James Smithson was born in 1765 in France, the son of Hugh Percy (Smithson), a prominent and wealthy English duke, and Elizabeth Hungerford Keate Macie, a direct descendant of King Henry VII. A life of prominence would have awaited him apart from one other significant factor — his parents were not married at the time of his birth and he was rejected as “illegitimate.”
While he was rejected by British society, refused citizenship by the British government, and denied an inheritance from his father, Smithson became a scholar and one of England’s greatest scientists, joining the Royal Society (an association of important scientists) at the age of 22 and publishing some 27 papers in his lifetime.
While he did not inherit a financial fortune, through his labors he amassed his own fortune. Because he had no wife and children, in his will he stipulated that his wealth go to his nephew, Henry Hungerford. His will further stipulated that if Hungerford had no children (which he didn’t), Smithson’s legacy would transfer to another recipient, the United States of America:
I then bequeath the whole of my property,…to the United States of America, to found at Washington, under the name of the Smithsonian Institution, an Establishment for the increase & diffusion of knowledge among men.
That’s right, Smithson’s fortune was used to establish the Smithsonian Institution in America. Why did he leave such a legacy to a country he never visited? He wrote, “Just as England has rejected me, so have I rejected England.” What might have been the benefit to England, had even a few men embraced and loved James Smithson for who he was, rather than for condemning him for the sins of his parents?
There is a danger in rejection.
But you know that. You’ve experienced the consequences of ignoring godly counsel, you’ve suffered because you made a financial choice you were advised against, you’ve lost friendships because someone wouldn’t confess and repents and gave up fellowship for the sake of pride. We’ve all rejected wisdom of various kinds at various times and we’ve all rejected others or been rejected by others, losing friendship.
But there is one kind of rejection that is greater than any other rejection. The greatest (worst) rejection is the rejection of Christ.
In the gospel of Luke, the Nazareans were the first to blatantly reject Christ as the Messiah. They heard Jesus speak in the synagogue on the Sabbath — after reading Isaiah 61:1-2, He simply declared, “Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing” (Luke 4:21). He was asserting that He was the Messiah and He had come as Israel’s eternal Davidic King.
And initially everyone seemed to embrace the message, “speaking well of Him…” (v. 22). And then Jesus explained that if they wanted what He would do as Messiah (release captives to sin and set free those who were in bondage to sin, v. 18), they would have to humble themselves, even as the Gentiles who believed in God in the Old Testament did (vv. 25-27).
And that enraged the Nazareans — “who is this Man to tell us that we need to humble ourselves? How dare He assert that we need to be like the Gentiles!” And so they attempted to kill Him, dragging Him to a cliff to attempt to throw Him to His death (what Satan had also tempted Jesus to do on His own, vv. 9-11).
And arriving at the precipice of the cliff, Jesus simply disappeared from their midst. They were holding Him, and then they weren’t. They saw Him, and then they didn’t.
And, while Matthew and Mark both indicate that Jesus returned on another occasion to Nazareth, Luke doesn’t record any other visits from Jesus to Nazareth. From the perspective of Luke, Jesus is done with Nazareth.
The Nazareans rejected Christ. But far more significantly, Christ rejected Nazareth.
There is a danger in rejecting Christ. There is a danger in hearing the truth of the gospel and turning away from it. There is a danger in assuming that one can stand in judgment of Christ and God. There is a danger in assuming that one’s rejection of Christ is definitive and done with impunity — that God is bound by that rejection and unable to respond to or overwhelm that rejection. The danger is that man does not judge God — He does not have that authority. God judges man — and He does have that authority.
The danger of rejecting God is not that one leaves God, having nothing to do with Him. The danger of rejecting God is not that God turns His back on the rejecter, having nothing to do with him. The danger of rejecting God is that without repentance, God will reject the rejecter and consign him to suffer eternally under God’s wrath.
Because rejection of God is eternal and unchangeable (once one dies), if you are currently rejecting God, follow the wise counsel of Christ and repent and humble yourself and He will liberate you from your sin.
And because rejection of God is eternal and unchangeable (once one dies), if you know some who are rejecting Christ, be urgent in communicating the gospel clearly and plead and pray persistently for them.
“James Smithson” by Henri-Joseph Johns, 1761 – 1843 is marked with CC0 1.0.
Words of Grace 