Guilt serves its purposes. It helps us know when things are amiss in our lives, when we need some work, and when we’ve done wrong and need to repent. The Light of Christ serves as our conscience to help us know right from wrong and this valuable compass must not be ignored. With prolonged ignoring of our consciences, they can be dulled until they do not function anymore. Yet, even justified guilt serves a purpose up to only a certain point, and then it becomes destructive.

Women take guilt to a whole new level. Many women feel guilty because they can’t be super moms, successful career professionals, glamorous wives with knock-em-dead bodies, and public servants all at the same time. Instead of noticing the good they do, they let the things they can’t do immobilize them until they feel guilty most of the time. Unfounded guilt or guilt gone too far manifests itself in the following self-talk.

Unfounded Guilt

• I can’t keep my house clean and keep up with my work and the kids. I’m just such a bad mother. My husband and children would be better off with someone else.

• Look at so-and-so. She’s just so talented, and is such a better mother than I am. I just feel so bad that I’m not as kind and gentle a mother as she.

• I’m fat/ugly/short/tall and therefore am not a good wife. My husband would be better off with another woman.

•  I’m not married and don’t have children so I can’t have as great an influence as my married friends who have children.

•  I’m divorced so I’m not as deserving of God’s blessings as others who aren’t.

•  I work outside the home so I’m not as good a mother as I should be.

•  I don’t work outside the home, so I have no talents or ambition.

•  I’m not able to be perfect; I’m just taking up space coming to church. Someone worthier should be here.

• Nothing I do makes a difference, I’m just worthless.

Guilt Gone Too Far

• I’m just no good, nothing I do works. I try, but I just can’t control my temper, stop drinking, stop swearing, (or whatever that’s being worked on).

• I’m just weak. That’s who I am. I’ll never be strong enough to change.

• I’ve tried and I can’t do it so forget it. I’m not going to try anymore.

Do any of these sound familiar? I am reminded of another woman I know. We’ll call her Tonya. Tonya had a drinking and marijuana habit that had lasted for about seven years. It was a social habit in that her husband and friends all joined in either one or both of these activities with her. When she became a devout Christian, Tonya was convicted that God wanted her to remove these habits from her life. But, peer pressure was intense. People didn’t let her just say, "I don’t feel like drinking tonight." They’d hound her and try to break her will.

After an initial failed attempt at going "cold turkey," Tonya decided she just couldn’t do it… at least not yet. Every time she smoked or drank at a party she felt intense guilt. Over a period of 6-8 months, the guilt became so intense that she felt about an inch high. Her self-esteem plummeted. She felt there was nothing she could do right in her life. She agonized, "I can’t stop drinking and smoking to save my soul." She felt like a complete and utter failure until one day she decided this guilt was getting her nowhere. She wasn’t going to give up hope on overcoming her habits, but she decided this excessive guilt that led to self-pity was beating her down.

What was Tonya doing? She was trying to do it all on her own. She felt that somehow she had to muster all the willpower to overcome her addictions by herself. She had beaten herself down into the depths of humility. In this case, guilt had served its purpose – to bring her to a humble, broken-hearted, contrite place where she was willing to reach out her hand to the only One who could help her – Jesus Christ. Once she decided to stop beating herself up and started praying with conviction that God would help her overcome these habits, He began to work in her life, restructuring her priorities, until she was willing to commit once and for all to lay aside first the drugs and then the alcohol. It was a struggle, but with God's help, she beat her addictions one at a time, and her self-worth continued to grow as she did.

"His knowledge of you goes beyond a catalog of your deeds. He knows you individually and completely. He understands your darkest hours when things seem as black as a cave with no light. He understands when you are feeling unworthy or forgotten or depressed or desperate or alone. He constantly and gently invites you to open up those dark recesses of your heart to Him that He may fill them with His light. You can’t shock Him. You can’t surprise Him. He won’t turn away from you in disgust, shaking His head and saying, ‘Oh, this is worse than I thought. There’s nothing I can do here.’ When He healed the sick, He often forgave their sins as well. His healing extends to the crippled heart just as surely as to the crippled leg."⁽¹⁾

That is the wonderful message of Jesus Christ – that no matter how bad things look, no matter how lost we are, Jesus Christ can help us change. His message is a message of hope. So many times in the scriptures when faith is mentioned, its companions are also mentioned: hope and charity. This is no coincidence for faith in Jesus Christ leads to hope – hope for a better life and hope for a glorious eternity – which leads us to live more like Jesus Christ and not only love others, but to love ourselves.

Footnotes
1 Virginia U. Jensen, I Can Do All Things Through Christ, The Best of Women's Conference, Bookcraft 2000, p. 234.