LENT: Mar 15 - Psalm 34:5

Look to him, and be radiant;

so your faces shall never be ashamed.

Psalm 34:5

 

Q: When did shame enter the world?

A: On page 3 of the Bible.

 

Shame is an important Biblical word. Before sin entered the world, we are told that “the man and his wife were both naked, and were not ashamed” (Gen 2:25). And this is talking about more than physical nakedness. There was nothing that stood between one person and another. They were psychologically naked and emotionally vulnerable. There were no walls or barriers. Without sin, there was nothing they had to hide.

 

The moment that sin entered the world, however, Adam and Eve immediately stitched together fig leaves. The walls started going up between humans. But the barriers also went up between man and God. Adam used to walk side-by-side with God. Once sin entered the world, man hid himself in the bushes. (And God eventually hid his own face from man, because our sinful selves could no longer gaze on his glory.)

 

Psalm 34, however, invites us to drop those barriers. Indeed, if we want to avoid a life of shame, we are called to start looking for God.

 

Look. And look. Until we start seeing him.

 

On this earth, we will never see him perfectly. Yet, the more we look, the more radiant our face will become.

 

In Christ’s Love,

A guy who likes the promise

Of heaven – “a world without sin” –

For now we see in a mirror, dimly,

but then we will see face to face.

Now I know only in part; then I will know fully,

even as I have been fully known.

1 Corinthians 13:2