“Shame” by Andy Mineo is a song that has given me so much hope each time I listened to it. It’s a very relatable song. The first time I heard the song, especially Andy Mineoʼs verses, I felt as though, the song was written for me.
There was this verse that said, “I wish I could have said it was my last time but Nah it wasn’t…Became a Christian heard about God’s power. Couldn’t see it in my life but I could tell you all about it. Overloaded with knowledge, making so little progress. Became a public figure but my struggles were in private.”
The rapper shared his addiction to pornography as a teenager and how he didn’t realize that something was wrong. He felt like he wasn’t going to watch porn anymore but found himself fall into that same trap.
It struck hard with me because I could relate on a different level. Personally, on my Christian journey, it’s been one filled with the struggles of having to pick the spirit over the flesh many times but I failed all the time.
Often times after wallowing in guilt and regret, I promise myself that it’s going to be the last time. Weeks later, I fall again. I knew a lot about God’s power and what it was capable of doing but like in the wordings of Andy Mineo, I could not see it in my life.
I could not relate to personal encounters that people would testify about. I couldn’t hear a direct, unfiltered message from God.
I didn’t feel good about my life. Publicly, people would talk about how often my story was an inspiration to them but privately, I was off track. With each step I took to move closer to God, my sin pulled me ten steps backward. It was debilitating.
Then when I heard “Shame,” I was amazed to see that someone could speak to me directly even when it was not intended. I learned that honesty is the way forward. Everyone has struggles of their own but it is a lot easier to bear when we admit that we genuinely desire not to dwell in darkness.
Over time, I got to learn that true change comes from having a genuine desire and not just the right information. When I was desperate for how to free myself from the shackles that held me captive, I would surf the net on how to overcome my struggles. Then when faced with the temptation, I was unable to say ‘no’ to it. I wasn’t invested in building accurate defense mechanisms.
Those chunks of accurate information I took into my mind were never applied correctly to build the desire that was needed. I still wasn’t feeling guilty enough. When faced with the temptation, I would remember a piece I read a few weeks ago and try to use it to conquer my fleshly desires but I found myself compromising and using that information in my favor.
For instance, I might have read something on the grace of God so I proceed to use the fact that God would always welcome me back once I confessed my sins and repented, so it made it easier for me to yield to my desires. It was pathetic because I was looking for ways not to feel bad about sinning against God.
I made myself believe that I wanted to be free but I postponed the effort I had to put in all the time. I used the right information for the wrong purposes and made no progress.
Then it got to a point where I had to question myself and wonder for how long I would continue to move in cycles. I wasn’t enjoying the guilt and emptiness that came after sinning against God. Especially when I knew that God was ready to help me out or that I could have all it took to chose the spirit over the flesh.
So I came up with a resolution to build up a desire to hate what I was doing and for the liberation from the sweet facade that sin provides.
So I wrote a declaration that goes thus:
“I must strive to do better every day and desire a change. My sensitivity must be activated. This is my season of change. I see it, I know it. Things can only get better henceforth if I will apply the right information to genuinely desire a change!
I have to hate what I’m doing with a passion and feel the heaviness of having to sin against God. I have to be able to bear the thought of what I’m about to do and the real grossness of it. I MUST WANT TO GET RID OF IT! So help me God.”
I would read the declaration out loud every day and ensure to cringe internally when I read some of the lines. It was my effort towards awakening my sensitivity to the things that were not of God that I still found myself engaging in.
You can personalize that declaration too and apply it to whatever struggle you’re trusting God to help you overcome. Trust this declaration to be applicable.
The last lines of the “Shame”’s second verse said, ‘and I learned that when I’m weak is when I’m seeing God the strongestʼ just goes to show that once God sees us trying our hardest, he takes the wheel and carries the rest of our burdens for us.
I’m still a work in progress, learning to build up that desire for a holy life and I’m hopeful for what’s to come, knowing that God has a lot in store for me.
