“I’m not ashamed of you, I’m proud of you!….I just don’t want anyone to see you.” That great line comes from the fun 1994 movie, “The Little Rascals” where Alfalfa, a little boy who has a membership in the “He Man Woman Haters Club”, is trying to hide away his would-be girlfriend in a closet so that his fellow “he man woman haters” won’t see him with a girl.
It is something for us to think about on this Maundy Thursday when we are called to heed the “Great Command” of Christ, that we would follow His foot-washing example of service and love one another as He loved us. Paul commands Timothy in 2 Corinthians – don’t be ashamed. Don’t be ashamed of the testimony of this Servant-Lord who stooped at the feet of His disciples and don’t be ashamed of your imprisoned mentor. In so doing, he commands us as well not to be ashamed of the faith in Christ that has been handed down through the ages.
Of course we may respond like Alfalfa, “I’m not ashamed of you! I’m proud of you! ….I just don’t want anyone to see you.” There are times when we might not want to clearly witness to our Lord. Perhaps our reasons are different today than they were for Timothy. Timothy perhaps wrestled with being ashamed of following what seemed to be two lowly criminals, one crucified and one imprisoned. We, on the other hand, may wrestle with being lumped together with bombastic and triumphalist expressions of the Christian faith. But regardless of the reasons – we can still find ourselves putting our Lord in the closet, promising that we’re proud of Him, but that we don’t want other people to see.
This is, of course, odd. The notion that we would be ashamed of Christ only shows how backwards our thinking is. If anyone should be ashamed, it is Him. You can imagine a lesser Christ shying away from people when they ask, “Do you know [insert your name]?” But He is not a lesser Christ. Rather, He is the Christ who saved us and called us to a holy calling. He died for us so that He could pay for our sins, and having forgiven us say to us, “I’m not ashamed of you, I’m proud of you.” And leave it at that. Amen.