Reforming the Feminine ContentBody Shame… Legitimate or Illegitimate
Tera Miller’s vulnerable article “Naked and Unashamed” was only posted a few days ago and garnered a lot of attention and responses. She really wrote well on the sin-free topic of loving and accepting your body and appreciating different shapes, etc. However, opening a whole different world, one commenter stated the following:
I’m struggling with knowing if my shame is legitimate or not. Part of me is ashamed because I haven’t taken good care of the the body Christ made for me and so my body directly reflects these sins. However there is also a part of me that hears the lies of the enemy saying you are dirty and ugly. I will continue to seek Christ in exposing the truth in my shame and where to walk in freedom and where to repent and seek restoration.
Now there’s something I can relate to! The minor background on me is that food and overeating were the major struggles in my life from age 12 until perhaps 2-3 years ago. And to say I don’t struggle with it at all now isn’t true, but what is true is that food and body image no longer rule my heart and they don’t make “surprise attacks” on my mind except maybe once a month. It’s an entirely different life for me now.
However, some of the consequences of gluttony have remained with me. Without trying to totally depress people, there is research that shows that once you’ve created the fat stores on your body, they really really want to just stay, and will tell you they need to be fed. Your body works against you to retain the extra weight. Ugh.
So there I stand, looking in the mirror after a shower with a frown on my face and that … feeling. Or sitting in a chair and feeling my stomach pushing the limits of my jeans. Ugh.
And I can feel shame knocking at the door of my heart.
After gritting my teeth and mentally barring the door with “there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus,” and ignoring the incessant doorbell chiming of this shame, it gets weaker and leaves me alone. But it once was impossible for me not to invite shame in to sit for awhile to chat. It’s much easier now.
Is body shame legitimate when you have sinned against your body and are reaping the results? I think it is legitimate if you have not repented. Shame’s purpose should be to make us miserable enough in sin to lead us to saving repentance. It IS what actually brought me to repentance for my gluttony. I think the word we use to differentiate is “conviction.”
The Holy Spirit really laid it down heavy on me at the end of high school that I was a glutton and how disgusting my sin was to him. It was terrible and I couldn’t bear it. And so I began to rage against this gluttony, and beg Jesus for his help. This conviction or ’shame’ was the beginning of the end of the Reign of Gluttony in my heart.
But if we have repented, then our sins have been washed away. The woman who once hoared herself out to many men can be clean and pure in the eyes of Jesus and his followers when she has repented of her sin. She is no longer stained and a “dirty hoar” but a pure, lovely bride. No one who loves Jesus would tell her she ought to feel shame about herself because she sinned “back then.” At the brink of repentance, shame should disintegrate. (Should is such an annoying word, right?)
What about those of us who eat too much, repent, change, then go back to eating too much, repent, change… that cycle…? How do we know if the shame we feel looking at those extra pounds is legitimate?
I hope I am referencing her correctly, but one of the elders’ wives spoke at the unrecorded Reforming Women’s Sexuality training day last year and said that she has to see her body as Jesus sees it - as soon as she has repented from gluttony, she has to choose to see her body as a precious gift from the Lord and to treat it well and not be ashamed of it, regardless of the state it is in, because God’s perspective is that he sees Jesus’ blood over her and that she is clean and new.
This was good medicine for me. Being a different shape than Jessica Alba is not a sin. Being larger than Jane Fonda is not a sin. Being the size of Queen Latifah is not a sin. Size and shape are NOT sin. Gluttony is the sin issue - regardless of body size. So when I have killed gluttony in my heart by turning to Jesus and worshipping him instead of the brownie on top of the fridge, there is “now no condemnation” for me regardless of my current weight because I am “in Christ Jesus.” I am returning to my true Savior.
Here’s one other thought. Since I have another idol, namely myself, this is the question I must ask myself when I start freaking out about my body: Am I ashamed because I look fat or because I sinned against God by seeking love in dumb food instead of Him? The answer to this is very telling for me.
When I am right with God, yes, there is a little sadness when I look at my body and think “this is not the size I was designed to be, and because of my past actions, my body is suffering.” But also balance that as I say, “thank you for my body, Jesus. Thank you for this gift and that I can walk, run, and do so many things in it. Help me to love you with my body, and not to worship myself and thinness.”
And I look beyond the present to an eternal reality and knowledge that we are all under a curse in our bodies and that we have a High Priest who laid down His life to resurrect them in perfection to worship Him forever in the fullness of time.
Adriel, Thank you for your post. Tera and you have really shared from your hearts. I so appreciate it; these posts have spoken directly to me and my heart. It has helped reinforce the questions I need to be asking about the shame I feel at times. I will use your question to help in revealing the true condition of my hear. Am I ashamed because I look fat or because I sinned against God by seeking love in dumb food instead of Him? Thank you again for sharing.
Adriene - thanks for your encouragement and for the honor of reading our posts. I am humbled that Jesus uses my writing to help other women in their walk. And I am humbled to get to work with a team of women writers who are open, vulnerable and letting Jesus use their writing to encourage also.
Thanks for good questions & thoughts here.
Adriel, I am blown away by your vulnerability and honesty — thank you for sharing your heart with us! It is a true honor to know you and the real struggles that are battled every day.
Adriene, thank you for your courage to comment and pose your own questions, which has led to more fruitful discussion!
I think that whenever gluttony/body image/size is being discussed, it’s really important to keep in mind that you cannot necessarily tell the state of someone’s relationship to food/exercise/God based on their physical appearance. We have different body frames. God creates us through genes, and those genes vary. As part of our fallenness, we as humans tend to make judgements and tend to make them too strongly based on visual (dis)information. No, it doesn’t mean obesity is inevitable for some people, but that our width and breadth and depth physically is not necessarily an indicator of the extent of our relationship with God or with gluttony.
Christian Chick -
thank you for pointing this out and adding this. I should have made it clear previously. You are correct - there are MANY factors that make our physical bodies the shape they are that are beyond a simple “gluttony” issue. Genetics, disease, dysfunctioning thyroids, etc. are HUGE factors that cause our bodies to be larger than they were intended, AND we were not all made the same shape ideally, anyway.
You’re right - there is a proclivity to immediately think someone who is “larger” as someone who must not have self-control, or eats too much, or is lazy, etc. This is simply untrue, shortsighted and judgmental. We have no idea what a person’s heart-issues are when we judge from the outside. The same goes for assumptions that because a woman is strikingly beautiful that she must be snobby, fake, shallow or a player.
This article was geared more towards an introspective look for those of us who HAVE identified gluttony as our own personal sin issue, and are suffering the consequences in bodily form. This should NOT be used to ungraciously apply to “those other people.”
Thank you for stating this well: the shape of our body “is not necessarily and indicator of the extent of our relationship with God or with gluttony.”
Thanks so much for picking up on the legitimate/illegitimate shame issue. After I read
Tera’s post, that was exactly the question in my mind…thanks for addressing the issue Biblically and also, for sharing your own struggle with this issue…it was a great encouragement to me.
Michelle - thanks for your kind words. I’m continually amazed at how God blesses me back when I give up ownership of my life and use the things that were once embarrassing and shameful to serve other women. Comments like yours help me know that God uses what was once meant for evil and has been offered back to God. He is a redeemer!