Scorn and Contempt

"Remove from me scorn and contempt, for I keep your statutes." (Psalm 119:22)

I remember when I was a child I couldn't talk very well. I had a great deal of difficulty pronouncing many different words. Older children use to make fun of me and scorn me. I felt terrible. I hated to go to school because I knew that I would be laughed at again.

In Psalm 22:6 the writer uses the words that our Lord used many years later as He faced the scorn of His accusers. He said, "But I am a worm and not a man, scorned by men and despised by the people."

Our Lord was scorned because He was willing to die for the sins of the world. He knew that He had to suffer those words and attitudes if He was to be the Saviour of the world. The Jewish people despised those that had to die the death of a cross. To them it was a contemptible way to die. But those people did not know the words of the prophet Micah who wrote, "You will bear the scorn of the nations." Micah 6:16

Jesus bore the scorn of the nations. He died that we would not have to pay the price of our sins. The price to pay was death and He paid that debt.

He was treated with scorn and contempt but God vindicated Him. He raised Him up from the tomb and set Him at His own right side to make intercession for us.

No one likes to be treated with scorn or contempt but we can bear it if we know that God will vindicate us. If we are suffering for Him then we can say with the song writer, "It will be worth it all, when we see Jesus."