I heard a great sermon this past Sunday. It was about how Jesus reached out to the
leper and healed him and how we should be reaching out to everyone around us,
especially the outcasts. After all, we
are all lepers in some way, shape, or form.
For me, a great way to gauge the effectiveness of a sermon is to see if
it comes up for me again during the week or even later.
Sure enough, it came up for me this morning. In biblical times, the leper had to shout
warning to anyone approaching, “Unclean!
Unclean!” If you touched a leper,
you too were considered unclean and had to remain separate from the
masses. What occurred to me, though, is
that so many people are still shouting “Unclean!” to those around them. You won’t usually hear it verbally but you
will see it in their mannerisms, their choices, their demeanors, and their
actions. It is that person whose shame
keeps them separated and in their own leper colony. It is that person whose self-worth is so low
that they tell the world “I am unworthy to be around you.” It is that person who thinks so poorly of
himself that his anger acts as both his shield and dagger.
My thinking then carried on to wondering if the leper that
Jesus healed had to work to stop warning people by shouting, “Unclean!” when
someone approached him. It seems to me
that would be a habit that you would have to work to break. I would think it was an automatic reaction
when people started to walk up to him.
Even though Jesus healed him of his leprosy, I am willing to bet he
still struggled with this.
Likewise, when there was healing with regards to my abuse,
like when God helped me forgive my grandmother, I still had to work against
some specific triggers. Even when I received
healing in the form of understanding my identity in Christ, I still had to work
to receive a compliment instead of my automatic response of discounting it.
It has indeed been a blessed week. God has shown me through an excellent sermon
and some revelation that even though healing occurs, you still have to choose and
work to live outside of the leper colony.
Wow! I appreciate how you took a sermon that you heard and added the flesh and bones that is needed to make it even real for you. God will heal you, but the process isn't over - you must go through the process of transformation. Whether it is mind, body, or soul. Thanks Audra!
ReplyDeleteThanks for your vulnerability. Shame stinks. There is nothing like the cleansing that healing brings. I agree with what you said, though. I find myself having to walk out of "the colony" frequently because it seems my old home there occasionally beckons. I remember how terrible it feels to live there and bail out fairly quickly. "This world is not my home." (Praise God!)
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