There's a movie that came out in 1944 called, "Gaslight".
It's back in the days when the lights that we would use in our homes, they were controlled by,
they were controlled by gas, by the amount of gas that was there to fuel the light.
And in the movie there is a husband and a wife. And the husband tries to manipulate the wife.
He tries to make here think that she's going crazy.
And the way that he does this is that he very subtly, gradually, over a longer period of time,
he removes just a little bit of gas from the light, so that the light gets a little bit dimmer
and then a little bit later on he removes a little bit more gas from the light so that it
becomes a little bit more dim and then later on he removes a little bit more gas so that it
becomes a little bit more dim and when the wife notices that it seems to be a little bit more dim
and comes to the husband and says,
"Did you notice that it seems the light is more dim."
he says, "Oh I didn't notice.
It looks the same to me."
And this keeps happening.
That she notices its becoming more and more dim and keeps coming to him and saying,
"Don't you notice," and he says "No, it looks the same to me."
And so eventually she comes to the conclusion that there must be something wrong with,
with her.
That she's the one who's broken.
She's the one who's confused.
That it's her fault that things seem off.
Those who have been abused can come to the same conclusion about themselves.
That it's your fault.
You might feel shame for the horrible things that you've been put through,
for the horrible things that you've been made to do, or suffer.
Or maybe you've even been told, "Well, it's your fault this is happening.
This wouldn't happen if you weren't such a ..." Fill in the blank.
"This wouldn't happen if you had done a better job of ..."
Fill in the blank.
And for those reasons, those who have been abused might walk around feeling a whole lot of shame.
They might start to believe that they're the ones who are really broken.
That's there's something really wrong with them. That they are the problem.
But you're not.
Do you know why?
Because you're the one who's hurting.
You're the one who doesn't feel safe.
You're the one still feeling the pain.
That was done to you.
And it's not the first time it's happened in the history of the world.
Jesus saw it too.
In the Gospel of Matthew chapter nine, it says
You probably noticed those two words, harassed.
Something painful happening over and over again and again and they had no ability to stop it.
Helpless. There was nothing they could do.
There was no way for them to create a situation in which something,
they were going to experience something different.
And Jesus saw it.
You know if you ever watch that movie,
the one from 1944, you know.
You'd be able to see so clearly, right from the beginning, exactly what was happening.
Well, Jesus looks at you and he sees the same thing.
He knows you've been harassed. He knows you're helpless.
He knows that you've been made to believe that it's your fault.
That you're not worthy of anything good from anyone.
But Jesus believes you are.
Because after he saw the individuals who were harassed and helpless, he did something.
The Good Shepherd went to a cross where all of our real faults were forgiven.
And all of the invented ones,
they were among the many, many things that God promises.
It's not gonna stop your Heavenly Father from looking at you and seeing perfection.
No faults.
Perfection.
Because in Christ Jesus, that's who you always are.
No faults. Just a perfect child of your father in heaven.