Sharing the Gospel of Honor
“Huli fomu,” his mother said as she gestured toward his mouth. With gloved hands, I opened his mouth as she had asked and discovered a small fistula on his palate.
His mother had traveled five days from the far end of the desert to reach us. He was her firstborn son, a great accomplishment for a young wife in her culture. However, because of his physical difference, he and she would never experience the pride of such a position and the accolades it traditionally brought. Instead, she had been cast out of her village along with the baby.
As I gently handed her precious son back to her, she looked at me with tearful eyes and whispered, “He is my honor.”
In the Islamic worldview of honor and shame, honor is a position attached to a group. That group can be one’s family, community, tribe, or nation. Follow the prescribed rules, and your honor is secure. Break them, you lose your position and are shamed.
This young mother had lost her position in the group, her honor, when she bore a child with a physical difference. Outside the group, she was shrouded in shame.
Her bold refusal to accept her son as an object of shame was courageous and rare. To lovingly call him Sharif, or honored one, was an outright affront to her family’s worldview. Descendants of Islam’s prophet Muhammad were called Sharif. It was a title of respect commonly used in society. But for a child with a disability? Never.
Thus began her wonderful journey out of shame and into honor as she learned more about Jesus, the Messiah sent to restore honor to every person, including women.
As a Westerner, I understand that Jesus died on the cross for my sins. I am forgiven because of His sacrifice for me. As a Muslim woman, my patient that day only knew that she was shamed for a deed beyond her control. She was now an outsider, rejected, along with her tiny son. And as far as she knew, God held the same opinion.
My friendships with Muslims have led me to discover that although I knew at age nine I was forgiven by God through Jesus, I have been carrying around a back-breaking, heart-smothering burden of shame all these years. And until I examined the Gospel through the eyes of my Muslim friend’s need, I did not know what to do with my own shame.
Now I do.
Christian, God has abolished shame through his son Jesus Christ. He has forgiven us our sins, He has given us power over fear, and he has released us from shame. We matter to Him. He honors us because He loves us. Jesus Christ sacrificed His life so we would come home again, would belong, again, forever.
This material is an adaptation of the original article “What Loving Muslims Taught Me About the Gospel” posted September 2, 2018 on Audrey Frank’s blog.