How God Turns Embarrassment into Joy
When I was 14 years old, I made a decision that would forever be etched into the pages of my awkward teenage memory: I was going to cut my own hair.
Now, you need to understand—this was not a calculated choice. I didn’t research styles. I didn’t watch tutorials. I didn’t consult a mirror as often as I should have. What I had was an old pair of clippers, un-oiled and stubborn, a burst of teenage independence, and a whole lot of “how hard can it be?”
As it turns out… pretty hard.
I didn’t know what I was doing. I started somewhere around the back—maybe the sides—and tried to just sort of go around my head like a lawn mower spiraling in toward the middle. But the clippers, long neglected of maintenance, didn’t glide so much as scrape. The result? Uneven grooves. Deep lines. No direction. No symmetry. Just chaos.
It looked bad. Really bad.
And what do we do when we mess something up? We try to fix it in the most panic-induced, logic-defying ways possible. So I thought: maybe if I wash my hair, it will magically… fall into place?
It didn’t.
Washing my hair only made the disaster more visible. And to make matters worse, I suddenly remembered: we were going to church that evening. Saturday night service.
Panic set in.
Hiding the Shame
I threw on a hat.
That hat became my shield, my fortress, my covering. Underneath it, I could pretend everything was fine. No one could see the mess I had made. I could hide my mistake.
But then we arrived at church.
If you’ve ever walked into a church building wearing a hat, especially back in the day, you probably know what’s coming. A well-meaning usher, someone’s mom, or maybe just the unspoken code of reverence, will gently remind you—“Take off your hat.”
I knew it was coming. I tried to delay. Pretend I forgot something in the car. But eventually, there I was, sitting in the sanctuary, hatless and humiliated. I tried to slouch low. Maybe no one would look. Maybe no one would care.
That’s when a young Black boy sat next to me. He glanced once. Then again. His eyes grew wide.
I braced myself.
And then he blurted it out:
“YOUR HAIR!”
I wanted the ground to swallow me whole. I dropped my head, humiliated, hoping he wouldn’t say anything else.
But then he added something that changed everything:
“Your hair is soooo cool!”
He was thrilled. Enthralled, even. His eyes sparkled. His joy was genuine. He wasn’t mocking me. He was amazed.
Apparently, I had unknowingly cut cornrows into the top of my head. I was the coolest white kid in town—and I had no idea.
What I thought was a mess… he saw as a masterpiece.
The God Who Redeems Embarrassment
It’s funny how moments like that can linger in your soul.
Not just because they’re humorous, but because they’re true.
Because they speak to something deeper.
We all try to cover what we’re ashamed of.
Our stories. Our sin. Our scars. Our failed attempts. Our haircuts, sure—but more than that, our identities.
And yet, there’s a God who sees right through the hat. Right through the shame. Right into the mess.
And instead of saying, “What have you done?”—He smiles and says, “I can work with that.”
From Shame to Glory
Shame is one of the enemy’s oldest tools. In the garden of Eden, Adam and Eve sinned—and what was their first instinct?
To hide.
They covered themselves with fig leaves. They tried to escape God’s presence. They assumed their sin meant they were no longer welcome in His gaze.
But God still came looking.
And He’s still doing it today.
You may be hiding under something—mistakes, regret, what people might say. But God’s not here to condemn. He’s here to redeem.
“Those who look to Him are radiant; their faces are never covered with shame.”
— Psalm 34:5
Unexpected Glory
The beauty of that church moment wasn’t just that someone complimented my tragic haircut. It was that I learned something about grace:
Sometimes God uses the things we’re most ashamed of to display His goodness.
We want polished. He wants real.
We want to present perfection. He wants surrendered imperfection.
“But He said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for My power is made perfect in weakness.’”
— 2 Corinthians 12:9
That verse doesn’t say His power is made perfect in our success, our polished personas, or our filtered photos. It’s in our weakness. Our vulnerability. Our “I messed up and now I’m wearing a hat” moments.
What Are You Hiding?
Take a moment and think about it.
What part of your story have you tried to cover up?
Maybe it’s a past failure. An addiction. A season of rebellion. A broken relationship. A divorce. A pregnancy out of wedlock. Financial ruin. A moral failure. A public mistake.
Or maybe it’s something quieter—anxiety, depression, doubt. The things that don’t always get mentioned in testimonies.
Whatever it is, it’s real. And you’ve probably thought, “If people saw this… they’d never look at me the same.”
But what if that’s the very place God wants to work?
What if your greatest embarrassment could become your loudest praise?
What if someone looks at your scars and says, “Your story! It’s so powerful!”—not because you did everything right, but because God showed up in everything wrong?
The Hat Comes Off
Eventually, we all have to take the hat off.
We can’t live our lives in hiding. Shame is a heavy burden. It chokes out our joy. It silences our testimonies. It tells us we’re disqualified.
But God redeems.
Not just with forgiveness, but with purpose.
Not just with second chances, but with transformation.
And often, the very thing we try to hide becomes the testimony that sets someone else free.
Final Thoughts: God Loves the Whole You
That day in church could’ve gone a very different way. But God had a lesson for me—and maybe for you too.
The gospel isn’t about God loving a future, cleaned-up version of you.
It’s about Him loving you now. Fully. Joyfully. Relentlessly.
And yes—He will shape you, sanctify you, grow you. But not because He’s disappointed. Because He sees who you really are.
The mess you made?
He sees it as material for glory.
The shame you carry?
He’s ready to redeem it.
So go ahead. Take off the hat.
Someone might just point to the thing you feared the most and say with wonder and joy:
“Your story is sooo cool!”
Because God can take any mess, any shame, any haircut—and turn it into something that makes others stare in wonder.
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