One of my wife’s cousins has a tattoo on his arm. It’s a Bible verse, but you’d only know that if you could read Hebrew, since that’s the way it has been inked onto his arm. (Hebrew looks cool I guess). In English the verse says,
And what does the LORD require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God. (Micah 6:8, NIV)
Having a tattoo written in Hebrew is perhaps a little pretentious, but the fact that he has such a visible reminder of the kind of God that we serve permanently sealed on his arm is perhaps not such a bad idea after all.
After all, I have been part of the Christian Church long enough to know first-hand how easy it is to explain away the Biblical calls to help the poor and needy. I am personally guilty of reading through my Bible and rationalizing away verses that seem to speak so clearly about caring for the weak and oppressed.
Jesus may have said,
“Sell your possessions and give to the poor. Provide purses for yourselves that will not wear out, a treasure in heaven that will not be exhausted, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys” (Luke 12:33). But then I do this weird mind-trick on myself where I explain away the command and turn it around to mean something completely the opposite, like, “I should get the 32” LCD from Costco instead of the 55” that I really want.”
Acting with generosity and kindness to the weak, lonely, oppressed and hurting does not come naturally. (At least, for me it doesn’t). It’s something I have had to work at conscientiously. Something I have had to pray for God to help me understand and put into practice.
Yet, the results have been eye-opening. The more I read the Bible the more astounded I am by just how frequently God speaks about the need to care for those who cannot help themselves.
“Cursed is anyone who withholds justice from the foreigner, the fatherless or the widow.” Then all the people shall say, “Amen!” (Deut. 27:19, NIV)
That’s strong language—uncomfortably strong language. But resist the urge to dismiss it out-of-hand or pretend that it somehow doesn’t apply to you. (“Ah yes, but that’s the Old Covenant, we’re under the New Covenant,” or, “That was just for Israel, not for me today,” or, “Those are all metaphors for other things.”) The command to love is reiterated by Jesus explicitly, described in Acts, and reaffirmed by Paul in his letters. There’s no getting around the Bible’s command to care for the oppressed.
As we prepare for Local Impact Sunday, pray for God to open your heart to ways in which He might be calling you to get involved. Ask God to help you understand what He says in the Bible about caring for the poor. And pray for the Spirit to give you new understanding of what Jesus means when He tells us to “love your neighbor as yourself” (Matt. 22:34-40).