Tag: shame

Never Fail

By Ife J. Ibitayo

I spent some time today looking through my high school yearbook with my little brother. I couldn’t help but grin as I saw pictures of my high school self. Apparently, a decade later, I still look the same. I don’t know whether that’s a compliment to my youth or an insult to my maturity! But as I flipped through the yearbook’s pages, my smile dimmed when I arrived at the photo of the leaders for our Christian club because there was one person missing from it.

I still remember the day when our treasurer—who I’ll call Barry—knocked on my dorm room. It was late at night, and he had a pile of books in his hands. He told me about how he’d been struggling with his faith, and he wanted to read through some of these resources with me as he attempted to splice together the crumbling remnants of his Christianity. I was club president and pastor at the time, but I was also struggling to balance the load of club activities and classes with the minimum free time I thought I needed for myself. So I blew him off, and within the next couple weeks, we no longer had a treasurer.

I Failed

I was reminded of Peter in the Gospels. When Jesus said all of His disciples would desert Him, Peter excluded himself from that group. When Jesus said Peter would deny Him three times, Peter effectively called Jesus a liar. He promised he’d suffer to the death before he denied his Lord and Savior (Matthew 26:31-35). But within a few short hours, all of Jesus’ disciples deserted Him and Peter denied Him just as He had said.

Yet none of this was a surprise to Jesus because God knows our frailties better than we do. He knows when we’ll snap at our spouse or disappoint our children. He even knows when we’ll fail the people who need us the most in their hour of need.

What I find most comforting about Jesus’ prophecy is that right after He tells the disciples they will desert Him, He says, “‘After I have risen, I will go ahead of you into Galilee (Matthew 26:32).’” In other words, Jesus had already baked their failure into His plan. When His followers fell, He rose. When they stumbled, He went on ahead, both to catch them and to prepare the way.

He Never Does

A few years later, I saw Barry again in college. He had reestablished his faith, and he was doing well academically and spiritually. Even though the shame of my failure still burns within me, I’m grateful that I learned a valuable lesson. I will continue to fall short of the perfect standard of love I strive to live up to; however, my God never will. And He can redeem even my greatest failures for my good and for His glory.

“None of the good promises the LORD had made to the house of Israel failed. Everything was fulfilled.”

(Joshua 21:45)

Naked and Unashamed (The Genesis Archives Pt. 3)

By Ife J. Ibitayo

For Part 1, “Let There Be Light”, click here. For Part 2, “Recycling and the Image of God”, click here.

“Adam and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame” (Genesis 2:25).

Naked is not only a provocative word today, but it’s also a rare word. We live in a cover-up culture. Women cover up their faces with foundation, concealer, blush, and mascara. Men cover up their true personalities with brash jokes and crude humor. We all cover up our true selves with carefully crafted photos on Instagram and clips on TikTok. Why is one of the few universal truths of life the need to play make believe?

Naked Before Man

The Bible’s answer is sin. As soon as Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit, “Their eyes were opened, and they suddenly felt shame at their nakedness. So they sewed fig leaves together to cover themselves” (Genesis 3:7). Shame only exists when we have something to hide. And from that day on, we’ve been trying to hide from God and from each other.

Yet God hasn’t taken away our desire for intimacy. In many books I’ve read, men have poured out their hearts to their lovers. They know they must expose the skeletons in their closets to the eyes of their special someone. We want to know that our sweetheart can love our unloveliness because instinctively we all know that love can only thrive in exposure, with unclothed hearts and bodies, with the very real threat of rejection overcome by acceptance.

Naked Before God

We know this is true with those we love here on earth, but we act as if it’s not true with God. The author of the book of Hebrews said, “Nothing in all creation is hidden from God. Everything is naked before His eyes” (Hebrews 4:13). God possesses true x-ray vision. He sees every part of us, from our physical form to our invisible spirit. Yet I’m moved by His response to Adam and Eve after the Fall. Genesis 3 says that God went for His daily walk in the garden of Eden. Not seeing His friends, He asks them, “Where are you?” In reply, Adam says, “I heard you walking in the garden, so I hid. I was afraid because I was naked.” But God said, “Who told you that you were naked” (Genesis 3:10-11)?

God is not playing dumb in this conversation. He is making a crucial point here. He’s saying, “I didn’t say you were naked, so who told you that you were?” He already knew of Adam and Eve’s nakedness when they exposed themselves to sin. But His first response was not condemnation but connection. When Adam and Eve hid from God, He drew near. When they eschewed contact, He initiated conversation because God still loves us, broken messes that we are, even when we mess up.

Conclusion

But there is still the matter of sin. Adam and Eve instinctively knew they had to hide from God after they sinned because sin must be paid for. But what recourse did Adam and Eve have to repay God?

This question will be answered in “The Genesis Archives Pt. 4.”

“As Scripture says, ‘Anyone who believes in him will never be put to shame.'”

(Romans 10:11)