 |
|
|
|
Reaching Out to the Least of These |
As they opened the gates to the school courtyard I felt like I had been transported back to New Testament times. I had been in India for several weeks, but even that had not prepared me for the mass of humanity that hobbled in. Many were missing limbs and other body parts. They were dressed in rags. These were the least of the “least of these.” These were the lepers. For the next two hours we fed them rice on leaf plates and poured water directly into their mouths from metal containers. A “cup of cold water in Jesus name” (Matt. 10:42) took on a whole new meaning for me. Eventually the gate shut again and everyone in our team was silent. We stared at each other. No words could express what we had just experienced. We wanted to cry or laugh or both. “When you have done it with the least of these my brothers, you have done it to me.” (Matthew 25:40) We had just served the Master. Over this past year I have found myself in many moments like these…
In these moments I find Jesus there, even when the church
sometimes isn’t. It is not that God is unfairly biased. He has just vowed to look after those who have no one else to look after them. And He encourages us, as his people, to have the same attitude: “However, there should be no poor among you, for in the land the Lord your God is giving you to possess as your inheritance, he will richly bless you.” (Dt 15:4) This is not new, wild, radical or liberal. John Wesley took the gospel to the frustrated, hopeless, poverty stricken masses of England. Detractors nicknamed him “the pastor of the mob.” As he visited the workhouses and prisons, he said: “I love the poor. In many of them I find pure genuine grace unmixed with paint, folly, and affectation.” As Wesley gained God’s heart for the poor this compelled him to open schools and orphanages. His concern did not stop at sentiment, but was transformed into a lifestyle. Steve Miller describes that transformation: While teaching at Oxford University he earned about 30 pounds per year. One cold winter day he noticed a poor chambermaid shivering because she had nothing to wear but a thin linen dress. Wesley wanted to buy her a coat but had spent his salary on luxury items for himself. As a result of that incident, Wesley began to limit his expenses so that he would have more money to give to the poor…This practice, begun at Oxford, continued throughout his life. Even when his income rose into the thousands of pounds, he lived simply, and gave away his surplus money. One year his income was a little over 1400 pounds. He lived on 30 and gave away 1370. So great was his generosity that in 1776 the English tax commissioners inspected his return and wrote him a letter questioning how a man in his station of life could give away so much money. He responded with these words: “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures upon the earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But lay up for yourselves treasure in heaven…for where your treasure is there will your heart be also.” (Mt6:19-21) (reachout.gospelnet.com) This kind of Christianity cuts right across the real religion of our culture, which is consumerism. The 10 commandments of the god GET are:
1. Buy! Because getting, not giving, is supposed to make us happy. I have found the opposite to be true. “It is better to give than to receive.” (Acts 20:35) Like most every middle class North American I have grown up with a tendency to be egocentric and ethnocentric. This does not mean that we are terrible people. It simply means that we are all blinded to a certain extent by the culture we grow up in. It is hard for us to see the world as God sees it. Most of us have lived at a very safe distance from real poverty. Yet when God looks down on the world that is the first thing He sees. If we could shrink the world down to a neighborhood of 100 people, then it would look like this:
God did not stay at a safe distance. He entered our poverty stricken world as a poor man named Jesus. He sacrificed and denied himself so that we might have. As it says in Psalm 112:9: “He has scattered abroad his gifts to the poor, his righteousness endures forever.” God calls us to do the very same thing. To meet the needs of people on all levels: spiritually, emotionally, and physically. That means more than just throwing money at social problems. It means getting personally involved. Mother Theresa said: “Today it is fashionable to talk about the poor. Unfortunately, it is not fashionable to talk to the poor.” It is interesting that people like Mother Theresa and John Wesley were moved to action, not in a vacuum, but in face to face encounters with poverty. This seems to be the testimony of how God usually gives us His heart for the poor and changes our lifestyle. I grew up seeing the same TV images of hunger and poverty that you did. It wasn’t until I knelt down next to a homeless man named David, however, that God broke my heart. Since that time I have rubbed shoulders with the poor on four continents. And like all the scriptures promise, I am much richer for it. Long before the phrase was coined God thought globally, but acted locally in the person of Jesus. The key is to start somewhere with one person and let God take it from there. Here are some practical starting steps you can take to reach out to the less fortunate around you:
If you need help with maritime contacts, e-mail me at macneilm@bethany-ca.edu. Above all, determine to do something. Actions speak louder than words, but words and actions together speak the loudest of all!
Mike MacNeil leads the Extreme Discipleship program at Bethany Bible College, as well as leading ministry teams for YES and Real Life Ministries.
|
|
|
