Depersonalized Personalized Sin Breaking a rule Betraying a relationship Repentance Admitting guilt Sorrowing over personal betrayal Forgiveness Canceling a penalty Renewing fellowship Faith Believing a set of propositions Committing oneself to a person Christian life Obeying rules Pleasing the Lord.

It's a beautiful way to put it: Leave the poetry in what you make. When something becomes too polished, it loses its soul. It seems robotic. So talk like you really talk. Reveal things that others are unwilling to discuss. Be upfront about your shortcomings. Show the latest version of what you're working on, even if you're not done yet. It's OK if it's not perfect. You might not seem as professional, but you will seem a lot more genuine.

Without Christ, we're in Satan's grip. But because of His great love for us, Jesus shed His blood and died to redeem us from our sins, giving us full forgiveness.

Part of the depressive syndrome is that you are immensely loyal to your interpretation of yourself and your world. If God says you are forgiven in Christ, you create new rules that mandate contrition, penance, and self-loathing. If God says he loves you, you insist it is impossible. There it is: your system is higher than God's.

The gospel is only available to people who know they are unclean.

Sin is not rational.

The first steps out of shame will be the hardest. These are the anti-denial steps in which we will put shame into words. You can't do battle with something nameless, and too often shame eludes accurate identification. So we will search for words that bring shame out into the open, where it can be seen and fought against.

Practice saying, "I am a sinner, saved by grace".

Ironically, our desire to clean ourselves actually minimizes the problem of uncleanness. It assumes we can give ourselves a good enough scrubbing to get a little holy before we meet the Holy One.

The cure for shame will always be found in how we become connected to God.

Then, when shame strikes, it is so nasty you have to numb yourself, and what better anesthetic than your addiction? It is the perfect vicious circle.

Here is a community goal: to be able to identify one pattern of sin in our lives.