Scapegoat

capegoat: a person who is blamed for the wrongdoings, mistakes, or faults of others, especially for reasons of expediency.

 “Aaron shall offer the bull as a sin offering for himself and shall make atonement for himself and for his house.  Then he shall take the two goats and set them before the Lord at the entrance of the tent of meeting.  And Aaron shall cast lots over the two goats, one lot for the Lord and the other lot for Azazel.  And Aaron shall present the goat on which the lot fell for the Lord and use it as a sin offering, but the goat on which the lot fell for Azazel shall be presented alive before the Lord to make atonement over it, that it may be sent away into the wilderness to Azazel.

Leviticus 16:6-10 ESV

   The first Monday after the NFL Season ends is known as Black Monday, because this is when a number of head coaches and general managers are fired for their team’s performance.  One of the reasons they are fired or let go is because the owner can’t get rid of the whole team, so the coach and or general manager becomes the scapegoat for the team’s bad record and or performance.  This just isn’t the case for football, but this will happen to just about every coach in every team sport at every level.  In essence coaches, especially head coaches are hired to be fired.  Coach Dean Smith is a rarity to coach the University of North Carolina Men’s Basketball Team for decades and retire on his own terms.  Scapegoats just don’t happen in sports, but they also happen at jobs, within churches, and even within friends and families.  So lets explore how a Scapegoat ties into the Lenten Season and Easter. 

    The first concept is that when there is a Scapegoat, there is a guilty conscience.  Guilt means that we realize that responsible for the mess we are due to our actions, words, attitudes and even our lack of action.   This means that we realize that there are consequences for our actions and that relationships are, at best damaged, to broken beyond repair.  I think guilt can cause that famous fight or flight response.  Whether we stick our head in the sand and pretend nothing is wrong, or we it forces us into action.  In essence we play the blame game or scapegoat someone into the responsibilities and consequences of our poor decisions.  I think there is a third option for guilt, but more on that later.

 To expound on the blame game, why should we take responsibilities for our actions when we can make someone else responsible for them and we can make them face the music.  How often do we blame a sitting president for an economy or blaming the pastor of a church for the church not growing and for younger families moving to the bigger church down the road? It is never our fault because it is always someone else’s actions, attitudes or words that causes the problems or not finding the right solutions to fix all of our problems.  Blame always tries to minimize our guilt if not get rid of it completely. 

    The second concept of a scapegoat is this idea of alienation.  When we blame or scapegoat someone, we are termination the relationship somehow.  I think one of the reasons we do this is that we feel guilt in what we have done or said to that person so we alienate them so that we don’t have so see them and either face the music and or be awkward in their presence.  I think the biggest reason why we alienate people and send them of off to the relational desert is that they are paying the price for our guilt and for our actions.  Guilt needs to be atoned for, and scapegoating someone means the debt, guilt and consequences are being placed on that person or group of people.  How many of our relationships have died because we blamed people for our bad decisions or for our lot in life.  Killing a relationship is sometimes easier or more convenient than actually doing the hard work and taking the responsibilities for our actions.

    The third concept of scapegoating is this idea of peace.  In his book, The Mosiac Atonement Josh McNall makes two great statements and the first one is.  

The scapegoat succeeds in delivering a measure of peace.

In essence this statement is right, the reason we scapegoat is to appease our guilty conscience.  We often will try to do anything and everything, except the right thing.  We will even throw  people under the bus if it makes us feel better.   As I wrestled with this section of Josh’s book, I came to realize that this peace is only temporary.  When it starts to fade, we try to find other ways to sooth our soul and to clear our conscience.  I think this view of peace is not only means a lack of strife and conflict, but it also means that we are happy.  True peace means doesn’t always mean we are happy and that conflict is always absent or minimal.  True peace is our response to when things are not going well.  Josh’s second observation is this

First we lynch our scapegoats, then we worship them

We are all created to worship something and we tend to worship what makes us feel better.  We worship scapegoats we are placing the guilt and consequences that belong to us on them and we think we have skirted around the consequences, guilt and responsibilities of our action or inactions. This is me thinking out loud, I think we scapegoat and worship anything that absolves us of any responsibility to grow up and that masks our guilt and shame. This form of worship often leads to unhealthy relationships and even addictions to various things, such as food, alcohol, technology.  When we mask our guilt an shame, it takes us down some really dark roads and have some ugly consequences until it we grow up and deal with them. 

    The fourth concept of being scapegoat is the idea that the scapegoat is innocent of what the are being blamed for.  The only way they could bear the transgression and the blame is if they were innocent of said action or words.  Biblically speaking, the only way for guilt to be taken care of and dealt with is by the sacrifice of an animal with no blemishes.  Within the Old Testament, t here was a \yearly feast where the High Priest would sacrifice a perfect lamb for the sins for the nation of Israel and the blood is what allowed the people to go before God.  All the sins of the nation were placed on the other lamb and sent off into the wilderness.  In essence the only way for our guilt to be properly taken care of is for it to be placed on someone or something that has not sinned

   \To finish up this blog, the passage that we started off with foreshadows Jesus.  Jesus is the ultimate scapegoat, to where He bore our sins and guilt so that we may be forgiven.  Jesus was alienated to a hill outside of the city limits of Jerusalem and died a brutal death on the cross.  His death took  care of our guilt and shame issue once and for all.  As the author of Hebrews puts it, Jesus sacrifice is the sacrifice to end all sacrifices.  In essence, Christ death, paid the price for our guilt and His resurrection made sure that we can over come our sin and guilt and that we don’t have to continuously live in it.