Excerpts from the book...

Page 9 ... Shame is healthy to a point, but when it morphs into self-loathing, it is unhealthy. Self-loathing shame thinks, "I am wrong, I am broken, and defective." People living in perpetual shame are the living dead. Page 13 ... Most people suffering shame would never inflict that same pain onto another person. Yet, they inflict it on themselves. God wants them to stop beating themselves up. They don't have to pay the price for their sins, Jesus already paid that on Calvary. Page 16 ... Think about all the sins people commit. Our sin is not abnormal. We are not freaks. We sinned just like everyone else. Page 17 ... "We all stumble in many things," the details of your sin vary from the details of my sin, but we are both sinners. Neither of us needs to feel shame in the presence of the other. We both have stained garments. The stains may be in different places, for different reasons, but we both have sinned. Page 19 ... Imagine a living radio. He is a perfect little radio. He can tune into any radio station he chooses, but he has tuned into weak stations with lots of static and now he thinks that there is something wrong with him. He thinks he is flawed and will never be right. He has stumbled across a good station for a moment now and then, but he loses focus and ends back up with weak static. There is nothing wrong with the radio. He is perfect and can pick up any station, but he thinks he is flawed. Page 23 ... People feel hopeless after years of living in shame. They can hear John 3:16, but they always hear it with an unspoken "except me." They hear Romans 5:8, but they automatically hear that "except me." They have listened to the static of sin for so long, they no longer believe that God could love them, but they are wrong. Page 27 ... James mentions rain, this is a metaphor for healing hearts that have suffered a drought of joy and peace. James is saying that there is healing. There is no reason to continue suffering through a drought when there is a way out. There is "rain" on the other side of the fear. Modern psychology calls this exposure therapy.