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Let’s dive on in with the story of an unlikely heroine of the Bible, Rahab. Rahab… was a prostitute and God used her for good. He saved her life both spiritually and physically. And through her life, there was major redemption on many levels.
That’s the story in a nutshell! You can read the whole story in the book of Joshua. When Rahab turned to God and put her faith and trust in Him, he protected her and loved her, despite the fact that she had been tangled up in the recurring sin of hooking up and despite the fact that the people of her own city, which many of them were also corrupt, they despised her and mistreated her, but God used her anyway!
God allowed Rahab to be a part of at least two huge redemption stories! Rahab became the mother of Boaz, who later redeemed Ruth. You can read that awesome story in the book of Ruth. And… the most wild part? Rahab actually became a part of the family tree of Jesus, the messiah! Talk about redemption!
Because Rahab experienced the life change that comes from putting our faith in God, because she repented and laid down her old life, she became free and pure and there was no longer condemnation and shame in her life! Romans 8:1 says “Therefore, there is no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus.” God washed Rahab clean, redeemed her and used her life in amazing ways!
I love this picture of Rahab repenting, of her handing everything over to the Lord and putting her total trust in him! Can you imagine the feelings of shame and guilt and just feeling dirty and unclean that Rahab experienced? And the way that others were probably constantly judging and condemning her. If you’ve ever experienced a hookup or a spiritual hang up, then you probably know those feelings of shame, guilt and regret. You know the feeling of wanting to cover up and hide.
It’s so interesting to me that we try to cover up when we feel shame, both figuratively and literally.
Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden, after they sinned and their eyes were opened and they discovered they were naked… they hid and tried to cover up. Our kids when they’ve done wrong, sometimes they’ll go to their room and hide under their covers. When we cry, even as adults, we often cover our face and try to hide.
The beautiful thing is that we don’t actually have to hide. There is a way for things to be made right. There is a way to shuck the shame. It’s called “repentance.” Repentance is Heaven’s reset button. It releases the shame and brings freedom and joy.
Let’s talk about repentance. What is it??
Repentance is similar to confession, in that we’re acknowledging we’ve done something wrong. But repentance takes it deeper. When we repent, we feel a sense of remorse about what we’ve done. And we ask to be forgiven.
Repentance is an important part of the greatest love story of all time. It’s a part of the Gospel!
The Gospel tells us about how Jesus came down from heaven, lived and died. And then lived again. He was the perfect sacrifice for us, people who make mistakes. The Bible says that because we are sinners we deserve death but God, the Good Father, he loves us so much that he sent his own son to die in our place.
Romans 5:8 says that God showed his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Sometimes people have a misconception that because we’ve made bad choices in the past that we’re too dirty to come before God, but the truth is we can bring all of messiness, our guilt and our shame, the hook ups and hang ups from our past… we can bring that stuff to God and lay it at his feet.
We don’t have to clean up first or try to hide. We can come as we are, we repent, we lay our mess at His feet and He will clean up our life. All we have to do is show up and accept His grace.
Ephesians 2:8-9 says “For by Grace you have been saved through faith. It is not your own doing, it is the gift of God not by the result of your works so that no one may boast.”
We could never be good enough, do good enough, or clean up enough to earn eternal life. Romans 10:9 and 13 says “If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and you believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead you will be saved. Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”
You are loved and accepted by God, so much so that he wants to give you freedom and peace in knowing that you’ll have eternal life with him someday. He wants you to come to him with repentance… to lay down your screw ups, your mess and to ask his forgiveness which he gives in an instant! He wants to wash you clean, to rid you of the guilt and the shame so that you can live FREE, but first…. FIRST you have to repent and lay it down.
STOP trying to hide it. STOP trying to carry it. Proverbs 28:13 says “Whoever conceals his transgressions will not prosper, but he who confesses and forsakes them will obtain mercy.”
If you’re walking around carrying all this heavy stuff, your sins, your screw ups because you think you’re too broken or messy, I have to ask you “WHY, Sis?!”
Do you know who Jesus came for?
Do you know who he hung out with?! The sinners! The unrighteous. In Mark chapter 2 we see him sitting and eating with the tax collectors and sinners. We see him forgiving and healing all sorts of sinners, prostitutes, adulterers, the ones who hooked up and were hung up on all sorts of sin!
Jesus came for the sinner! For the unclean! For the broken person who’s walking through hookups and hangups! Jesus came for me! And Jesus came for you!
Our weakness is made strong with the Lord. It’s time to shuck the shame from whatever thing you’re holding on to… or maybe still walking in! Confess it, repent… it’s time to lay it at his feet, Sis. There’s freedom in that!
When we confess that we need a savior and repent of our wrongdoings, and believe that Jesus died as a Holy sacrifice to set us free, to restore our relationship with God, to bridge the gap, then we become adopted into the family of God. We’re given a seat at the Royal table, we even become co-heirs with Christ.
We become a child of God! 1 John 3:1 “See what great love the father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are!”
After repentance, what’s the next step?
If we’ve truly repented, we should then desire to move forward in God’s best plan for our life. Knowing his best plan for our life takes digging into the word. The other thing is that, after repentance there are going to be some curve balls thrown our way. That’s the world that we live in. When we dig into God’s word, we become equipped with the armor of God! Some of us don’t know how to live a full, abundant life and we don’t know how to dodge the curveballs, because we’re making all the excuses why we can’t make time to crack open the Bible.
Look, I’ve been there too. There have been times where I didn’t flip through a single page of my Bible for weeks or even months at a time. It’s sad, really. I’ve missed out on days at a time that I could’ve been growing in God’s goodness. I could’ve been soaking up all his awesome promises, his wisdom, and the true stories of people in the Bible, people like Rahab who walked through sin, like me, but turned their life over to the Lord and then experienced freedom and redemption!
That’s what it takes. If you really want to experience God’s fullness and deep love and if you really want to know God’s best plan for your life moving forward, then you’ve got to get into the word, Sister!
God’s given us an entire road map with the Bible… a complete guide for living an abundant, joy-filled life FULL of freedom and goodness!! But we have to dig in to discover it! You’re not gonna get everything you need from this podcast alone, or from Sunday morning church service alone!
Sis, how do you cultivate all the other relationships in your life?! You spend time working on them. You invest time into them! Let’s get intentional about spending time with the one who created us, the one who loves us most, the one who DIED for us, the one who holds our future and the one who knows a better way, the BEST way! It’s time to crack open God’s word for yourself, Sis!
I’m reading back through the gospels right now with an amazing group of women. We’re reading through Matthew, Mark, Luke and John in 40 days and we’re doing it together which is awesome! If you’re rusty on your Bible reading or you just don’t know where to start, start there! With the book of Matthew…. It will walk you through Jesus’ life and ministry and all his teachings about how we can live our lives in accordance with what God wants for us, which is always the best plan!
As far as which Bible to read, (I get this question all the time) I have several different ones but my absolute favorite is the She Reads Truth Bible. It’s the Christian Standard version which makes it very easy to read, plus it’s absolutely beautiful and it has space on the sides for note taking. It’s completely awesome.
I’m at a point in my relationship with God that I absolutely crave spending time in his word. Like I stay up super late almost every night because I just absolutely love reading my Bible. The She Reads Truth Bible makes spending time in God’s word so inviting, but mostly I get in this space of just feeling like I’m curling up in God’s lap and spending time with him and getting to know his character and his heart and his wisdom and his love for me. And I just want to spend that time with him. I want him to know how much I love him too! And I want to ask him to show me what HIS plan is for my future.
After repentance and seeking God’s way, the best plan for our life and our future, the next thing we need to do is look forward… and KEEP looking forward!
Let me share something with you from Matthew 19 verses 16-22. There is a rich, young ruler and he comes up to Jesus and he’s asking what it takes to receive salvation, eternal life.
The rich, young ruler says “Teacher, what good must I do to have eternal life?”
“Why do you ask me about what is good?” Jesus said to him. “There is only one who is good. If you want to enter into life, keep the commandments.”
“Which ones?” he asked him.
Jesus answered: Do not murder; do not commit adultery; do not steal; do not bear false witness; honor your father and your mother; and love your neighbor as yourself.
“I have kept all these,” the young man told him. “What do I still lack?” (He knew in his heart that salvation didn’t come from being good enough, or doing good enough!)
“If you want to be perfect,” Jesus said to him, “go, sell your belongings and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”
When the young man heard that, he went away grieving, because he had many possessions.
That’s heartbreaking! He chose to cling to his possessions, his material things and to his past, his hookups and hang ups, and all the moments and experiences from his life. He clung to those things so much so that, he left Jesus with deep grief, because he chose to keep looking backwards instead of simply following Jesus!?
Once we repent and choose to follow God’s best plan for our life, we HAVE to stop looking back towards the past and start looking towards the future!
Jesus shared something in Matthew 12:43-45 about what can happen when we go messing around in our past sins. He had been healing people, and literally casting out demons and then he warned…
“When an unclean spirit comes out of a person, it roams through waterless places looking for rest but doesn’t find any. Then it says, ‘I’ll go back to my house that I came from.’ Returning, it finds the house vacant, swept, and put in order. Then it goes and brings with it seven other spirits more evil than itself, and they enter and settle down there. As a result, that person’s last condition is worse than the first.”
When we repent, our sin is cast out. God washes it away and washes us clean. The Bible says “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” (1 John 1:9)
So God cleans up our heart and we clean up our mind, we grow in God’s word and we begin walking in God’s best plan for our life. But if we start looking back and start dabbling back with that sin again… it’s going to come back with a vengeance and become a stronghold in our life again. Jesus warns us… don’t look back. Don’t go messing around in that anymore!
The coolest thing about total repentance and stepping forward into God’s plan for our life is that God takes us from a place of living death to LIFE! We become reborn.
I love this scripture, Mark 5:36-43…
There was a man, a synagogue leader who came to Jesus crying out that his young daughter had died. Jesus told him “Don’t be afraid. Just believe.”
He went to the man’s house and it says “He went in and said to everyone, “Why are you making a commotion and weeping? The child is not dead but asleep.” They laughed at him, but he put them all outside. He took the child’s father, mother, and those who were with him, and entered the place where the child was. Then he took the child by the hand and said to her, “Little girl, I say to you, get up.” Immediately the girl got up and began to walk.
Look sisters, some of you are so bound up and shackled by your past and your shame and guilt that it’s causing every day of your life to be a living death.
God, the Good Father is whispering, “Little girl, I say to you, get up.” He wants to take your hook ups, your hang ups, your screw ups, your world as you know it and he wants to give you LIFE! Eternal life, abundant life, the GOOD life! No more walking around in a living death, Sis. It’s time to shuck the shame! It’s time to be reborn. It’s time to go from death and condemnation to LIFE!
It’s time to repent and leave everything at the foot of the cross.
It’s time to make what Jesus did for you bigger than anything you’ve done in your past, bigger than anything that’s ever been done to you or said about you! It’s time to receive his mercy and grace! Sister, it’s time!
2 Peter 3:9 says “The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.”
God, the Good Father, the one who created you and loves you the most… He’s looking for your heart… for you to give him everything, the good bad and ugly. He’s waiting for you to lay it all down, to hand your life over to him so he can take it and turn it into something good, something powerful, a redemption story!
My Bible says there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus! My God says…. beloved daughter, I DIED so you could be set free. It’s time to shuck the shame!!!
When you’re dealing with past hookups and hang ups, when you’re desperate to shuck the shame, it’s time to repent, to lay that stuff at the foot of the cross, then commit to living the way that God calls you to live because it’s the best plan for your life! Then it’s time to look forward!
God wants to rewrite our story, he wants us to put our faith and trust in him so that he can use the broken, beautiful mess of our lives for good. He wants to use us, the ones who’ve walked through sin and shame. He wants to turn our mess into a redemption story for his glory. Amen and Amen.
