Jesus Seeks the Scandalized on the Kiss Cam

By now you’ve seen it.

It’s all over every social media platform. I saw it on the late news last night and on the early news this morning. Everyone laughing. Everyone mocking. Many glad that ‘those cheaters’ are getting their comeuppance. Not only are they cheating, but at a Coldplay concert? Sheesh.

In a culture that shouts the mantra of ‘love is love,’ there’s a strange undertone of harsh, severe judgment, even a note of deep glee at the downfall of their illicit love affair. Keep on mockingly exposing their failure, especially if it can get you clicks and likes. Talk to all your friends about it.

When I first saw it, I didn’t laugh. I felt incredibly deep grief. I’ve sat with too many couples where one was caught. However, none so publicly, so globally.

The shockwaves of this in their lives will not only be deep personally, but will be shattering relationally, even through future generations of their family. It’s a story of shattering guilt, shame, and incalculable trauma for their children. Grief and tears are the only appropriate response.

It’s in this moment of exposure, shame, and guilt, that Jesus isn’t pointing the finger and putting on a massive jumbotron in the clouds for the whole world to see. He’s offering grace and mercy. He came to seek and save those who were hiding their affair and were caught publicly, on a kiss cam at a Coldplay concert of all places. He didn’t come to save the righteous, but sinners. He didn’t come to expose and shame, but to deal with that shame on the cross.

My sin was never placed on a massive screen for a sold-out concert to see nor was it shared immediately and globally after. However, my sin deserves the same as theirs, and Jesus dealt with it at Calvary and calls me his beloved. His love keeps no record of my many and massive sins. Grace exposes in order to cover, not to shame. Grace desires compassion more than clicks. Grace doesn’t add blows to the already shattered, but offers restoration.

To the watching world: there is a Savior who laid his life down for his unfaithful bride. He didn’t point, mock, and laugh. He grieved, he wept, he died, he rose again, and will wash away every stain and wrinkle until his bride is spotless. And even until then, he cherishes her- he cherishes me and you if you looked to him by faith- with all his heart, soul, mind and strength.