Tweet

Timothy Massaro

21 Jun, 11 tweets, 2 min read

To truly be free from shame and guilt, to offer ourselves to others, to be open about our failings and strengths, first requires us to look at ourselves truly and compassionately. Openness, vulnerability, and courage are all based on self-compassion.

Self-compassion looks at ourselves as flawed & finite whose brokenness & neediness are not causes of shame. Sin brings shame & guilt but this is not inherent to who we are or our neediness. Self-compassion is rooted in God’s love for us as his creatures & as his redeemed people.

Shame and guilt are often intertwined in our lives and are hard to distinguish. The voice of shame tells us that we are our worst actions and evil deeds. Guilt positively tells us our actions are bad and sinful but they are not who we are. Sin violates who we are as God's people.

Adam's sin brought guilt into the world which created the ripple effect of shame and fear and death for us all.

Christ came to free us from shame and guilt by loving us and saying to us that we are not our worst actions and that our guilt has been completely forgiven.

B/c our greatest fear, the fear of death, and eternal separation from God has been overcome by pure, unconditional love, Shame has been shown to be untrue and Guilt has been dealt with. God's verdict over us tells us who we are and that he is trustworthy. His love defines us!

God’s love for us as his creatures & as his redeemed people allows us to look at ourselves w/ compassion & grace and even forgive ourselves for believing the voice of Shame - that our sins define us and are intrinsic to us, that our neediness and vulnerability are to be feared.

It is only when we can give ourselves a break & love ourselves as God loves us that our vulnerability isn’t something to hide or be ashamed of. It is only when we have self-compassion & godly self-love that we can open up to others & give what gifts we have to offer w/ courage!

When we have self-compassion and self-love, being grounded and rooted in Christ’s beauty and love, we can then give that love to others by being vulnerable and open with our hearts and lives.

B/c we no longer fear the voice of Shame in our own hearts and we no longer have Guilt between God and us, we no longer need to fear what others may think of us or our sins and weaknesses. We no longer need to fear the things others may do to us or have done. We know the Truth.

When we do not take the path to truly understand ourselves and the contesting voices between our True Self (governed by Love) and False Self (governed by Fear and Shame), we will never understand the movements of the Soul or be self-aware concerning how we react to others.

When we do not understand or take time to listen/know the Truth about our Selves, we will not see how our actions towards others are merely an echo of how we view ourselves. When we are governed by Shame & Fear, we act out of Self-Hate believing the voice of Shame/False Self.

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More from @word_water_wine

Timothy Massaro

@word_water_wine

13 Jun

What we’re seeing w/ the “anti wokeness” policing and legislation coming from this evangelical and Reformed consensus is directly due to bad histories of modernity like Carl Trueman’s The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self.

These attempts at finding out how and why we are in this conundrum in the West downplays the role slavery, colonialism, empire, and racism had in building modernity. The modern mind is plagued with guilt over these sins by which the West became a dominant superpower.

The intentional misremembering of the past is how atrocities are committed in the present.

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Timothy Massaro

@word_water_wine

10 Apr

I think we have to say emphatically there’s a place for our emotions with God and each other— whatever they are. God wants us to come to him with all our baggage and wounds. He wants us, not an idealized version of us.

He doesn’t promise to immediately vaporize our sorrows or problems but asks us to lean into Him as the safe haven of home that will lead to healing and joy, many times without God removing the thorn in our flesh.

Our ultimate goal is healing from depression and anxiety but that might not come in this life. We can experience some relief through therapy or medication. And we can still experience joy and happiness and love while having mental health issues.

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Timothy Massaro

@word_water_wine

10 Apr

For those wishing to understand my previous comment concerning Jonathan Edwards' Occasionalism & the denial of Trinitarian Concursus, I offer some articulations & how it results in such a tragic view of God's grace, joy & the "evaporation" of anxiety. (see pic)

Oliver Crisp describes Edwards in this way: “In early modern theology the question of divine causation loomed large in light of Newton’s mechanical philosophy and the pantheism of writers like Spinoza....

"Some fended off these worries with occasionalism, claiming that human actions were merely occasions of divine action. Jonathan Edwards (1703–1758) took occasionalism to be a correlate of his uncompromising doctrine of divine sovereignty...

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Timothy Massaro

@word_water_wine

3 Sep 20

When worldview as a heuristic is the only way we think right action comes about (ie ideas have consequences), we neglect all other forms of virtue and habit formation, structures, and discipleship. The logical part of our brain is not the basis for change of action or belief.

This is why it is so critical to capture the imaginative part of the brain which subconsciously affects the rational capacity. One's deep beliefs are much more basic to change in action than pure rationalization which is often done after the act of belief.

This has massive implications for preaching, teaching, discipleship, counseling, and therapy.

One simply needs to study how the body stores trauma to see how the cognitive side of the brain is ineffective for deep healing.

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Timothy Massaro

@word_water_wine

29 Jul 20

Why are we addicted to toxic, abusive leaders in the church and in society? We fear the social breakdown that we see all around us. We cannot control the forces of nature that seem to steal away the good life we want so desperately so we turn to the "powerful."

We elect the "powerful" to hide from the raw evil we have unleashed into the modern world. We elect people who we feel can "protect" us from what we fear and dread. We elect the people that act like us if we had power.

We choose what seems solid and strong in a culture where everything is melting before us.

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Timothy Massaro

@word_water_wine

10 Jun 20

Be careful to not only read the theological texts of the Reformation and not look into the biblical insights they had into law, civil society or politics. Otherwise, we will have a truncated view of the gospel and what #Reformation actually was.

A biblicist approach to the Reformation will fail to see how they ministerially used all kinds of disciplines and philosophies to support their theological and juridical arguments. Using sociology or CRT as a subordinate heuristic is not inherently contrary to the Reformers.

To be ignorant of these disciplines is to spurn the Holy Spirit who gifts pagans with common grace and knowledge for the betterment of our neighbors according to Calvin. If you actually read the Reformers, they heavily cite pagans who had a glimmer of truth (just like St. Paul).

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