I've been around some families, and the name-calling, the name-calling that goes on, I've just literally cringed at the words that I've heard people called, by someone who's supposed to be their brother or sister. It goes on all over. I've noticed among Maori people quite often when I've been with them, I've heard the most horrendous shaming of one another, see, when we should be building one another up, instead of putting one another down - and words shame people. Words have death and life, words have power to shame. It's not just in that culture, it also exists in our culture in various forms, different forms, that same putting down, those words.
Another way that people are shamed is in the area of emotions. How many have heard this statement, boys don't cry? So what happens you get exposed to that, after a while you begin to believe inside, you're embarrassed about you're emotions, so you begin to shut the emotions down. You have many men today, and they cannot express healthy emotions in marriage or relationships, because they were shamed about their emotions; it's something wrong with me if I have emotions. Many young boys exposed to that whole Kiwi thing of rugby, racing, and beer, and they're perhaps more gentle or creative and sensitive, they become shamed about what they're like, and become very vulnerable to homosexual relationships. Shame is a very powerful thing. I remember being at school, if you didn't play rugby, what's wrong with you? What's the message you get - there's something wrong with me that I don't play rugby. What if I just don't like it, and don't want to? That's got nothing to do with it, there's something weird about you. Do you understand that? There's a shame message goes with it, it's in the culture. It's in our culture, very strongly in our culture. If we don't recognise it, and then begin to learn how to deal with it, both in stopping it coming around our own life, and standing up and not shaming others, we're going to find it'll happen continually to us.
See, unfavourable comparisons - why can't you be like your brother? That shames you. You'll never be like your brother, you'll never be like your sister, you'll never be like someone else. You're unique, but the belief that comes with it is: you should be like them. Well actually, no you shouldn't, because you're unique, you're different. See the lie of shame is: I'm different and that's bad, but the truth is: I'm different and it's good! Can you understand that you get that lie builds in, so you'll see that in dealing with shame you have to start to deal with the lies that people build up, we build up in our heart as a result of it. Manipulation and control - if you love me, you'll do this. You know what happens is people begin to perform to get the approval, and then they feel ashamed that they gave up what they really thought.
What happens in so many relationships, and I've seen this, I've actually had to deal with it in my own life quite in a major way, of so much wanting to approved, that you actually don't say what you really think when you should be speaking. You're silent, because you feel ashamed that your view, your thoughts, your ideas are different to someone else's. Now of course as a believer, our thoughts and our lifestyle and lots of things we do are different, so we've got to be unashamed of that difference, because that difference is unique. It's good, and actually the difference that we can bring to the world is what will make it healthy, amen. Okay, come on, I'll give you a couple more. You're getting very quiet about this.
Constant blaming and criticism - blaming, people who have got shame in their life will blame everyone else. Remember when Adam, first thing he did, hey God, You, You're the trouble, and that woman You gave me. See, blaming is an evidence or a reaction of shame, so you get some families where people are always being blamed. When you get a culture of blame, people feel ashamed, they always feel something's wrong with them, I can never do it good enough.