Step 4
Exposing – We allowed God to speak to us about the things that keep us from Him and keep us in sin. We chose to expose our darkness to God, even with another person. Mercy and Grace covers every struggle as we learned deep surrender.
There are things in our lives that keep us hiding aspects of who we are from God. This is not who we really are, but who we believe we are. So we keep those things hidden. We won’t let God see or speak to us about our hidden shame. This hiding keeps our lives in sin. Secret fears, these things lock our motives into self protection.
This step is all about what perverts our motives and keeps us hiding from God. We want you to hear God talk to you and tell you that there’s no reason to be afraid. The motives of the Spirit are pure. It’s the heart that is empty, rejected, or wounded that will have mixed motives, some of which are highly destructive. Motive drive behavior. Lies drive bad motives. A person with insincere or impure motives will end up hurting other people. Persons who are deeply aware of Papa‘s love will find it easy to have pure motives. The goal of step 4 is to clean up some of the fears in our life so we can hear and receive the full measure of His identity for us.
We are not attempting to control anything. We are not trying to control our motives, actions, feelings, behaviors, or thoughts. Beliefs drive motives. Bad beliefs produce bad motives. Imagine that you believe someone at your job hates you and is trying to get you fired by lying. How would you respond? How would you feel? If you where aware of God’s perspective about this situation, then your motives and corresponding behavior would reflect God. This is the goal of step 4. So now we begin to expose that which we have kept hidden to Him.
There are many who will try to skip this step. If you truly want to experience the freedom and power of being like Jesus, then treat this step, and the next, like it is the most important. You may have to stay longer than you think ought to be necessary. But, remember that the greater your surrender, the higher God can take you.
Contrary to popular belief, God is not into exposing us to shame. Rather, He tries to gently walk His children out of darkness as they are ready.
To the heart that is hiding, confrontation sounds like accusation, exposure, and risk of shame.
God, on the other hand, gently highlights area of darkness and waits for us to bring them to Him, with our hands and hearts open wide. The choice to expose our darkness is ours along; no one should force you do it. If we are to ever be truly free, we must commit ourselves to taking an honest inventory of any dark thing that takes over our emotions, feelings, and behaviors. If we have something that you wouldn’t see in the life of Christ, than it is something that we should bring to Christ that we may surrender it.
It is extremely helpful to have the assistance of those who have gone through this step already. Often times we will try to short change ourselves because we are afraid to face the things we have been hiding. We know from experience how intimidating this step is. We know how scary it can be. Also, we know how much of God’s love and grace you will find during this process. Lean upon a close trusted friend, group sponsor, or personal minister. You are not alone in this.
Remember, you are not your sin. You are not defined by the darkness you have lived in. We only sin because we don’t know who we really are. We sin because we cannot see how deeply loved we are.
How you get free in step 4 is by choosing to bring your struggles to God and allowing Him to talk to you about the reasons behind the things you do. You must be able to hear His voice. You cannot use scripture as a substitute for not being able to hear when doing this step. This is not a formula; what motivates you is personal. You have to hear Him speak to your heart.
Every area of darkness is coming from the fear that you might not matter, that you have no value.
(You might say, “what about pride?” Pride rejects God’s value yet tries to steal value from other. It constantly tries to prove it has value already. A person who truly has value doesn’t need to prove it or steal it.)
This fear is a direct result of being born separated from God, not knowing how He feels. Demons then come and lie to us, over and over, reinforcing this fear until it becomes part of our subconscious identity. How we cope with this fear is what produces sin and darkness in our life. You are not your fear. You are not your sin. You are a person who cannot see your own worth.
When you break down step four and really look at it, it is not really about exposing our sin to God, it’s really about allowing God to expose the lies behind our sin and replace those lies with His love. You are not your sin. This will change our perspective so that it aligns with God.
Behind every addiction is a core lie.
How sin enters the life of a person starts with the fear of insignificance. As the person wrestles with this fear, they begin making judgments about themselves, about God, and about those around them. These judgments are meant to help us navigate life. We are attempting to order our universe, and prevent pain. These judgments become the rules we live by. Because these judgments are not in agreement with how God feels, they bring chaos instead of order. They bring sin instead of holiness. These judgments are how we often times protect ourselfs from rejection, shame, and our insecurities. They often form as resentments and unforgiveness. They can also cause us to hide and feel worthless.
Because of our unique position as sons of God, God honors every judgment we make. Jesus said, “Whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven. Whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.” Our judgments are how we bind and loose. God will not take our judgments from us, to do so would be to undermine the position He is trying to get us to stand in as sons of God. Instead He has to get us to change our judgments to ones that agree with Him. He hast to get us to confess the wrong judgments, and repent of making them.
It is an interesting Bible study to note that Jesus never asked us to repent of sin. Instead He says repent so that your sins will go into remission. If it’s not sin that we are repenting of, than what are we repenting of. Repentance means to change the way you think. Because judgements form the foundation of how we think, I believe that we are to repent of our judging, our judging without God. I believe we are to repent by turning ourselves towards God. We have been doing this whole thing without Him. Now He invites us into union.
Without God‘s heart involved, without the love of God as our source, every judgment we make will in fact become our own bondage. This is why unforgiveness, resentment, and bitterness are so destructive. But, we are also making judgments against ourselves. Now you can see why shame, condemnation, and guilt will keep us from stepping into our full sonship with God as our Father.
All of these need to be brought to God so that He can change our bad judgments into judgments of righteousness that have the heart of God as their source.
Practicals to doing step 4
We are asking you to see past your darkness, past your failures, and past your sins. Rather than being focused on the symptoms, we want you to see the root so you and God can remove it. You are not designed to carry fear, unforgiveness, resentment, shame and the like. You were designed to be full of God’s love for you and His life. By letting go of the things that you were not designed to carry, the real you will begin to emerge. You are not sin waiting to happen. You are not failure waiting to happen. You are a son of God waiting to happen.
If you are struggling with an addiction, then the 12 step program you are a part of will often bring you through the process of dealing with the step 4 of our program.
Some of us have used a ministry called “Sozo,” from Bethel, which is focused on hearing God so that you can forgive those in your past and bring healing to your relationship with God. There are in fact many ways to accomplish this step, so long as you’re releasing the bad judgments and receiving the truth from God’s perspective.
Step four is really about walking out this scripture. “If you continue in My spoken word (Greek – something said), then you are truly disciples of Mine (someone mentored by Jesus); and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free. …everyone who commits sin is the slave of sin. So if the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed.” -John 8:31-32,34,36 NASB
The bad judgments we make are founded upon lies that we believe. When you bring your judgments to God, He will expose the lies you believe and ask you to accept His truth in their place. His truth is the only truth that is real. The lies you believe are based upon how you cope with your core fears. Your core fears are how you personally believe the fear of insignificance. In step four our goal is to deal with the judgments that keep us in bondage to sin. In the following steps we will deal with our core fears and the lies that destroy our identity.
In the above scripture Jesus is saying that as we hear His voice and allow Him to mentor us, this process will expose the lies we have believed and He will give us truth that sets us free from the sins that have controlled our life. When we can live only from the perspective of Jesus, we will live free like Jesus.
In this step, and the next, we are striving to solve the issue of “seeking to save our own life.” When life squeezes us, we often begin defending and justifying. In these moments we often prove how little we have surrendered and how much we are still alive.
How do we get to the place where we no long seek to save ourselves? The answer is to surrender our motives and triggers until all that is left is His motives and triggers. We give Him our judgements and lies, and He replaces them with His love and value. Here, we finally find life, life that is free from self.
God will never take your judgments from you. You must give them to God, learn how He sees, and make new judgments based upon the truth that He shows you. You must learn to judge according to God‘s heart. Instead of hating the person who has wronged you, you will to learn to see them as a lost son with a destroyed identity. You will learn to see them as someone God desperately wants to love on.
How often and when
Utilize this step whenever you discover something negative in your life. You don’t have to go searching for negative things. It is not your job to root out every negative emotion and feeling that might be buried below the surface. As negative things come to the surface, deal with them then. You can use this step as often as is necessary regardless of where you are in this 12 step process. When we start this step, often times we have a list of things we need to get out of our life. As you continue through the process of removing each one, it can be tempting to see something negative behind every door. Resist the urge to be a detective. In general, we are just trying to get the big stuff out of the way, the stuff that make our relationships hard and keep us in bondage. You will discover that much will fall off of you as you continue onto steps 5 and 6.