Hearing the Creator’s Voice: How Our Belovedness Drowns Out the Shame
by Bethany Peck
Hearing the Creator’s Voice:
How Our Belovedness Drowns Out the Shame
by Bethany Peck
“At every moment you have to decide to trust the voice that says, ‘I love you. I knit you together in your mother’s womb.’”
—Henri Nouwen
Stepping into the stately restored mansion, I noticed an uncomfortable increase in my heart rate as I took in the group of women standing before me in the foyer. We were gathered at a day retreat for healing from emotional and sexual wounds—not a luxurious spa day, unfortunately.
Feeling uneasy, I sensed physiological signs of resistance to the painful subject at hand arising within me, so I grabbed my name tag as a distraction before the host started the introductions. It had been eight years since my first support group, so I was by no means new to gathering with others in a healing space. Yet still, I could hear the voice of shame nagging at me in those first awkward moments of greeting.
“Hi, I’m Bethany, from Baltimore,” I tried to say, as bubbly as possible. But internally I zoned out to the returned pleasantries as the lies of shame hissed at me: “You are the broken Bethany from Baltimore—rejected, unworthy, cast aside, stained, betrayed, divorced, unlovable, unwanted...”
The urge to run to the restroom and not return burned through me, as the lies tried to convince me I didn’t belong and these women were ready to reject me.
At the very first women’s conference I attended, when my marriage was crumbling and I was new to recovery from betrayal, my body literally revolted at the prospect of having to share any of the difficult parts of my story with others. Thankfully, my years of recovery had already trained me for these moments in the foyer now. God had been working to soften my heart and grow me in the security of his love, but I was still battling with shame and couldn’t shake it—no matter how hard I tried.
Taking a few calming breaths, I repeated everyone’s names again and joined in the small talk as we moved into breakfast. Thank goodness for eggs and bacon and coffee to focus on, I thought.
Have you ever experienced those first few awkward moments in an unknown situation, when the deep-seeded lies within feel like an insurmountable impasse between you and others? Or maybe it’s even in a group of people you know well, but the shadow of shame keeps you separated from feeling truly known. Perhaps you just survived another holiday season of skating through the gatherings with an invisible cloak of shame. Or now, as the new year begins, there’s something that darkens your soul and feels like a great chasm that can’t be overcome—a shame you can’t pinpoint exactly from something more insidious you aren’t ready to face. Another year looms ahead, but your soul is shackled and your mind is under attack from shame’s negative voices...
Friend, you’re not alone. And this life with shame isn’t what God intends for you or me.
If you’ve started a new Bible reading plan for 2025, you may have recently started in Genesis 1, which is when we learn about the origin of shame. Adam and Eve disobeyed God by eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and as a result, shame descended between the two of them, as well as with God. This “shame curse” is the very curse that plays out in our lives today.
It is the shame that lies and makes us hide.
Curt Thompson writes about this battle in his book, The Soul of Shame: “Shame is the emotional weapon that evil uses to (1) corrupt our relationships with God and each other, and (2) disintegrate any and all gifts of vocational vision and creativity.”
That’s a devastating diagnosis, isn’t it?
I’ve seen the destructiveness of shame in my own life. For years, the shame stemming from sexual betrayal kept me disconnected from friends and loved ones. I lived in a fearful fog and felt constantly assaulted by vicious lies about myself that became a storm of self-loathing. I’m grateful God has carried me on a deep healing journey to restore me with the beauty of his love, but the shadows of shame still catch me in their snares, like those moments at the retreat when I wanted to run and hide.
In more recent years, I’ve seen how shame has held me back from creative projects, as that nasty voice of fear—inherited from the evil on—whispered, “What will people think of me?” So, I held back from using the gifts God gave me.
Are you stumbling through this fog of shame as you start this new year? Do you feel stifled by the negative voice of shame telling you that “If only people really knew the true me, they’d reject me?”
Friend, with all gentleness and fortitude, I want to call out that voice of shame as a lie. No other New Year resolution can compare to starting 2025 by saying “No!” to the deception of shame and inviting the loving voice of God to speak truth into your heart instead.
You are beloved. No sin or brokenness or shame disqualifies you from God’s love. Your Creator’s voice is the most important one there is.
Before I share some Scripture and practical tips for combatting the lies of shame, I want to tell you a little more about the retreat.
After some introductory remarks, the dozen or so women who were part of the gathering were ushered into the dining room where a hands-on project awaited us. This seemed unusual from the many conferences and meetings I attended, but as someone who enjoys arts and crafts, I was intrigued, especially so when our effervescent instructor started to pass out ceramic plates of a lovely forest green shade, and to my surprise, a hammer.
Have you ever heard of Kintsugi? I was first mesmerized by this practice after reading Art + Faith: A Theology of Making, by Makoto Fujimura. Kintsugi is the ancient Japanese art form in which broken tea ware is mended by a master artist, delicately putting the ceramic pieces back together with a lacquer covered with gold. Fujimura writes, “Kintsugi does not just ‘fix’ or repair a broken vessel; rather, the technique makes the broken pottery even more beautiful than the original, as the Kintsugi master will take the broken work and create a restored piece that makes the broken parts even more visually sophisticated.”
Here, at this retreat, where I was longing to learn more about “how to” heal from the wounds of shame, I was given the opportunity to engage in a practice with my hands to see, touch, listen, and feel—along with others in community—what it looks like to truly heal by listening to the voice of love.
It was the most powerful embodiment practice I didn’t know I needed.
As we each took turns with the hammer to smash our plates, the brokenness looked bleak. But together, we were able to help one another find the pieces that fit our project. Our leader watched us with a shepherding eye as she gently prepared the gilded glue that would turn our shards into art, while the other mentors circled the room to offer words of encouragement as we puzzled each piece back to the whole.
Later that afternoon, we took a walk in the November sunshine along a sparkling creek adorned with towering sycamores and maples glowing in gold. As I listened to the soothing sounds of the stream and reflected on the Kintsugi experience, I was filled with awe and felt God’s gentle words of lovingkindness wash over me. As the sun’s beams warmed me, with my Kintsugi plate’s golden rivulets still in my mind’s eye, I meditated on the Living Water within me that had overcome the morning’s threat of shame.
You are not broken, my friend. Yes, there is brokenness in your life—I’m sure—and I’m so very sorry for whatever that may be. But, I want to encourage you that our Creator is making you new. We all have certain smashed pieces of pottery that may be threatened with demolition by the negative voices of shame. But God’s healing voice of love is renewing you each day and preparing you for the New Kingdom when all shame and suffering will be vanquished.
Makoto Fujimura writes about this very transformation with his Kintsugi metaphor: “And so it is with us: through the fissures of our broken journeys, with pieces of our own hearts shattered on the ground, we journey by God’s grace into the New Creation. God sees beyond our shattered remains. He picks them up and sings a song over us.”
Friend, God’s song of love is the most important voice to listen to as you start this new year. I know it’s hard on days when shame from the evil one’s lies feels like an assault, and that is why we must start with God’s truth every morning.
Here are two of my favorite reminders:
“Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.” (Lamentations 3:22-23)
“In all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 8:37-39)
With that foundation, we have to practice silencing the lies and listening to the voice of love. Think of the Kintsugi story… We all need caring communities in our lives. We are not meant to do life alone, another lesson learned all the way back in Genesis. You and I both need people sitting at the table with us, helping to piece together the broken pieces of our pottery, mixing the glue that will restore semblance, and offering words of encouragement. The essential thing to this type of community is baring and sharing your story. Letting others into our shame, so that they can wrestle with those lies alongside us and defeat them with love, is the beginning of freedom and the lifting of the fog.
We also need creative space, as each of us was designed to make and create (a Genesis lesson again!). You are not just a spiritual being, but a physical one, too. Putting our hands to work is an act of creation that silences the voice of shame. Author E. Lily Yu writes in her stunning book, Break, Blow, Burn, & Make: A Writer’s Thoughts on Creation, this: “Wherever we speak, create, act, and move in obedience to the living Spirit within our spirit, we spin out lines of gossamer, imperceptibly fine and yet stronger than steel, that draw [the Kingdom of God] closer.”
Steep yourself in God’s truth. Engage in a loving community. Create and make beautiful art. Look to the Creator, my friend, as the new year begins and each day to come, just like David did in Psalm 34:4-5: “I sought the Lord, and he answered me; he delivered me from all my fears. Those who look to him are radiant; their faces are never covered with shame.”
Remember that you are a work of art, and you are created, formed, and perfected by love. Cherish the vision of biblical hope, so beautifully described by E. Lily Yu:
“God does not promise safety, public appropriation, wealth, ease, or success, and He will not spare us grief, loss, pain, and death. But God is Love, who suffered for and suffers with us, and in His hands all will be transfigured, so that one day we will see that the mortar of the shining city to which we belong holds firmer for having been mixed with our tears, and we will be glad for what was done.”
You are not what shame whispers in your ears. Listen, instead, for your Creator’s voice. He whispers to you, too. You are beloved and becoming beautiful in the here and now, as painful as it may be. And you will be perfected one day with gossamer threads of gold—God’s precious Kintsugi.
BETHANY PECK
Bethany is a writer and photographer living near the beautiful Chesapeake Bay in northeastern Maryland. She loves nature and writes about experiencing God's love through creation at bethanypeck.org and on Instagram at @beautiful_purpose_writing. She’s been featured in Fathom Magazine, The Way Back to Ourselves, The ClayJar Review, and other outlets. In her day job, she gets to write stories for local ministries in the Baltimore area. She and her dog Hunter stay active by hiking, paddleboarding, and enjoying long evening walks.