Wednesday, November 11, 2009

Imaginiff

A few months ago I played a game called "Imaginiff" for the very first time. When a card is taken and read, a person's name is placed in the blank. All players must choose which of the scenerios that person would be found in. They must "Imaginiff" that person where doing something and decide how that person would react. I learned a great deal of things about the people I played this game with and also learned how everyone had a different perception of that person.

Now a few years ago I worked at a group home for abused, neglected, and delinquent teens. I sat in a training one day when asked to think of my most horrible and terrifying secret that I would be afraid for anyone to find out about. After thinking about it, I had come up with that one. Then I along with others where told to imagine if we had to get up in front of an entire audience of people and tell that same secret. We were asked to think about the reactions we immediately had. This included physical reactions as well as mental and emotional reactions. It was explained to us that this is how it would feel if we or those clients of ours were to be exposed in their secrets. Not only would there be fear, hurt, anger, and saddness but the most prominent feeling was that of SHAME.

Max Lucado once wrote "If pride goes before a fall, then shame is what keeps you from getting up after one." My secrets had held me in thick, unpenetrable chains until one night I cried out.
"At that time people will sing about
the pleasant vineyard. 'I the Lord, will
care for that vineyard; I will water it at the
right time. No one will hurt it, because I will
guard it day and night. I am not angry. If
anyone builds a wall of thornbushes in war, I will
march to it and burn it. But if anyone
comes to me for safety and wants
to make peace with me, he should
come and make peace with me."
Isaiah 27:2-5
(NCV)
In these verses, God is letting His people know that they have done wrong and that one day He will take them back into Him if they want to make that choice to come to Him. He doesn't say for them to change everything first and then come. He just says "come and make peace with me." He knows our shame of our secrets. His son has borne them all. Not only did He bare them upon His back but Hebrews 12:2 says "Jesus accepted the shame as if it were nothing." Most of the time we take those secrets that more than likely began in pride and we get lost and covered in the shame for fear that they will be played in front of those we love the most or played before anyone to see those parts of us. Can you imagine what Christ went through when not only your sin was placed on Him but the sin of every human past, present, and future? And yet He considered it to be nothing. He loved us so much, He was willing to die before everyone with the whole world knowing that shame upon Him so that we could live a life without the chains and live instead in freedom. He became the worst of mankind so we could live the best life of what God the Father has for us. But will we let go of that shame and instead grasp the life He has for us. Imagine that!

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Thank you for your wonderful artwork, and for your insights. Blessings! Debbye
http://debgraafsma.wordpress.com