INSULT OR INJURY?

When Oprah was mistreated in Switzerland, was it insult or injury?

Was it cause for alarm when a clerk wouldn't show her a $38,000 purse?  Really?  Oprah gets by with wanting a purse that costs what our house cost when I was in third grade?  Capitalists wonder how rich liberals keep from being singed when they fire up their rants against greedy rich people.  But to be fair, hypocrisy is not the issue.  Oprah felt slighted by racism.

So who knows the root of Oprah's rebuff?  No one but the clerk who (of course) denies the rebuff was racial.  Was Oprah profiled by weight...or just old-fashioned social snobbery?  I'm thinking most people are familiar with being EVALUATED in a store by a snotty salesperson.  That's why we loved Julia Roberts' takedown in "Pretty Woman".

Am I saying it was not hurtful?  SURE it was hurtful.  My whiteness felt such a slap this summer at an American Indian grocery store by a surly American Indian clerk who had previously been very kind as one of her tribe checked out.  But I didn't make a federal case of it.

Sometimes insults are only injury if they are allowed to be.

How about the Missouri clown who wore an Obama mask?  Was that insult or injury?  Well, when compared to being burned in effigy or having your fake head impaled on a stake...I guess "just wearing a mask" seems tame.

President Bush never made a federal case of his insults.  Why?  Think they weren't hurtful?  Just imagine if President Obama's face were on some of these signs...

2006 HBO documentary, "Death of a President"

I'm sure these examples of the hate that President Bush sustained were hurtful.  Knowing people hate you is a cross to bear.  But the former President never whined about his treatment or ordered the Secret Service to act...or answered back by returning evil for evil.  My opinion is that such strength came from a good sense of self-identity.

Christians are people who have become aware of how God sees them.  And from the foot of the cross, everything else fades to pale except the opinion of the worth Dispenser.  The world's opinion still stings, but God's affection and acceptance is a warm blanket.  In those times, He is good to whisper encouragement about the kingdom to come.

I got a kick out of Jase Robertson's experience in a NYC hotel lobby this week.  When he asked hotel staff about a restroom, the man escorted him out the front door because he was mistaken for a homeless person.  Did Jase file a complaint about facial profiling?  Nah!  He thought it was pretty funny and they remained at the hotel as guests.  That is a healthy perspective which disallows injury.

If Oprah and President Obama want to move to such a place of less offense, they have that option.   

Consider Jesus' example in Isaiah 53.  He endured active mocking by men and passive ignoring by men who turned aside.  Men looked down on Him and put no value on Him.  Then He went to His death considering it joy to buy man's redemption.  Yeshua Ha-Mashiach knows something about insult and injury.

One day when He returns, He will put His foot on the neck of iniquity.  Maranatha!