Contempt

We are in a pandemic of contempt.

I see it spreading everywhere (especially on social media).

Sometimes I see symptoms of it in myself.

The biggest symptom of contempt, I think, is how quickly I think I notice that others have contempt for me.

How dare they? I think.

But when I get honest in prayer, I see the truth: The contempt I know I feel for them is greater than the contempt I think they feel for me.

As a Christian, I am lost if I choose to have and hold contempt.

The Spirit of the Christ is not a spirit of contempt, but of grace.

I am no longer in the Way of the Christ when I find I am giving contempt a place to grow in me. I must confess my sin and turn 180 degrees.

I must turn away from contempt and back to grace.

Many of the people Jesus met on his way were contemptible people. They made choices that were indecent, immoral, and unhealthful. They were wrong about things that most folks got right.

But Jesus neither felt nor showed contempt for these contemptible people; he felt love and showed grace. He invited them to be his companions as he went on his way.

Even when some of them were in the act of murdering him, Jesus could find no trace of contempt for them in his spirit. He loved them and showed them grace with his dying breath.

Grace, not contempt, is the meaning and message of the Gospel.

God knows that healing our communities, our country, our neighbors, and our selves will not from our contempt. It will not come from contempt’s cousins: pats on the head and pity for those we look down upon.

Healing comes only by grace.

How do we turn away from contempt and turn towards grace?

How do we turn away from the ways of the world and turn back towards the Way of the Christ?

Let’s start in our own minds.

Ask: “Is my mind for other people like the mind the Christ has for me? Is the grace of the Christ flowing into me and through me in a way that warms those who come into contact with me?”

Next, turn back to the Way of the Christ online.

Do you say and share things that curdle with contempt or glow with grace?

As Christians, if we truly believe that “his grace reaches me,” that grace will shine through in what we say and share online.

A Christian whose online posts whiff of contempt is a Christian who may be having serious trouble believing in the grace of the Christ.

Instead of showing contempt for a Christian like that, it is crucial to build up his faith by showing him the grace that was in doubt.

It is hard to give grace to someone who is prickly with contempt, but this is the Way. Grace is not grace if it is not hard and sometimes painful. Grace is not grace unless the odds of failure are high.

For those of us who are Christians, the only place to be now is at the foot of the cross of the Christ. Only there can we feel the grace of the Christ. Only there can we be aware of how badly we need this grace (and how willing the Christ is to give it to us).

At the cross of the Christ, grace can heal us of our contempt and set us free to carry grace and peace to those we once hated and pitied.

Christian, turn away from contempt and turn back to the cross of your Christ.

Grace and peace.