Photo and Commentary ©2024 by Robert Howson
Tuesday, August 20, 2024
Your face turned red and you were certain that everyone else in the room noticed the change in your appearance. And you had every right to blush – you were embarrassed. Then again, maybe you weren’t embarrassed at all, just very self-conscious. The really cute girl in the row next to you said she really liked your third grade picture when they came out, but you were just so shy. There are a number of reasons for blushing; even the fear of blushing can cause you to blush. It’s called erythrophobia. Whatever the reason, the capillaries widen, more blood flows through, and your cheeks turn red. And to top it off, your hands start sweating.
The Bible speaks of the lack of this reaction in negative terms in reference to the Children of Israel: “Are they ashamed of their detestable conduct? No, they have no shame at all; they do not even know how to blush. So they will fall among the fallen; they will be brought down when I punish them,” says the Lord.” (Jeremiah 6:15 NIV) And to emphasize the point, these same words are repeated in 8:12 of the same book. The Lord wanted them to be conscious of their guilt, but they were too hardened to respond.
The male Western Tanager’s face is red too, but for a different reason. Unlike the red in others of the same family, his face is red due to rhodoxanthin, a pigment which is seldom found in birds. Instead, he gets it from insects in his diet which produces yellow pigments.
But we have no excuse. Most of us don’t eat too many insects, yet we have every reason to be ashamed of our failure to live the life we should. In the context of Jeremiah, we should be blushing. But there is good news. God covers us, not with a cheap cover-up, but with His own blood. That’s something we’ll never completely understand, how the redness of His blood makes us perfectly clean. But thank God for it.