anybody have anything in your past that has caused you even a little bit of Shame at all at ever in your life I believe the overwhelming burden of our past is the one thing that can be most difficult to break to be free from and it will often keep us from being as effective as we could be in the present and I I I just want to start with this statement know this he has forgiven you of all your sins amen Colossians 2 he forgave us all our sins having canceled the charge of our legal
indebtedness which stood against us and condemned us he has taken it all away nailing it to the cross and no matter how many times you've dropped it our God has forgiven us and the truth is sometimes we haven't forgiven ourselves I feel like look the Lord laid just a few things on my heart for you today and honestly for me today and the first does this if you want to be free really free you have to start by accepting what cannot be changed you have to accept what cannot be changed the pain of Life the
things that we wish to God that could be changed but cannot be changed we did something and we want to undo it but it can't can't be undone or we said something and we want to take it back but it seems too late now or we didn't say something and we wish we would have but now it seems too late we missed our opportunity or we didn't do something and we should have and and now the weight of what we didn't do feels so heavy it's always weighing us down and holding us back it is
the chain of regret and it follows us everywhere and you don't even know what it is to be free from it it's just become normal or maybe that chain from the past is the chain of bitterness and anger because of what was done to you and it wasn't right and somebody owes you something they owe you an explanation or they owe you a childhood or they owe you a marriage or they they owe you an apology they owe you something and you're just carrying that you owe me chain around with you everywhere you go and
it it's just become part of your life but what the enemy wants to do to you is to accuse you and the primary lie is he wants you to believe that your past defines you and that your past determines your future he wants you to believe that your past defines you that you are your Affair that you are your bankruptcy that you are your failure that you are your sin that you are your broken promises and yet the Bible that's called condemnation that means unfit for use and yet the Bible says therefore now there is
no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus so are you going to believe the accusations of the enemy or are you going to believe the truth of the word of God that you were bought that you were paid for that you were clean you were redeemed you were holy you were blameless that you are more than a conqueror that there's nothing nothing nothing that can separate you from the love of God that's who you are in fact I'll say this the enemy of your soul loves to leverage your past against you he's an accuser
what does an accuser do he brings accusation he points the finger he br brings up the past and the devil loves to speak of our guilt to God you know I'm not trying to shame anybody but all of us can look back in our past and see man I wish I would have done that differently I wish I would have said that different I should have handled that in a different way we are guilty and this is where it starts but it's not where it stops guilt then produces what's called shame cuz I know a
lot of believers who are locked in this Vault of Shame Shame produces feelings of worthlessness you you feel so ashamed of of what you've done it starts with guilt and the enemy accuses us look how guilty they are but if we're not careful guilt produces shame watch this guilt has to do with what we've done shame has to do with how we see ourselves guilt gives way to shame shame produces regret and and then we end up in fullblown condemnation we are just so condemned we feel like God is mad at us that God's waiting
for us to mess up we feel unworthy before him I can't raise my hands I mean there's no way I can worship God if if people in this church only knew about me what God knows about me and the enemy tries to use condemnation to keep God's children from walking in the fullness of their freedom are you catching this I I was visiting a man not long ago who um knew he didn't have much time left and he was trying to get things made right in his life and he had some really beautiful examples of
things he had done just being intentional and and he had written letters to his daughter just asking for forgiveness and trying to own some things he had written a letter to his ex-wife extending forgiveness and asking for forgiveness he he had he had really worked hard at making sure all the finances were in order and he had next to him a folder with all the forms that needed to be filled out and and here's how everything can be transferred over and he he' made sure everything was made right but he said to me I I
just I just want to make sure I make myself right with God before I die and I said well you can't do that you cannot make yourself right with God it doesn't matter how in order you get your paperwork that's not what it's going to get he's not going to when you get to heaven he's not going to say let me let me see the paperwork let me just make sure everything's in order you can't make yourself right with God but Jesus is our justifier and our reconciler he's the one who makes us right with
God so that chain that you've been carrying around that I got to make myself right with God chain he breaks it that chain that sometimes gets labeled as religion he sets you free from that that that chain that is guilt and shame and you've got to you've got to be good enough to make up for what you did he sets you free from that burden many of us think I've let God down but I got good news for you you can't let someone down who you weren't holding up in the first place we don't hold
God up he holds us up and he makes us new if you want to make peace with the past you know how to do it you take your pieces from the past and you hand them to him and God's not done with you either and Satan will whisper and try to get you to throw in the tow he'll try to get you to quit he'll try to get you to think that everything's over but just remember this never place a period where God has chosen to place a comma I just want to encourage some of
you if you've been living with a life lifetime of pain there is still reason to live there's reason to be free not every painful thing we go through is the result of something that we've done God is not a tit fortat God thank God for that I I may have I may have made some mistakes but I am not a mistake so we must remember that God Is Bigger Than Anything you face in the past or will encounter in the future our God is Not distant he knows your pain and hurt and while you're in
your difficult Seasons he may seem silent but he is still present and he is still in your life and he will make things right in this life or the next life he will remove the pain heal the hurts and change your life forever
