephesians 5 teaches us to be imitators of God. Scripture teaches us we become a new creation when we place our faith in Christ’s death, burial, and resurrection. We have new identities. The old things have passed away and new things have come. This isn’t just positive thinking or self-help beliefs, but faith in a cosmic event that took place in history.

As amazing as it is to be imitators of God Scripture teaches us there are some things that hinder us from imitating God. Scripture describes them as snares that hinder us from living out and experience what we have been given through the righteousness of Jesus Christ. Below are a few:

Faith in Christ: It has to start with Jesus. We aren’t born being able to imitate God. Scripture teaches us we are born wanting to be God. We don’t want to submit, follow, love, or worship anything but ourselves. In His grace and mercy he doesn’t leave us in this spiritual condition. God enters into human history, lives out God’s standard of perfection, and then willingly dies on the cross for our sin, shame, guilt, and offense against a Holy and Righteous God. Jesus not only takes our sin and shame, but we receive His righteousness and this is how we become a new creation and able to imitate God.
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Think about what comes to mind when you think of God as Father. There are words like caring, personal, providing, comforter, and we can approach Him with anything and it doesn’t change our relationship. Maybe some of us have a negative connotation when we think of God as Father. We think of our earthly father and we remember when he let us down, didn’t come to an event, maybe too hard on us, or intimidating, and there are so many emotions that come with the description of God as Father.

For some of us this morning we have the opportunity to be a father and as a father of two children I know no matter how hard I try to not let my children down they are going to grow up telling their friends stories about how I missed a game or a recital and how I was never there for them. I know I am going to drop the ball, going to hurt them, going to let them down, but my hope is that I can point them to one who will never let them down.
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All of humanity and earth have been created by God and we were created to be connected to Him. He created us with beauty, distinction, and value and worth, and Scripture says that we were created in His image. Our culture continues to tells us the complexities of human life spontaneously occurred out of chaos and happened to result in highly designed and creative life forms.

However, Scripture teaches that all of creation was created for His glory and humanity is not only a part of creation, but we are created in His image in Genesis 1. We were not only created in the image of God, we were made to be like Him. Therefore, the more we understand who God is the more we understand who we are. When we are asking, “Who is God?” We are asking, “Who are we?”
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I think the biggest hurdle to this is our perception of time. We think, “I would read the Bible, pray, memorize Scripture, meditate…but I don’t have time.” I know this could come across as guilt so I want to be careful but to be honest the less time we spend with Jesus the busier we will feel and the more time we spend with Jesus the less busy we will feel.

Here is why: As we fall in love with Jesus God will inform us of what we need to be doing, He will give us wisdom so we know what to do, and He will give us peace so that we are not dominated by anxiety. Scripture tells us when we neglect this relationship we will be like a man trying to chop down a tree with a dull axe. Not happening. Scripture doesn’t teach us this to make us feel guilty, but to help us and empower us and I guarantee it will make a difference. When we take time to connect with Jesus and fall in love with Him you will see it in your life, your marriage, your children, and your work. It doesn’t mean everything will get better, but it means you will tap into supernatural activity.