As Christians, we should not be living under condemnation. In fact, we ARE NOT living under condemnation because of what Jesus did for us. But we also need to make sure we don’t give in to feelings of condemnation after we fail with any sin. After we sin, when we wallow in shame and guilt and feeling condemned by God, that is actually to continue in our sin. When we wallow in shame and guilt we are being un-Christian. We are not having faith in the Gospel. The good news of the Gospel is that we are forgiven in Christ! Which means when we fail with sin we should run to God and thank him for his grace that we have experienced, we should enjoy his forgiveness, and we should then keep living for him with gratitude.
Romans 8:1-4
Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, 2 because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit who gives life has set you free from the law of sin and death. 3 For what the law was powerless to do because it was weakened by the flesh, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh to be a sin offering. And so he condemned sin in the flesh, 4 in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fully met in us, who do not live according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.
I speak with experience. This fight against crossdressing can be long and hard. For many of us it is a deep addiction. To give it up sometimes takes many years of trying, with dozens or hundreds of times of failing, followed by confession and repentance, followed by trying again. It is very important to talk about what we do and feel at those critical moments of failure. Satan loves it when we give in to shame and we feel like we are too sinful to be close to God. If we feel that way, then our failure is doing two damaging things. It is not only a failure into sin, but then it becomes something that pushes us further away from God. So we might fail with crossdressing and then feel too unworthy to go to church, or feel too unworthy to pray, or feel too unworthy to be used by God in other people’s lives. But we need to be doing the very opposite of this! When we fail, we need to run to God, not away from God. When we fail, we need to take joy in our salvation and forgiveness, not wallow in despair. This sin will NOT take away our salvation. This sin will NOT take away our forgiveness. Yes a true Christian will repent and keep on fighting sin, but our punishment is taken away in Christ if we slip up. We must stop giving in to feelings of despair. We must stop feeling like we have to clean ourselves up before talking to God. We must keep trying to resist sin out of gratitude to God for his forgiveness. When we fail, we should confess, repent, take joy in God and his forgiveness, and then live in gratitude for him again.
Excellent article to remember, thanks for the wisdom. “Christians often confuse guilt with the conviction of the Holy Spirit. They assume the presence of guilt is synonymous with the presence of motivation for change. This is not the case”