Shame for Glory

Amen. Good morning, church. Good morning, good morning. It is great to be back with you all.

And as we get going this morning, what I want to do is comment on something that is really important. We want to stop and make a good statement about something that is happening today. And it's happening up in Washington, DC. I wonder how many of us are aware of this.

You know, I hope it's a good red-blooded American that today, this not today, specifically, but this year, America is preparing for its 250th year celebration. And that was amazing. Yes. There's some equivalent essential as a nation.

It's a big deal. And the theme this year is freedom 250. That is the way that this is being rolled out. And something that is happening today, Sunday, May 17th, 2026.

It's a really big deal. Every church, I hope, is recognizing this, celebrating this, talking about this. Every Christian should be rejoicing and celebrating this. What is happening today is that President Trump and his administration, they have declared today, Sunday, May 17th, as a part of the freedom 250.

This is called Rededicate 250. And it is a national jubilee of prayer, praise, and thanksgiving. How about them, apples? Isn't that amazing?

Thank you, Lord. If you didn't know that this event is happening, let me tell you, there's thousands expected at this thing. There are thousands more tuning in online. It started this morning.

It's going to be running all day. And this event, it is centered on prayer, on worship, on patriotism, on America's Christian heritage. This is a big, big deal. And I want to tell you that this thing is a lot more than just some patriotic rally.

It's a lot bigger than that. The messaging that we have seen consistently from this administration in the weeks leading up to this is that, again, central theme, central idea here is that America's survival, America's blessing, its freedoms, the freedoms that you and I have and enjoy today, and our future, America's future. It is directly tied to a national gratitude to our Heavenly Father through prayer, through repentance, and through a return, as President Trump has said, a rededication. That's why hence the name, rededicate 250.

Back to God, back to the foundational moorings, the spiritual foundations of this nation. This is a Christian nation. It always has been, and it always will be, God willing. Amen.

And so we're seeing a return to that. Praise God. We are giving thanks to him. Amen.

Thank you, Lord. What we're seeing is that this is a giving of thanks to God for his national presence with us as a nation, as a country, over the last 250 years, and we are asking for his divine intervention and his protection and his guidance for the next 250. That's what's happening. And I thank God, and I praise God for that today.

And I want to be very clear and very blunt about something this morning. If this offends you, if that bothers you, I'm so sorry, sorry, not sorry. If you think that this kind of thing would have happened, if any of us would believe that we would see an event like this take place in this nation, under a Harris-Walls administration, you better think again. If you think that you would have seen something like this, we would see something like this happen under a Biden administration.

You better think again. You can think what you want to think. Yeah, I mean, go ahead. If you want to.

You are entitled to your opinions, your thoughts, your ideas. You may have thoughts about this president that we have right now. You may have thoughts about previous presidents and previous administrations. And I didn't really like him, and I don't really like them, and I didn't like her.

And I don't like the way he speaks. I don't either. Okay, by the way, a lot of times. I don't like this, and I don't like that.

You were entitled to your own thoughts and opinions. That is inherent to human nature. That is normal in the body of Christ. We will have diversity on a lot of things.

But we need to understand this. Think what you want about President Trump and this administration. This administration has done so many things. To further the Judeo-Christian values that this nation has been founded upon.

You may not realize that. Okay, you may not be aware of that. You may not be educated on that. If you are not, I want to encourage you from the bottom of my heart to get educated about those things.

Again, you can think what you want to think about the man. But here's where I stand. This is where I have always stood. This is my normal line of thinking and saying, okay, that you may disagree with me, and that is perfectly okay.

But when I look back at what happened in November, 2024, the last presidential election cycle we had. Can I tell you something? Jesus wasn't on the ballot. That's right.

If he was, I would have voted for him. How about you? Anybody else? Yes, I would have done that.

The absence of Jesus being on the ballot and running this country, there is an obligation that I have as a Christian man. There's an obligation that men in this room, you have as a Christian man, for ladies in the room, as a Christian woman, to vote in, to support the candidate imperfect as they may be. And I underscore imperfect. Imperfect as they may be.

Do I think that President Trump is some super godly man? No, I do not. Do I wish that he was? Yes, I do.

But imperfect as a moral candidate, a finite human being may be. It is our moral obligation and our duty as a Christian. To vote in the man or the woman that will further Christian values and further bring this nation back to where it is to it. And we believe that, amen?

So while we're here, I want to take a minute and share with you some of the things that this administration has done, what the Trump administration has done. I want to put this up where you can scan this. If you've got a smartphone, you can just hit that QR code. It'll pull up a PDF document real quick, real easy.

You can read along. I want to highlight some of the things that President Trump and this administration has done. We do not worship President Trump around here. We're not about to build some 15-foot golden statutes, not to President Trump, not to any man, not to any woman.

We worship the Lord God almighty. And his word dictates our life and our convictions and our beliefs and what we do. But again, we need to understand that for some of this, you may not be aware of the things that this administration has done or is doing. And if you were aware of those things, it might change some of your negative thinking.

And it might cause you to be more grateful for what's happening in this nation today, that amid the decline that, yes, we see it. It's running rampant. There's a lot of evil. And there's a lot of things going wrong in this world.

America is not a perfect nation. We're not a perfect country. But by God's grace, we are reshifting back to sinor as we should. So I want to encourage you, you can scan this read along with me.

I want to highlight just a few of these four. You see on here, one of the bullet points is that he has created a federal task force to eradicate anti-Christian bias throughout the federal government. That's a big deal. That's a big deal.

That's a big win for conservative values for Christians here in America today. Trump's administration has ordered the repeal of all federal regulations that violate religious liberties. Again, a big win, a very, very big deal. Trump's administration has targeted and is prosecuting the anti-Christian Southern Poverty Law Center, the SPLC.

If you are not aware of what the SPLC is or what it stands for, what it does, again, I encourage you to get educated on that. You're going to find that the SPLC among other groups is one of those that is designating mainstream Christian denominations and organizations, 501c3s, as hate groups. Go figure. But that's what's happening.

And this administration is targeting and rolling back that kind of stuff. Praise God. Trump's administration has put in several pretty good Supreme Court justices. And we say that pretty good.

No one is perfect, right? But if you don't understand that yet, and I trust we do in this room, again, as red-blooded Americans, as voting citizens, you need to understand the justices that sit on the bench with the Supreme Court, they decide a lot for this nation. There's a lot of power. There's a lot of weight there.

And Trump has appointed some pretty good ones, right? Gorsuch, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, Amy Coney Barrett, these justices that have been in from his first administration and this one, these men and women have voted on some key rulings, some key landmark cases that are in favor of religious liberties and some major things, such as Roe v. Wade and all these things that we have seen happen in these past years. Praise God that we've got some men and women with ethics and morals and Christian moorings in them.

I thank God for that. How about you? Amen. This administration has effectively abolished the Johnson Amendment.

What is the Johnson Amendment? That is literally, this is something that keeps churches and nonprofits from speaking out about political and governmental issues similar to what I'm doing here today with you all. OK? Out of fear because what this is, the Johnson Amendment, this came back in 1954 from Ben, Senator Lyndon B.

Johnson, who introduced this before he became president. And this is literally a provision in the tax code that says that nonprofits, anyone that's got a 501c3 status, like GCF Brennan, like pretty much every church out there, cannot formally endorse or oppose candidates. That a church is not allowed to say, you should cast your vote here. This person represents this, that you cannot do that, for fear of losing your tax exempt status.

All right. While Congress says, yes, I understand Congress has not formally repealed or abolished this, the Johnson Amendment. It is still in effect. What Trump has done during his first term as first administration is effectively he's done executive orders.

He has given directions to the IRS, the Internal Revenue Service, and others saying you cannot go after, you cannot attack churches. And they're right, they're a freedom of speech, and to speak out about things that are cultural, and what can it stand for, surprise God. That needs to happen. This administration is recognizing two sexes, male and female.

Praise God, man. Thank you, Lord. What we're seeing here, church, is at the federal level, the Fed has shifted back to recognizing biological definitions of the sexist, male and female, which, by the way, is how God created it in the beginning. So praise God that this administration is coming back to what God's word says.

Amen. They've issued an executive order keeping men out of women's sports. Thank you, Lord. Amen.

This is an ongoing thing. It's an ongoing thing. This refers to things, as we know, like Title IX, the interpretation of Title IX, and how that shifts down and flows from the federal level to the state level to, you know, there's a lot of work to be done there, but praise God that this administration has set those things in motion, and we are seeing great benefits from that already. The federal government is no longer promoting gender transition programs at any age under this administration's direction.

Praise God. This administration is removed or revised. Any agency directives, there are websites, there are web pages that are coming down that support this and support the gender ideology crap that is going on there. I'm just going to say it like it is.

That stuff is being removed. It's part of a broader rollback in this government as we're seeing things like DEI, diversity, equity, inclusion, all these initiatives and government politically funded things that are being rolled back. And this is happening. Trump has issued an executive order combating the debunking of Americans, the debunking of Americans based on religious or political views.

Basically what we're talking about here, that is not religious discrimination in the sense more of what it is, it's financial discrimination. Oh, you believe in this, and you talk about that, and we're going to pull your access to our funding platforms. That's happening to conservatives, that's happening to churches, that's happening in this nation. Believe it or not.

And we're seeing this administration target that, roll that back and say you cannot do that, you cannot treat conservatives worse than you would somebody else and go after them and attack them. Thank you, Lord, for that. Amen? Here's another one.

This administration has cut federal funding for any school or program pursuing critical, pushing critical race theory. Gender ideology or other inappropriate racial, sexual, religious or political content. Thank you, God. Amen.

That stuff is being rolled back in our schools. And lastly, this administration is working. This is ongoing to remove the radicals, the zealots, and the Marxists that have infiltrated the Department of Education. This is, again, Trump's administration, what we're seeing here, they are anti-DEI, they are anti-CRT, all these things, and anti-gender ideology, all these affirming things that we're seeing that back, what they are, they are pro-princial rights.

They are pro-decentralization of education, return it back to the states, let the states decide who is the Fed to decide these kind of things, and push these ideas. Teachers are being, you're not allowed to speak about these things. We have children that don't know how to tie their shoes. They can't drive yet, but they're being told that they're trapped in somebody else's body.

And you're really a man, you're really a woman. What's wrong with that? And we're seeing these things roll back, praise God, Amen? So there's some, I could do a lot of commentary on all these, I'm not going to, but what we're seeing is there's a major cleanup operation that is happening here in this administration.

And if you are a Christian man or woman, from the bottom of my heart, I believe that you should celebrate these things. You should recognize these things and say, you know what, I've got disagreements with this or that, and I really wish this would run better, and I wish I probably got the same wish list you do, but I thank God that these things are happening. And what we are seeing through this, hopefully, is that as President Trump is saying, and some of what we're seeing today with the Freedom 250, the Rededicate 250, is that this nation will once again fully, truly, return to being one nation under God. We're going to see that happen.

Amen. So thank you, God, that this is going on in this nation. Thank you, Lord. Amen.

Well, Church, we are here today to keep ongoing in the series that we're on, the Exchange Life. How many of you are enjoying it? Yes, you're enjoying getting something new and fresh and good from it, I hope week by week. This will be six weeks in.

We took a break last week. If you were here last Sunday and you heard Pastor Sasha speak from Ukraine. Wow, did you enjoy that one? My goodness, if you were not here and you missed that for any reason, please go back, get that on our website, get that on our app.

That is an incredibly powerful teaching that he brought who was working out of Psalm 91. And I could have sit up here and talk to you this morning out of Psalm 91, but there's nothing like hearing it from someone who is actively going, they're living in hell. They are going through hell right now. In every way, imagine what's unimaginable what's going on there.

And that was such a powerful teaching that he brought. So we took a break there in the series for that. But let me tell you where we have come from so far in the series on the Exchange Life. We have covered five exchanges in week number one, rewinding about six weeks back.

What did we talk about? Punishment for forgiveness. Punishment for forgiveness. Jesus was punished so that I could be forgiven.

Is that good news to anybody here in this room? Yes? Amen. In week number two, we talked about death for life, how Jesus died our death, why?

So that we might share in his life. In week number three, we talked about how our old man died in Jesus. So the new man might live in us, the old man, for the new man. Thank you, Lord, amen.

And in week four, sin for righteousness. This is a big week, a big teaching, a big concept. A lot of us as Christians, as believers, we deal with, we struggle with, did Jesus really come and take all of my sin and make me righteous? Because we don't feel righteous all the time, but it's not about what we feel.

It's the truth that Jesus, because of his sacrifice, he has made, it is done. He has made you righteousness. His righteousness has been imparted to you. Amen.

And then in week five, Pastor Lee talked about rejection for acceptance. Jesus endured our rejection so that we might share in his acceptance, we might have that. And so far, this is just five of nine that we're looking at. Somehow, these truths, they get better and better.

They are great and powerful things that are coming our way. I hope you agree that. And I hope you're excited about these last four weeks in the series. Amen.

You're not getting old, not getting boring yet. Amen. We're talking about the cross. And we're talking about what Jesus did for us.

And these are powerful things for life and living. This morning, we're going to continue forward. And we're going to talk about exchange number six. And here it is, shame for glory.

Shame for glory. Jesus bore our shame. He took your shame. He took my shame.

Why? So that we might share in his glory. Now, can I just ask you at the outside of this message? Are you excited about that idea?

Are you excited about that concept? Even if you don't know where we're going this morning and you say, I kind of like the sound of that, but I don't fully understand it. Can you be excited that somebody came and took all of the shame that should have come upon you was due to come upon you? And in exchange for that, you received glory?

That should make you feel really, really, really good this morning. And we need to break these two words down right here as we start this morning. What is shame and what is glory? Let's answer the first question here.

What is shame? I want to submit to you this morning that shame really simply put is this. Shame is a consequence of sin. Shame is a consequence of sin.

When you and I sin and we do sin, no matter how hard we try, not to, we are going to come up short. We're not going to be perfect. We're going to say things we shouldn't. We're going to do things that we shouldn't.

We're going to have regrets. We're going to have guilt. And shame is a direct consequence of sin. When we sin, we have shame.

Now, I want to tell you this morning that there are two things, big things that happen when we sin. The first one is guilt. And you will see this from a child upwards. If a child sins and they know they make a mistake, they do something wrong.

And mom and dad, you come to them and you say, why did you do this? What's the first thing you see on them? Guilt. Guilt, it's a self condemnation.

That's really what guilt is. It's a feeling of condemnation. It's a feeling of judgment. Uh oh, I did something wrong and I'm going to be judged for it.

And we have guilt come upon us. You'll see this from kids and up. We already know from week number four, I don't need to re-preach that I don't think today. How Jesus became sin for you and I.

And again, as a result of him becoming sin, he has given us that righteousness. So if you understand that, if you really truly get that this morning and you say, I agree with that, I believe that Jesus did that for me, then understand what you're agreeing with, what you're saying I also understand, is that Jesus came and he dealt with all that. He dealt with all that stuff. And now he took my guilt that's been associated with my sin and I've got his righteousness.

But we still feel guilt. It's still there. It's a natural human reaction. We can't wallow around in that.

We can't stay in that place. It's natural to feel it, but we shouldn't remain there. Would you agree with that? So when we sin, we feel guilt, but here's the second thing.

We feel it is shame. We feel shame. And I want to tell you this morning that shame, it is a very strong, powerful tool in the enemy's arsenal against the believer today. It's a very powerful, it's a very effective weapon that the enemy uses against you and I.

He does it, he wields it, he wields it often, and he wields it well. Why? Because we allow him to do it. And he uses this weapon of shame in the life of the believer, the Christian man or woman, because shame causes you and I to identify with our sin rather than who we are in Christ Jesus.

Come on, don't need to say that again. What shame does is it causes you and I to identify with our sin, the mistake that I made, the mistake that you made, what you said, what you did. Satan wants to keep you and I in a place where we identify with that thing instead of who Christ Jesus says that we are. And he does this and he does this really, really well, sadly, unfortunately, but he's very, very effective with this.

We allow him to put shame on us because of what we have done. We get exposed for our failures. We get exposed for not living up to God's standards and that shame comes. And I want to tell you that shame is a devastating thing to live with in your life if you were trying to be a believer.

A man or woman that loves the Lord, follows his precepts, follows his ways. Shame is an awful thing to live with because it keeps you from living that victorious full life that Christ Jesus came to give you. So shame is something that we must deal with. We've got to get shame off of us.

That's shame. What's glory? Well, let me tell you that, glory, it's a little bit difficult to define and it's difficult to define not because it's hard to understand, but simply because glory, it's hard to explain because it's multifaceted. It's like a diamond.

There's a lot of aspects to it. There's a lot of sides to it. There's a lot of dimensions of what glory is. Here's a really good, simple working definition of glory for us this morning for what we're talking about.

Glory is the manifest presence of God, often displayed in dazzling magnificance. That's biblical, that's simple. That would be a really good, simple way of saying this. That's what God's glory is.

Church, glory is God's character. It's his nature. It's his attributes expressed. That is the glory of God.

Glory is his weight. Do you know what I mean when I say the weight to the weightiness of God, a weightiness of his book? God's glory has weight. There's a heaviness to God.

It's that all, it's that reverence of who God is as our Father. And when God's glory is made manifest, when you see this in Old Testament, the New Testament, wherever his glory is revealed, wherever his glory is shown, there's a heaviness, there's a weight there's an all that comes with that. And so glory is, it's his weight, it's his inestinable worth that is being revealed in and through creation. Glory is, to say it this way, it's the totality of who God is as our heavenly Father.

He is all glorious, amen? And his glory knows no bounds. And get this, in exchange for your shame, in exchange for my shame, all the shameful things we've done, the actions, the words, all the shameful things we could have ever done will ever do. Jesus comes and he gives us his glory.

He meaning that he gives us his nature, he gives us his character, he imparts more and more of who he is, it gets infused into you and I. Your shame, my shame for his glory. Tell me that's not a magnificent, glorious trade-off, that that is not a magnificent, glorious exchange that is made possible in the sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ at the cross for you and I. Oh, it's a big deal and it's something to get excited about this morning, maybe more excited than you feel like getting in this moment, but you should, you should get really excited about this.

Hebrews 12-2 says it this way, Hebrews 12-2, let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfector of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning at shame and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Sat down at the right hand of God, I'm not throwing in glory, can you see that this morning? Church, at the cross, we know this, Jesus endured shame. He did and he endured shame that frankly, it is unimaginable for you and I today.

There is no Hollywood movie that has been produced, there is no amount of images, there's nothing that you could think or say that would help you and I fully understand the shame that our Savior went through at the cross. There's just no way to really get it, but the shame that he walked through, it did not deter him. For the glory that was set before him, as the scripture says, and the joy of bringing, as it says elsewhere in scripture, many sons, many daughters to glory, he underwent that. He bore our shame on his shoulders, the shame that should come to you and I.

Let me tell you, there's no form of death that the Romans ever contrived really, that I would argue has maybe ever been contrived in history. There's no death, no form of death more shameful than crucifixion, there's just not. Crucifixion was the lowest form of punishment, reserved for the worst of the worst. If you were a Roman citizen, you could not be crucified, that's how bad it was.

It was reserved just for the most base, awful, ugly, wicked people, and that's what our Savior endured. You see, they took all of Jesus' clothing away. I know you've seen the movies, I've seen the movies, Jesus is wearing a loincloth, that's because they're not gonna expose a nudity like that on a public screen. But in reality, our Lord and Savior hung there on that cross naked with all the eyes of the world upon it.

Men, women, young, whoever was there, hung there naked, broken, bleeding, bruise for you and I. Scripture tells us that he was unrecognizable as a man. I mean, stop and think about that. You know that you're looking at a man, a human, but he unrecognized was a man beaten to a pulp.

Beaten, we know that there wasn't flesh in some places on his body, just muscle and bone, beaten beyond recognition, hanging there like a piece of meat in a butcher shop for all to observe and to scorn and to spit. He had passers by spitting on him, he had the soldiers insulting him, he had the Jewish leaders insulting him and telling him, God gave his very best and we gave our very worst. That's what happened. God gave his very best as one and only but gotten son and the world didn't want to have anything to do with him.

You see, this is what Scripture says in Isaiah 53, 3. It says, he was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and familiar with suffering. Like one from whom men hid their faces, he was despised and we esteemed him not. It's not a good picture for you and I, his it.

Not a good picture for mankind. God giving his best and we are giving our worst. Psalm 69, 7 says, for I endur scorn for your sake and shame covers my face. I mean, what a picture, you know?

And yes, this is King David that wrote these words, he's the author of the Psalm 16 and we know that. But what is widely understood and agreed upon is that this Psalm, it's a messianic Psalm, it's a prophetic Psalm. King David is speaking not just about himself and what he's undergoing at that moment before the Lord. It's also speaking of Christ Jesus and what he would undergo one day, the trials, the tribulation, the scorn, the shame for all of mankind, for you and me.

It's a looking ahead. And so we can say this that what Christ endured at the cross, if you had to sum it up in just one word, did he endure awful physical trauma? Was his blood poured out for you and absolutely was? Was his body broken?

Yes, but if you had to pick just one word, I wonder what word you would pick? What word would I pick to describe? What our Savior went through? I think we could really sum it up if we had to use one word and say that at the cross, Jesus endured shame.

He took that shame and he took it upon it. He endured every form that it is, could ever be associated with it. That's what he bore upon himself. And he did it because he knew that he could bring you and I to glory.

Let's stop and think about that for a minute. That's a big deal, isn't it? But don't stop there. I want you to think with me about this.

Why is it? All this that we're talking about, it begs a really, really good question for you when I hear this morning. Why is it that people experience this? Why do people experience shame?

I mean, I hear what you're saying and you're saying that Jesus came and he made an exchange. He took my shame so that I could have his glory. Well then why is it if Jesus came and did, then why is it that people still walk around and shame today? Why is it that people still have shame?

Why is that? Well, there's a lot of good reasons why I'm glad you asked. It's a good question. Here's just a few of them.

Here's some reasons why people, it's a very real deal in our world and our culture today. Number one, humiliating experiences from the past. That'll do it, won't it? Anybody identify with that one?

I don't know about you, I got a lot of them, right? Lots of things from the past that want to creep up. It could be something as simple as, maybe you were made fun of by someone. And because of that, you have always hung your head in shame.

Maybe you failed in this or that area in life and you came up short, you didn't hit your own mark that you established for yourself or you didn't hit somebody else's mark that they established for you and because of that, you have hung your head in shame. Maybe you did something foolish, stupid, dumb. And because of that, there is shame on your life. Can I tell you what happens, what do you realize?

They're not interested in me. I talked to a lot of people, been prayed with a lot of people, counts a lot of people over my years. And one of the things that you will see is that somebody can walk through something, what I might call small, what you might call small, what we might call large. It doesn't matter how you want to classify it, but people walk through things and one occurrence in their life, some humiliating experience from the past and they will spend the rest of their lives because of that incident, because of what was said or done, to them by them, they will spend the rest of their life walking in shame.

That happens, it absolutely does. And these people, they say things, they think things like this, maybe if you just hadn't been there. Maybe if you hadn't said that. Maybe if you hadn't done that.

Maybe if you hadn't acted in that way. Maybe if you had just done this instead. Brothers and sisters in Christ, can I tell you something? That voice, that is the voice of the accuser of the brethren.

That is Satan, that is his voice speaking. If you had just, if you had just, he is coming and he is coming to try to condemn you, he is trying to come and judge you and make you think about what could have been and maybe should have been. And he is seeking, he is working to trap you in shame and keep you in that shame. That is his desire.

And you and I can't let him do that. Things from the past, they are in the past. Let me say it again. Things from the, in your past, they are, that's where they're in your past.

They can only come forward if you bring them forward by the might of Jesus Christ, by the power of the Holy Spirit. The things in our past, they can truly become things of the past. Don't let the accuser of the brethren speak to you. Some of you, you will know what I'm speaking about this morning because you have been walking around in shame for a long, long time.

You're sitting here today and you say, that's me, I'm doing that right now. And if that's you, then you know it. There might be some husbands in here. You have not had a conversation yet with your wife that you need to have, why?

Because of shame. Why isn't, there may be a conversation you haven't had with your husband yet because of shame. Young people in this room. There may be a conversation that has not happened yet with your parents because of shame that you have over something you said or did.

Come on. That's real. They just keep moving forward in shame and they never ever taste the freedom that Jesus Christ has for them. If you're locked in shame, you can't be set free.

And this is a morning of freedom. It is, it's a morning of freedom for us all. The Lord Jesus Christ himself, he is here today to make an exchange with you. Do you believe that?

If that's you, you don't have to raise your hand, you don't have to agree with me in this moment. But if you're here and you're locked up in shame, you need to understand the Lord Jesus Christ himself. He's here today and he's here to make an exchange with you. And it's the best exchange you could imagine.

Your shame for his glory. That's what he's here for. So we have things from the past. What about this one?

Another big reason what calls a shame today. Memories of things we did before we knew Christ. Oh man. You know, if this is you and you're sitting in your sand, back in my BC days, before Christ days, I said that you hear people joke about that all the time.

In my BC days I did this. I said that. And because of that, I have so much shame and I'm not gonna step forward and I'm never gonna try something new and I'm never gonna do this or that. I'm not gonna go to that book study that you were talking about.

And I'm not gonna pray out loud and I'm not gonna be the leader of my home. I just have so much shame over what I did. It is time for you to step forward. Let me just say it lovingly but bluntly this morning.

Is that okay? I'm gonna say that. If you think that because of things you did in your past, you have so much shame that you can never step forward. Join the club.

We're all in it together. We have all got the t-shirt. There's not one of us. I think in this room that's got a clean, impeccable record before the Lord where we did everything right, and said everything right.

All of us before we knew the Lord, we did foolish things. We said foolish things. We lived for ourselves. We lived in ways we should, we had bowls that we should not have.

We didn't say things that we should. That's normal life, okay? Do not let that hold you up. Do not let that keep you locked up and shame from moving forward into what God has for you.

You and I cannot do that. The enemy wants to bring things from the past. He wants to bring them forward things to haunt you. That's a strong word to you.

That's what I mean. Those memories of things that you did, they come and the enemy wants to throw them at you to make them haunt you. And do you remember when? And you're never gonna fix that.

And you're never gonna limit you from growing forward in God. And you're never gonna get to serve in the church. You can never use that as a test of money. Oh, the enemy loves the work that way.

And I know this from personal experience. I wanna tell you about something that happened to me. This is some 20 plus years ago now. So we're something that was really shameful in my life.

But by the grace of God and by the power of the Holy Spirit, He has set me free from that thing. And it does not follow me here this day. But some 20 something years ago, I'm 14, 15 years old. And there was a girl that I got romantically involved with before I met my wife, Oxana, before we got married, before she ever even came on the scene.

And here I am, a young teenager, doing stupid, dumb things. I wanna stand here today and tell you, it is by the grace of God that I was a virgin when I came into my marriage with Oxana. That's being honest and truthful. The things that I did with this young lady, she's not a member of this church.

She's not a member of any of our GMI churches. If I said the name, then the name's not important. But if I said the name, this morning no one in this room would know who she is. But there are things that I did that we did together.

We were stupid. And if I told you some of the things, you would say, all that was just stupid, dumb, young love. And that is that really a big deal. But these were things that were done in secret.

There was so much deception to this story, to the season, spending a few years there. We were making promises that we're gonna get married and we're gonna go do this. And I just, I love you so much. And we just went so far emotionally and praise God, the physical aspect never reached the place where we had sex.

I just being honest. And can I tell you that when that thing got revealed in my life, that was a pretty shameful time for me as a young man. And I remember having to go to my leaders in the church and explain, one of the biggest things I was doing at that point was serving on the worship team in our church. And let me tell you when you're 14, 15 years old, that's your whole world.

That's just, just get to serve. That was the biggest deal. And to have that taken from me as it rightfully should have been when I was living in a place of sin and deception, not just my parents and family, but to my spiritual leaders. I've been lying to them covering things up, just the webs that we weave of deception, right?

And those things were, and to go and talk to my worship leader back then, I remember sitting at Steve Warnakey's house. I can tell you where I sat on this couch and said, I've gotta get right and I've gotta get pure and clean in my life and I can't play guitar anymore. And he said, I know you and I know you're gonna fix it. I've got, nobody beat me down, but I had to walk the restoration for that.

And can I tell you that here I am today, over 20 years later, and married to this wonderful woman sitting here in this front row, my marriage has never been threatened. I have never walked in an impure relationship. I've never cheated. Those things have been so far from me.

There's just not things that I struggle or think about. But I look back at that time period. And I would be lying to tell you that there are not times where the enemy comes and he begins to throw those darts again saying, do you remember when you did this? Do you remember the sin?

Do you remember the deception? Do you remember what you did? What you said? What you promised?

I tell you, those things wanna come back and haunt you. I know this from personal experience, but here's what I do know as well. Jesus came and he forgave me of my sins. And he forgave that young lady for her sin and her part of the story too.

I'm talking about me today, but we experienced forgiveness through that together. And what was wrong was made right. And it's by the blood of Jesus that he came and he took what was a very shameful thing. I stand up here today, listen, I reckon as what I'm talking about, I'm not to say that I'm not ashamed about what happened 20 years ago.

I am ashamed that I did those things. I'm ashamed of what I said. But I can truthfully say that before you, I don't carry shame today because of what happened. I understand that God has forgiven me.

And it's by his blood that he took what was shameful, what could have wrecked me, could have wrecked her. And he made an exchange with me. And I received his glory. And I know that I'm his son.

And I know that as imperfect as I am, as a work in progress that God can still heal, forgive, cleanse, make pure what was impure. I stand before you as a testimony to that. And I know that my story is not the only one. We could pass the microphone around this morning and there would be story after story after story.

You know this in some cases, as well as I do, you could maybe say, I know it better than you do it. Let me tell you what happened to me. There is story after story in this church family of God's goodness and how the past does not come forward to haunt us. If we stand firm in the blood of Jesus Christ and we say, Jesus, you came to take away my shame and I understand you have imparted your glory to me.

Now I can walk forward victoriously. Thank you God, amen. Jesus has taken care of all that. And because of that, you and I have been set free.

So those memories of the past, guess what? They cannot come back to haunt us unless we let them. What about sins of commission as a Christian? Sins of commission.

Do you know what I mean when I say that? Sins of commission. These are the sins that you and I commit by doing something wrong. That's the commission part, right?

Do you actively say it? You actively do it? You participate in it? You pursue those things.

This could be things like lying, like sexual immorality? Like gossip, like theft, like drunkenness, like hatred, like pride, et cetera, et cetera. You got the picture? Do I need to keep going?

No, I got it. All those are sins of commission in the life of the believer. What we're talking about is active wrongdoing. I am doing what God told me not to do.

And I know that. And that's a sin of commission. What about sins of omission as a Christian? In some ways this is even bigger, more deadlier.

These are sins where you and I failed to do what you should have done. You omitted to take action. You omitted to do what was right. So you hear a lot of people say the sins of commission and omission.

That's what we mean by that, right? These are not necessarily evil actions. Rather, it's just neglected obedience. That's what it is.

And neglected obedience is disobedience. That's what that is, right? And so these could be things like refusing to help someone in need. That could be a sin of omission.

Refusing to help someone when you could, when you had the power, you had the ability to do it. You said, nah, I'm good, I'll pass. Staying silent when truth should be spoken. That can be a sin of omission.

Neglecting prayer, neglecting your family. Ignoring conviction when the Holy Spirit impresses something upon you and says, I want you to pay attention. You say, I'm good, right? Ignoring that conviction from his voice.

Failing to forgive. What about failing to love others? The dude community. I mean, come on.

Do you see what I'm saying? And these are the silent but very, very deadly sins in the life of the believer. Look at this from James 4 17. This is the CEB version of the Common English Bible.

It says, it is a sin when someone knows the right thing to do and doesn't do it. That's pretty straightforward, isn't it? That hurt a little bit? Maybe, maybe for some of us.

Because you know the right thing and you haven't been doing it. That's a sin of omission. And can I tell you the sins of commission and omission in the life of the Christian, in the life of the believer? They call shame.

They do. What about this one? Character flaws that you haven't yet grown out of. What can I tell you that calls a shame for a lot of people?

It does today. Think about it this way. I know I'm saying things that you haven't grown out of yet. But think about it maybe this way.

In other words, things that you haven't fully grown into yet. Things that what I mean by that, they're there. It's not that they're not there. They're there in your life.

But they haven't come in the full stat tree yet. They haven't come in the full maturity. They're still being realized. Can I tell you we've all got those things?

Let me give you a real simple illustration that I know what this means. My daughter, Madison, she's going to be six here in a couple of weeks, in about two weeks time. And what I have been told, again and again, this girl loves her shoes. That's a big deal to her.

And she's a great window shopper for shoes. And I have been told multiple times that I need shoes for my birthday. What I understand right now is that we need a pair of princess heels. And I need a pair of tennis shoes that are pink, because that will make me go faster.

So we're working on those two things. Pink tennis shoes that will make me faster, and some princess heels. OK, so that's the logic there. Now, what if, as a good dad, I go to the store.

And I buy Madison a pair of pretty pink tennis shoes for her birthday. She's turning six, but let's say I go to the store. And I buy tennis shoes for a 10-year-old. And I bring those shoes home and I wrap them in the box and I give it to Madison on her birthday.

And she throws it, she knows that she unwraps it and with complete dismay, she says they're too big. And I say, well, no, just try them on. And she puts those tennis shoes on, let's say. And I get angry, as a father.

Can you imagine? If I got angry and said, what's wrong with you? Why can't you wear those shoes? You should be.

Why don't you send them to them? What's something's wrong? And let's say in this hypothetical story that Madison at that point, she begins to hang her head in shame. And she says, I can't do it.

Dad thinks I should. And I feel like I should be up, but I can't do it. Do you know what would happen at that point? If I was such a mean cruel father, and I did something like that, what would you say to me?

You would say, chill out, dad. I mean, ease up a little. She's six. You got it.

And then she was a fraternion. Let give her some time. Let her grow into it. She'll get there.

Oh, come on. Do you see what I'm saying? We do the same thing sometimes to ourselves. We do it to ourselves in life with our character development.

Sometimes we allow others to do that, to speak those things over us, and say, you should be further along by now. You should be able to do that. You should know better than that. You should have been able to speak that way.

You should have reacted this way. You should just be further along. You should be able to do X. And we begin to have shame over that lack of character in our lives.

Oh, you see what I'm saying. And I recognize this. It is very possible, I think, to walk into a church like ours. You could be here for a few weeks.

You could be here for a few months. You could be here for a few years. And be around a bunch of godly Bible-believing Christians like we have in this church. This is a very strong, healthy church.

Thank you, Lord. We've got people that believe God's word, read God's word. They live by it. We're all growing together.

And you can walk into a church family like this. And you could go to a life group, for example. And you can hang around people that have really seemed like they got it together. And you're like, man, my marriage doesn't look like that.

And men are such depth when they talk. And they've really got all their ducks in a row. I don't even know what are ducks. I can't even get them in.

I don't know what they are. I'm trying to figure this out. I've got a lot of problems. And I need to get to work.

Can I tell you, first of all, join the club. All of us do. This might be a real strong church family. And you might feel intimidated and say, I've got a real big lack in my life.

But can I just encourage you with something? We are all growing in place. We are all growing together. And I want to encourage you to be realistic about your growth.

There's not a lot of things that are achieved overnight. That's why it's called the Christian walk. It's a steady pace. You're a Christian walk.

I'm learning. And you've got to reach a point. If that's you and you say, I've got all the shame, because I just don't measure up. I don't level up.

And I'm not like you. I'm just so far behind in this thing called life. Hey, be realistic. Just be comfortable to be yourself.

That's the best advice I can give you. Say, this is me. I'm a work in progress. And I'm OK with that.

I'm not giving myself a pass. Listen, I'm not giving you a pass this morning. God's word doesn't give you a pass, by the way. Well, that's the way it is.

And I can just ride this thing out. I don't have to change. Oh, no. You can.