Despising the shame

Be motivated by what Christ despised. Our text says: He despised the shame. You know, it is so shameful to die on a cross. That was an accursed, shameful death. That is why the cross is erected on the main thoroughfare going into Jerusalem: So that mothers could walk by with their little children and say, Look children; look at those people on the cross. Do not ever be like them. They are objects of shame. But Jesus despised the shame. He lived by the fear of God, which esteems the smiles of God, to be a greater weight than the smiles of men; and the frowns of God to be of greater value than the frowns of men. So, he did not care what people thought of him, only what his Father thought of him. You see, that is what should motivate us. You do not have to stand before people on the Day of Judgment. You have to stand before your Father in heaven. It does not matter what that fellow teenage peer thinks of you or of what you are wearing, or of what you are saying, or of your hair, or your car or anything about you. What matters is what God thinks of you. Despise the shame. If the world around you say that you are unpopular, because you are a Christian, so be it. If you are popular with God, if you are a friend of God, you have everything. Despise the world’s shame. Run the race. So, we get motivated, you see, by the example of Christ, by what he endured, by what he rejoiced in, by what he despised.¹

Joel Beeke