Hello beloved ones of God, I hope you’re all fine by God’s grace.
I am definitely sorry for the period of silence, I had issues these week, principally my WordPress blog being blocked for un unknown reason. By God’s grace, it is all solved now.
Before I’ll start, I would like to say that I’ve been arm-wrestling with God and myself before writing this post. I battled with it, and it was just like it held me tight and said “preach me”. I didn’t want to write on this, not because it’s not a good one but because I felt unqualified for this.
Anyhow, let’s get going.
When I was still a teenager, I watched this TV series called “Seventh Heaven”, known in the French-speaking side of the globe as “Sept à la maison”. It was the story of a pastor (Reverend Kamdem), husband and father of seven awesome children. Without trying to endorse anything in this TV series, I’ll use it for the teaching of today.
My favourite male character in Seven Heaven was Simon Kamdem. He was a nice blonde tall cute guy (probably my first crush), who unfortunately for him got involved in a car accident, which caused the death of a little boy (perhaps 3-4 years old, I don’t remember). He didn’t end up in prison (accident) but he carried that guilt to his college years.
When he reached college, he started escaping from lectures, and spent all his time in his university student room having sex with different girls. He eventually had poor grades, and his family ended up finding out about it. He was the only one of all his siblings who fell into extramarital sex. All his elders had gotten married before having sex.
When he finally opened up on the reason why he fell into extramarital sex, he said something which pierced my heart more than any words ever. I’ll try to recall at my best what he said.
“ There was this voice in my head which kept telling me that I had already killed a little boy, that no matter what I would do, no matter how much I would repent, I was already going to hell. God would never want me back after what I did, and there was absolutely no use trying to obey God and to live a pure life anymore, since I was already condemned. ”
In fact, he even added that the only moment during which he could hear those voices less was while he was having extramarital sex, and that afterwards the guilt would only increase, and the voices would remind him even more that his life with God was over and his life on earth was over, now not only because of the boy he killed but also because he had extramarital sex.
That left him in a vicious cycle, in which he was persuaded by the devil that whatever he did, God didn’t love him anymore and he was going to hell for sure.
I have named this the Simon Kamdem effect. Do you relate to it ? Have you ever felt like since you’ve committed x sin, you are disqualified forever from God’s kingdom, and He will never ever ever ever ever forgive you, and He has already decided that because of what you did you would die and go to hell?
What I call the Simon Kamdem effect is the spiral of guilt, shame and condemnation which overpowers the life of an individual, making him believe that because of a sin (or several sins) he/she committed,
- God is never ever going to forgive them,
- They’re going to hell no matter what happens next
- Their repentance is of no use because God has already given up on them
- They have already committed a sin, so there’s no use trying again to serve God,
- Their life isn’t worth it anymore and they could even go on and commit all the other sins imaginable on earth since
- No matter what they do as from now, it has already been decided that they’ll go to hell
- God can’t use them ever anymore in their whole life time because of this one thing they did which He will never ever forgive and forget
Have you ever felt this way ? I have. In fact I almost feel exactly this way every time I sin (maybe even worse at times). When I do something against God (and I usually do; In fact I tend to see myself as Paul does, the worst sinner ever 1 Timothy 1:15 NIV), I hear all those voices telling me how it’s over, how God will never want me back, how it’s not worth trying anymore because I have already lost etc etc etc.
I know someone else who really really really messed up, and the Simon Kamdem effect helped him give up on his last hope.
Matthew 27:3-5 NLT
When Judas, who had betrayed him, realized that Jesus had been condemned to die, he was filled with remorse. So he took the thirty pieces of silver back to the leading priests and the elders. “I have sinned,” he declared, “for I have betrayed an innocent man.” “What do we care?” they retorted. “That’s your problem.” Then Judas threw the silver coins down in the Temple and went out and hanged himself.
That’s so unfortunate, that Judas left his chatterbox (the condemning and demoralizing voice inside him) use the Simon Kamdem effect to make him give up on hope of forgiveness and to end it all while Jesus would die for his sins too, while the grace and forgiveness at the cross was available for him too, but the devil didn’t let him know that, he just let him swim in guilt, shame and condemnation. The loss of all hope of restoration before God eventually led him to suicide.
Some of us feel this way but never go up to physical suicide. Instead, we commit
- Spiritual suicide: we give up on prayer because we already believe that God hates us so much that He’ll never listen to us anymore, we quit our churches, we stop with our ministry because we’ve been convinced by the devil that it’s over.
- Emotional suicide: We indulge in the greatest self-pity and self-hatred ever, and though we’ve asked for forgiveness, and though God has forgiven us,we refuse to forgive ourselves and to believe that He could forgive something so horrible. We start feeling sad, numb, broken and before we realize it, we fall into clinical depression.
- Gifts suicide: We take all our gifts and bury them away, we refuse to be sent by God because we have already declared and accepted that we are unqualified and not worth it, that God should choose someone else and not us. Instead of using our gifts for His glory, for the edification of the church, to bring people back to God, we bury them and live unhappy and unsatisfied because we needed to punish ourselves for sins Jesus had already received punishment for.
The list could be extended…
Anyhow, I would to God today that I wouldn’t end this without showing His people that their relationship with God, their ministry in God, their salvation in Christ is not over till they decide.
I’ll show you something.
- Peter too betrayed Jesus, he denied him 3 times in public
- Paul killed lots of disciples of Christ
- David stole someone else’s wife and killed her husband
- Jonas said no when God sent him and even ran away from God and went in the opposite direction
- Moses killed a man when he thought that nobody was around
- Jacob tricked his father to earn blessings
- Abraham had extramarital sex with the servant of his wife because his wife and him tried to fulfill God’s promise of a son by themselves
What all these have in common is the fact that they sticked to God no matter what had happened. They decided to go no where else but in God’s presence, and that’s how you defeat the Simon Kamdem effect
Make it clear to the devil that even if he wants to make you believe that your relationship with God is over, you’ll never start a relationship with him because you’ve chosen Jesus.
Don’t turn away from God in shame, stick to Him and draw even closer to Him.
John 6:67-69 NIV
“You do not want to leave too, do you?” Jesus asked the Twelve. Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and to know that you are the Holy One of God.”
1 Timothy 1:15 NIV
Here is a trustworthy saying that deserves full acceptance: Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners—of whom I am the worst.
Prayer
Father Lord God Almighty, I come before You with all my guilt and all my shame and all my pain, God I just can’t carry it anymore on my shoulders, and I don’t want to lose the joy of your presence. Please Lord heal me now, help me realize that it’s not over yet, that there still is hope, that in Christ Jesus I am forgiven, Loved and restored. Help me start afresh as from now, leaving the past behind and running to You, holding fast to You. When the devil reminds me of my past , help me remember what You say about me: I am valuable, completely forgiven and unconditionally loved. I am not what I did, I am who You say I am, In Jesus Christ’s Name. Amen.
God bless you all
If you’ve watched “Seven Heaven” or had a similar experience, please share in the comments section what you felt.
In case you’ve liked the post please leave a LIKE, and why not share on social media to a friend who may need this ?
Thanks for reading
Victoria Eyog
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