Sometimes God wants me to go first…

Where I live, spending time with widows is relatively easy. Not so concerning orphans. For instance, the local children’s hospital has rules about visitors. If a child has no family or no family visits (it happens), I could not visit those children without special vetting and permission. Orphans are protected by laws to keep the public from seeking time with them. This is, of course, protection from predators, but it also keeps me for obeying all of this verse:

Religion that is pure and undefiled before God the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world. (James 1:27)

Piper points to an OT verse that speaks about caring for those who are unable to care for themselves:

Therefore the Lord waits to be gracious to you, and therefore he exalts himself to show mercy to you. For the Lord is a God of justice; blessed are all those who wait for him. (Isaiah 30:18)

While this is not as specific as James about those to whom God shows mercy, it is clear that He does it to show His glory. I can transfer that to the description in James and rightly assume that caring for needy people exalts the Lord. Piper puts it this way: “One mark of great, self-sufficient poise is the willingness to get down low with the weak.”

That opens the door to far more than two groups of needy people. It even puts me in that category because God gets personal by using “you” to describe those He wants to be gracious toward. He is talking about those who wait for Him. Needy people do that, also people who are humble and realize that God is eager to help. It is not about those who take matters into their own hands. Instead, I am to wait on the Lord. However, the point is that God exalts Himself by showing mercy.

Since mercy is taking pity on and showing compassion to those who do not deserve it, this covers the entire human race. Salvation is a mercy because our sin means sinners should be punished, yet to be merciful is to be like God.

This gets personal. It tells me that if I am not merciful with those who are weak, I’m not being like the Lord. In the Bible, “weak” can describe those who are feeble, sick; morally weak; or those lacking in knowledge or faith. I know several who fall into each of those definitions. The feeble and sick are easiest to be merciful toward, but I get annoyed with those who seem dim about God and dim in their faith. I get  the same reaction in my heart when Christians disobey.

In other words, my ability to be merciful has great flaws. I do better when I remember how much mercy God has shown me, but pride and self-righteousness often jump in instead of treating others  in humility and with His compassion.

Maybe this is why God illustrates with widows and orphans. It is much more likely to feel tender-hearted to them than to others who are weak as a result of their own choosing or because they fail to seek the truths of God that will strengthen them. Yet I’m faced this morning with a similar challenge. Will I be strengthened in my faith and walk with God by being merciful to those whose sins and spiritual neglect usually annoy me? To do this, I must first do this:

If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. (1 John 1:9)

PRAY: Lord, I’m acutely aware of the people who disregard Your principles and choose to do life their way, even when their Bible is open in front of them. I pray that You will change their hearts but You have not done so, indicating that it is my heart that You first wish to change. Piper’s line of being willing to get down low with the weak points to my bad attitude of not being willing to put up with others who are unwittingly feeding their old nature and as a result fail to glorify You. This does not mean that I endorse what they do, but that I should have mercy on them and bless them, releasing them to experience Your grace in their hearts because You have worked forgiveness in mine.

Visit them. . . .

Today’s reading distresses me so much that writing about it is almost impossible. Piper’s book was written more than thirty years ago. Are these stats better now? Or worse? He says:

There are an estimated twelve million homeless children on the streets of Brazil. Their parents lost them in the crowds, put them out, died. However they got there, they are there. They beg, they steal, they sell their bodies. They eat garbage. Some policemen and others moonlight by contracting to kill street children so that they will not menace the city. In 1992 an average of four hundred of these children were killed monthly in Brazil. It’s the same in other big cities. The Philippine government estimates that there are fifteen thousand child prostitutes in Manila between the ages of nine and twelve. One estimate suggests that in Thailand there are eight hundred thousand girls between twelve and sixteen years old involved in prostitution.

Google AI says the numbers in Brazil are about 7 million homeless children, 250,000 to 1 million others in Manila, and at least 20,000 without hope and enslaved in Thailand’s major cities. Even if these numbers are exaggerated, what are God’s people doing about it? The Bible says:

Religion that is pure and undefiled before God the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world. (James 1:27)

Physically visit them? I cannot do that for these shunned and hunted orphans. We have widows in our large complex that I can visit, yet my heart hurts to think of so many children in such dire straits. Our church points to organizations that target rescuing these kids. They include: Chain of Love and International Justice Mission, yet the most an average person can do is pray and send money. Prayer puts the burden in God's hands and money provides the resources needed. Both are better than nothing, yet the implication in the Word of God is to doing something more personal. Jesus would and can.

Unstained from the world seems not connected to visiting needy people. However, the world is defined in another passage:

Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life—is not from the Father but is from the world. And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever. (1 John 2:15–17)

Summed up, loving the world is being so involved in what I can gain from life that I have no desire and no time nor reason for helping others have a life that matters. And isn’t that what God wills for me? For those kids?

PRAY: Father, my heart hurts. I can send money. I can visit a few widows. I try to keep worldly desires out of my motivations and actions. It seems so little compared to the size of this problem. I know You are powerful and merciful. What do you want from me in regard to this incredible need?

What is justice?

 

At first it seems justice would be easy to define. Most dictionaries say it is giving a person what is due them, being fair, impartial, a moral rightness. One says justice is based on ethics, rationality, law, natural law, religion, or equity. These terms can mean something different depending on background, culture, social norms and belief systems.

For instance, if a person kills an innocent bystander, some would say that person should be killed. That is justice. Others might say he or she deserves a fair trial, or maybe the bystander was not innocent and deserved to die. Law gets tricky and what is fair and just very often seems a matter of opinion.

Perhaps this confusion happens because truth has been relegated to personal opinion. Many assure what is true for one person is not necessarily true for others. The Bible is considered objective truth, yet many dismiss it as being true only for those who believe it. In other words, God not longer is considered the standard or truth for anything. Instead, humans decide what is true, or just and what is permissible.

Biblically, justice means: “to make right.” It is mainly a relational term — people living in right relationship with God, one another, and creation — and God determines what that ‘right relationship’ looks like. Our example and standard is Jesus Christ. He lived in right relationship with His heavenly Father and with humanity — by His obedience to His Father. For us to live justly, we need to be in a right relationship with God through faith in His Son. Then in that relationship, we also need to obey our Heavenly Father and treat others as He desires. Some examples include how we deal with those who mistreat us:

Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.” To the contrary, “if your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink; for by so doing you will heap burning coals on his head.” Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good. (Romans 12:19–21)

On the other hand, if someone violates law and is guilty, the ‘repayment’ to promote order and punish the guilty has been given by God to government authorities. When private citizens take the law into their own hands, they actually usurp the authority of God. Yet even this is debated. In some countries, if an intruder threatens and their victim takes action, the victim is charged with a crime. In others, that person is applauded for defending themselves.

Justice isn’t just about crime. Micah says: “He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?” (Micah 6:8). Another OT prophet says:

Wash yourselves; make yourselves clean; remove the evil of your deeds from before my eyes; cease to do evil, learn to do good; seek justice, correct oppression; bring justice to the fatherless, plead the widow’s cause. (Isaiah 1:16–17)

This passage goes on to connect justice with having sins forgiven and then being obedient to God. People who are in His family are to live with consideration for barriers to human thriving and the misuse of power that exploits people’s lives. We are to repair harm and inequities. However, justice is not the same as charity and development. Instead, it is more about challenging corruption, violence and abuse of others.

Unfortunately, the Greek word dikaiosunê has been translated in many English bibles as “righteousness” and North American churches tend to limit the idea of justice to vengeance or punishment in courts and prisons, as opposed to the wider vision of challenging other sinful activities such as greed, and unfair treatment of those who are vulnerable.

Religion that is pure and undefiled before God the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world. (James 1:27)

PRAY: Jesus, justice is lacking in an overwhelming way and in every part of the world. Some are called to fight it directly, others to pray for good governments as well as Your intervention. Grant me the ability to listen and be wise in words and actions as well as in praying for justice and mercy where both are missing and most needed.

Humility & Worldliness

 

From this devotional series, I’m assuming the writer knows there are Christians who seldom examine their lives to make sure they are walking with Jesus. They are not immersed in Bible study or prayer and other spiritual disciplines. These devotions speak to them with warnings and strong encouragement to get their lives right before God.

I have several friends with the opposite problem. They continually worry that they are ‘not good enough’ and focus more on their own performance than on the power of God or His grace in changing their lives. They think of themselves as failures rather than being victorious in Christ. This view of self is sometimes called ‘worm theology’ and is a false humility. True humility isn’t about having a low self-view, but about seeing myself as God sees me: a weak and unable sinner yet in Christ and having all that Christ died to give me. It is about loving God and loving others without focusing on me.

For me, to be constantly warned by someone else to examine my life is not necessary. God does that. My focus is on Him and on the relationship I have to Him through faith in Jesus Christ. If I sin, He tells me. If I do well, I thank Him for enabling me. I also realize that I cannot do or be all things, such as a preacher, teacher, leader, server, or all the commands in the Bible. This is a large world filled with overwhelming needs and issues. One person cannot address them all and needs wisdom to choose. All of us can pray and God does marvelous things. As we often say in our church, only God!

That said, I’m to be aware of worldly attitudes. The Bible does say, “Religion that is pure and undefiled before God the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world.” (James 1:27)

This love for the world (not the people in the world but the evil lifestyles, philosophies, immoral ethics and actions, all that goes against God and His Word) is described:

Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life—is not from the Father but is from the world. And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever. (1 John 2:15–17)

I’m aware that worldliness first shows up in inner attitudes, such as a ‘I will run my own life’ determination that takes me down into anti-God activities. Yet I can do things that non-Christians do without being worldly.

That is, I can be involved in sports or hobbies or many other activities but not with the same motivations as worldly people have. For instance, I can belong to a community group with a desire to share the love of God with people, rather than wanting to be prominent or popular. Worldliness can be subtle so I must be aware of what motivates my actions and involvement in various activities.

You adulterous people! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. (James 4:4)

James wrote about tongue control and how it reveals my heart’s condition. He challenges readers to help those in need because of a genuine concern for them. The Bible is clear that I’m to glorify God and win people to Christ, not promote myself. These concerns are to motivate all decisions and involvement with the world I live in.

PRAY: Jesus, I’m glad that You reveal selfishness and even more delighted that You forgive and cleanse all that I confess to You. Today’s devotional tells me “confess them, and begin to change today” yet I know that I do not do the changing. Each time I confess sin, You do something incredible — You change me. For that, I stand amazed and worship You. You are my Savior; I am not!

PONDER: the mighty power of God to change lives and to first make clear what needs changing. Then keep my focus on Him and let Him transform me as He sees fit.