Self-disclosure

I recently participated in an exercise that was very helpful. You may want to try this, too. Take a sheet of paper and make three columns. Title the three columns with the following titles: public self, private self, secret self.

Your public self is who people see in public. Describe how other people typically see you or how you would describe your public self.

Your private self is who the people you live with see. Describe how the people you live with typically see you or how you see yourself at home.

Your secret self is only who you see. Describe how you see yourself in secret.

Do you see three different people? Who is the real you?

Now, if people love your public self, yet that self is very different than your secret self, do they really love you? Do they love some person you’ve created that really isn’t who you see yourself as? Or if the person your family sees is very different than the public, then who is the true you?

Followers of Jesus are called to be authentic, vulnerable, above reproach, etc. We are called to be who we are and not try and hide behind some image we want to portray.

How are you doing in being who you are? Now there are two parts to who we are, aren’t there? We are clay jars – broken, fragile, ordinary, sinful, etc. But we also can be filled with treasure. And as that treasure dwells in our clay jar, our jar is changed. It becomes beautiful, not because of us, but because of what is inside of us. (It’s the child of Adam/child of God tension.)

Another question: Do you continue to feel shame and guilt over experiences and sin in your life that you believe you are forgiven for? Why does the shame and guilt remain if you believe you are forgiven? Is it because of a lack of belief?

Jesus says He wants us to be free. Freedom means freedom from shame and guilt.

So what’s the catch? Why is there this gap between what we believe and what we experience?

It takes us back to the public, private and secret self exercise.

Let me share from my own experience.

I am human, broken, and sinful. Because of this, I have trouble receiving what God offers in grace and forgiveness. I agree that I am forgiven because of the work of Jesus, but my experience of that grace and forgiveness is more challenging. I need the tangible evidence of this grace and forgiveness which rarely happens because of what I think in my head.

When I was in college, I was sexually active. As a result, I was burdened with shame and guilt for a long period of time. I was involved in ministry, loved Jesus, and was supposed to be a role model to others. Yet, in my secret self, I knew this was not true because of my sin, so I spent a lot of time beating myself up. I asked for forgiveness over and over again. I’m sure God was tired of me asking and wondered why I didn’t believe Him when He said I was forgiven.

Yet it wasn’t until Alisa and I began dating and moving toward marriage that something very significant took place. I told her about my past and I asked her for forgiveness. I was not giving her what she deserved. I went into that conversation with a great deal of fear and shame. Would she love me if she knew the whole truth?

Alisa forgave me. She loved (and still loves) me. In spite of my sin and who then I see myself as, she loves me. I experienced grace. I experienced the grace of Jesus Christ through Alisa.

My shame and guilt are gone. What once was in the secret place – where I could not imagine anyone knowing this about me – is now in the public place. And when I think about this part of my life, I no longer feel guilt or shame but grace.

That which we keep in the secret place often has power over us. It is often used by Satan to keep us feeling guilty and shameful. Did you hear that? It is Satan who wants you to continue to live in guilt and with shame. Jesus did not come to condemn the world but to free it. He did not come to bring a life filled with guilt and shame, but to set us free from our bondage to sin.

But we need each other in order to experience this grace and forgiveness. The person who led this exercise said this, “Vulnerability is the seedbed to personal transformation.”

Think about that for a moment. Jesus loves you for who you are – with all the wounds, junk, baggage, shame, etc. He loves you. There is nothing you can do that would make Jesus love you less. There is nothing you can do that will make Jesus love you more. His love for you is unconditional and unchanging.

When we allow ourselves to be known by another for who we are – it is a risk – but it is also an opportunity to allow Jesus (through this living, breathing person) to express the truth of His love for you.

I need that. I believe we all do. But it will not happen until we are willing to be who we are. This is not a call to bear your soul with everyone you meet, but I hope you will consider letting at least one person know everything about you. Don’t allow what is kept in secret to have power over you and keep you from experiencing the freedom Christ so desires you to have.

Christ’s vision for you is to live in grace, His grace.