There was once a time when I felt completely overcome by the amount of need in the world around me. As time moves on, so does the number of people with breaking hearts. Our world is stricken by poverty, disease, violence, and all manner of evil. It is hard to watch those around you struggle, and even more so when you are the one striving to make it through each day.
As I reach out to those around me who are hurting I meet others who are not interested in helping. I don't judge them, but I can tell you that I pray for them. It is not that they are heartless but that they have closed themselves off from having compassion, because they feel that if they let a little bit into their heart, they will be overcome with the flood. The risk of this type of attitude is that you will indeed wind up with a heart of stone, completely without feeling for those in the world less fortunate than yourself. In trying to preserve your own soul you will actually cause it to die from within.
Yet there is hope...
For we were made in the image of God who is full of compassion. And if we find ourselves as belonging to him, we need not ever be overwhelmed, because we know the Source of compassion. We cannot out give God.
Feel and empathise with those around you. LOVE THEM.
Let their burdens REST IN the hands of GOD.
ACT on your love and HELP those God places in your path.
They will KNOW LOVE because of what you have done.
Jesus did not rise again so that we could live mediocre lives waiting for a free ride to heaven, He came to show the POWER of LOVE. He came to impart that love to us that we can lavish it upon those in our lives.
If we all simply loved those we met everyday in our travels, IMAGINE how our world would be transformed.
‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the Kingdom prepared for you from the creation of the world. For I was hungry, and you fed me. I was thirsty, and you gave me a drink. I was a stranger, and you invited me into your home. I was naked, and you gave me clothing. I was sick, and you cared for me. I was in prison, and you visited me.’(Matt 25:34-36)
That's so interesting, Nicole. I was just listening to an online sermon yesterday about compassion. How it's not simply an emotion, but an action. The crossing of the street to help, not just the ability to notice someone has fallen in the gutter, and walk on by. Thanks for the encouragement to not let our hearts become hardened to the needs around us.
ReplyDeleteBlessings
Dotti