MARTIN CAREY
Some of you find yourselves living on the margins of the Christian community. You have your reasons for being on the outside, maybe painful reasons—and yet, you probably wish you were not. One powerful factor that can drive us away from churches is a sense of shame. Even while feeling confident in the Gospel of the forgiveness of sins, knowing we are brought near to God by Jesus’ death for us, we stand back. We can be confident trusting in Jesus and His word, but attending church and dealing with other Christians is another matter.
When Jesus walked the streets of Israel, He knew all about religious shaming behavior. One day while walking through the crowd in a Galilean city, a man dressed in filthy rags suddenly appeared before Jesus. His hair was wild and matted and his skin covered with sores. He was “full of leprosy,” a nightmare of contamination. In that “clean” crowd, he was the walking dead, and they all drew back in horror. The man fell down before Jesus with his face in the dirt, saying, “Lord, if you will, you can make me clean!”
This man’s story is found in three of the gospels; Matthew 8:1, Mark 1:40, and Luke 5:12. For the Israelite, lepers weren’t just unfortunate victims of an illness. They were receiving God’s punishment for their sins, as did Moses’ sister Miriam in Numbers 12, when she slandered Moses and challenged his prophetic authority. Leviticus 13 gives detailed commands for lepers and how priests were to identify them. The priest could only identify and rule on the sufferer’s condition, but he never would seek a cure. In the Bible, complete healings are found only through the prophets (Numbers 12, 2 Kings 5). Otherwise, healers would use various kinds of herbs and rituals which they manipulated as an exorcism to purge the demonic powers from the guilty sinner (https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/leprosy).
There were many kinds of skin diseases that were considered leprous, such as boils and burns that failed to heal. All such conditions required banishment from society. Lepers were to dress in rags, live alone in shame, and remain outcasts from all of society. There was little sympathy for misery; they were deserving sinners.
Severe and Desperate Case
The man in our story was an especially severe and desperate case. He broke the law by pressing through the crowd to approach Jesus. He could have been stoned for this egregious behavior, but he had nothing to lose. Death would bring relief. Kneeling before Jesus worshipfully, he had no sense of entitlement, no rights. “If you will,” he pleaded. In Mark, we see that Jesus was “moved with compassion” for the man. He didn’t hesitate but reached out and touched him. He wasn’t repulsed, for He did not fear any disease or sin. He moved in with His hand and His heart.
This is what Jesus came for,
“Because the LORD has anointed me, to bring good news to the afflicted; He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to captives” (Isaiah 61:1).
Jesus then said to the leper, “I will, be clean.”
Then as now, Jesus is more than willing; to save the lost, He will pour out His soul unto death. In an instant, the man’s disease and disfigurement are gone. He is clean, and his shame is gone. There is no contamination or shame too ugly or awful for Jesus to touch. Furthermore, His forgiveness is never alone, He restores our souls and deals decisively with all our shameful secrets.
Jesus then sternly warns the man not to tell anyone what happened to him, but to go and show himself to the priest. He needs the official declaration that he is clean.
“But he went out and began to talk freely about it, and to spread the news, so that Jesus could no longer openly enter a town, but was out in desolate places, and people were coming to him from every quarter” (Mark 1:45).
Jesus knew beforehand what this man would do, and He gladly healed him anyway. Yes, the man should have obeyed Jesus, but his spreading the news also fulfilled what Scripture foretold. We also see that Jesus also took the man’s shame and separation from society upon Himself.
“He was despised and forsaken of men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief; and like one from whom men hide their face He was despised, and we did not esteem Him” (Isaiah 53:3).
The man could enjoy inclusion and fellowship, while Jesus had to withdraw and live outside society. This is what Jesus does for all of us who trust in Him. He was excluded so that we who are broken and afraid can draw near and be included.
Multifaceted Shame
Our shame and exclusion from acceptable society comes in a thousand forms. For some, it is a painful divorce and single parenthood. Many Christians suffer the secret shame of sexual abuse. For others, it is a painful past of substance abuse with shameful deeds and resulting incarceration. You can look at any church congregation and know you have a collection of broken people carrying heavy burdens of shame. In this life, we all groan, waiting for that final redemption (Romans 8:23).
Many Christian families bear a shame of a wayward child. They raised their child in a Christian home with Scripture, prayer, and regular church attendance. Yet, that child has rejected his parents’ faith and scorns all the entreaties to return. This heartbreak is harder to bear when other Christians ask, “How could they have a child like that?” Pastor and writer Dave Harvey describes the significant anxieties for fellow Christians that wayward children reveal. Other parents may worry that they might also have a wayward child. They often protect themselves from worry by making comparisons:
“Rebellious kids trigger serious anxieties for Christians. We respond by playing the comparison game—examining prodigals and their parents to find differences between us and them, our kids and their kids. To assuage our own worry, we want to find something to explain, something to blame” (https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/lift-the-heavy-burden-of-shame).
Comparing ourselves with others creates a “callous culture” and drives away the grace that is so needed to protect and heal. There’s a legalistic assumption under that thinking, that if we are really good parents, doing everything right for our kids, then they will grow up to be good Christians. Therefore, wayward children reveal parental failure. We often forget how we all are saved by grace through God’s gifts to us. Godly parents can be His means of grace, but salvation is of the Lord, a miracle He performs, without exception.
Also, let’s keep in mind that we all need a lot of grace and help from God (Hebrews 4:16), dealing with the pain and brokenness of other Christians. As Harvey says, “We’re confused about how to care, what to say, whom to involve, and when (or if) to explore parental culpability. We’re often well-intentioned but poorly informed” (Harvey, Ibid.).
Shame of the Cross
We often fail each other, and dealing with our own shame must drive us to Jesus, who dealt with shame very forcefully. He faced all that evil men, religious and secular, could heap on Him. Hebrews 12:2 tells us that He “despised the shame” of the cross. What does it mean that He despised shame? He had contempt for shame itself because nothing they could say or do to Him could dishonor Him or stick to Him. He had “the joy set before Him” that no one could shake or remove from Him.
Friend, you can also despise the shame that others try to place on you, or that you secretly carry in your soul. Jesus already took your shame on Himself and bore it to the cross. He killed it right there, forever. Shame was put to death, along with every record of anything held against us, anything hostile towards us, “nailing it to His cross” (Colossians 2:14-15):
“When He had disarmed the rulers and authorities, He made a public display of them, having triumphed over them through Him.”
Those rulers and authorities want to crush us under a heavy load of shame, like an unpayable debt. Jesus stripped that power away from them. He shamed them completely, so you never need to knuckle under to their demands and accusations. You can despise the shame because He has already defeated every last little insult and wound sent our way. Jesus bears our griefs and carries our sorrows, now and forever, without any hesitation or interruption. He will always intercede for us (Hebrews 7:25). If you trust Him then you are complete in Him (Col. 2:10).
So, who’s afraid of church? We are all wounded, ashamed, and unfaithful people who live by drawing near to Him. Gather without fear. Is there someone you care about that bears a load of shame? You may never discern who’s at fault, and you should probably avoid trying to fix their problem. You can be a good listener who can keep things to yourself without judging. We can grieve or rejoice with them, whatever is needed right there and then (Romans 12:15). And we all, having been forgiven much, can draw near to each other, despising all fear and shame. He has made us clean. †
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