The sacrifice God wants is a broken spirit. God, you will not reject a heart that is broken and sorry for sin.

Psalm 51:17 (NCV)

There are many stories of shame sprinkled throughout the Bible. There’s the woman at the well, married five times and living with another man to whom she was not married. Her misery in venturing out at the hottest time of the day to gather water was preferable to the misery she was accustomed to: the sneers and whispers from all the women in her village. (John 4:1-26) There’s the woman who had suffered from a horrific bleeding disorder that made her an outcast, unclean and therefore unlovable. She couldn’t speak to Jesus due to her lowly position, but she still approached Him and in desperation, reached out to touch His robe. (Matthew 9:20-22) Then there’s Peter, the rock on which Jesus built His Church, who denied knowing Jesus three times on the night of Jesus’ trial. (Luke 22:54-62) These stories are only a handful of many, but all lived with varying degrees of shame, and every one found the grace of Jesus right in the middle of their shame. 

The truth is, every one of us has done something for which we are deeply ashamed. Each of us has walked in the sandals of at least one of these heroes of faith, and we would rather hide from the world than meet the condemning looks and hear whispers from others face to face. Without Jesus, WE stand face to face with judgment, too, but once we encounter His compassion and love, we stand face to face with grace instead! And where there is grace, there is freedom. 

Perhaps you can see a little of yourself in one of these stories of broken spirits. Maybe you can relate to a sexual sin. It may be that you suffer from an embarrassing physical ailment over which you’ve had no control. Perhaps you are ashamed of something that was done to you against your will. Or maybe you have even denied knowing Jesus, or you simply live like you’ve never heard of Him. But that isn’t the end of your story…GRACE is! Once you have approached Jesus with your brokenness and handed it over for Him to forgive, to heal, and to transform, everything changes. Because when you have been anointed by the King, you will never be the same. That shame that used to soak right in and feel like you would wear it for the rest of your life? Now it just beads up and rolls off into the dirt where it belongs. Pick up your brokenness and lay it at the feet of your Savior. It is the ultimate sacrifice! You are loved!