Living-loving like Jesus: Compassion, episode 129

0:00 If you love a prodigal, you can discover help and hope for your wilderness journey right here at the When You Love a Prodigal podcast and also help and hope for your own life journey. And that's, I think, what we're going to really be focusing on for a few weeks. I want to start the new year off with a look at what God might want to do in our lives through this prodigal journey. If you've been listening to this podcast for very long, you have heard me say that God is just as committed to working in us as he is in our prodigals.

0:43 He cares about our loved ones, but he also cares about us. A primary purpose he has is to make us more and more like Jesus. Now, my experience is that takes a while for us, certainly for our prodigals, but for us as well. And I'm grateful that God has given us a clear picture of what he is working toward, what we will be like as we become more like Jesus. The Apostle Paul tells us in Colossians 3, Therefore, as God's chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with, and he has a list, compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience.

1:42 Bear with one another and forgive one another if any one of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord has forgiven you. And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity. So what we're going to do is look at each one of those clothing that Paul is telling us that we should wear, that we should look like Jesus by the way we're dressed. And today we're going to start with the first, which is compassion.

2:23 Our family has sponsored children from the Compassion Ministry for many years. We have two right now, one is from Haiti and the other from Nicaragua. We've had them for quite a few years and they're basically the girl from Haiti is about to graduate high school and the boy from Nicaragua is a little younger, but they're getting up there and close to being on their own. I love what compassion does. They serve, they meet needs, and they develop the children. They work with churches in local communities around the world to make specific provision for these children that need some extra help because their family often is not able to provide enough.

3:13 I enjoy writing to my compassion children and receiving letters from them, meeting their family, understanding their situation. The same both for my girl and the boy that we get to know them and to pray for them. I think compassion is appropriately named to correlate with the biblical emphasis on compassion. It demonstrates what I believe Paul is talking about when he tells us as God's chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourself with compassion.

3:55 First I want to get some definitions for compassion. The English dictionary defines compassion as a feeling of deep sympathy and sorrow for one who is stricken by misfortune or other problems and it's accompanied by a strong desire to alleviate the suffering. So compassion recognizes suffering and need in someone and wants to have a part in alleviating the struggle to help them. But God's word adds much richness to this word.

4:36 Scriptural nuances include to suffer what someone else suffers, to suffer along with them, to sympathetically participate in their grief. It is closely tied to grace. I can think about that because since my husband left over a year ago, many people have come alongside me and sought to comfort, had to just enter into the pain and the grieving and sharing the load, the burden of that. An emotional expression of crying and feeling with someone who is hurting conveys compassion and includes the intent to help a will to change the situation.

5:29 So this is not a passive word. It's a word that says, I'm going to enter in and see if I can help. A mother's love or a father's love, a mother's love is defined in Isaiah 49, the father's love in Psalm 103 and the feelings of pity and devotion to help a helpless child embody a deep emotional feeling seeking a concrete expression of love. Surely you have had such feelings for your prodigal. You probably wept over them. You've said, why?

6:10 Why are you doing this? You've said, I'm so sorry for the struggles that you're having and your heart goes out to them. And that is compassion. Scripture is full of stories of compassion. The prodigal son's father in Luke 15 had compassion on him, eagerly watching for him. He had left with his portion of the inheritance and they hadn't heard a word from him, but the father is watching, watching, watching, and he sees him at a distance coming back. And what does he do? He prepares his speech to say, all right, if you're coming back, here's the rules.

6:54 No, he runs. He lifts up his robe and runs to greet him and as his son starts to apologize and ask forgiveness, he just grabs him in his arms. He says, oh, my son, you were lost and now you are found. And he puts his robe on him and he puts his sandals on him and he puts a ring on his finger. And then he says, let's have a party. My son who was lost is found. It's compassion. The Good Samaritan in Luke chapter 10 acted compassionately toward the injured traveler, dressing his wounds, taking him to an inn, leaving money for the end caper to care for him and saying, if it costs more when I come back, I will cover that.

7:48 He showed great even causing him a struggle, he offered to care for him and provide for him because he was filled with compassion. Now the true model of compassion that we have is Jesus himself. He lived out compassion throughout his ministry. Let me just give you a few examples. Moses and Matthew nine that when he saw the crowds who had followed and listened, he had compassion on them because they were harassed and helpless like sheep without a shepherd.

8:29 In Matthew 20, we see Jesus talking to two blind beggars asking that he would heal them and he had compassion on them and touch their eyes. Immediately they received their sight and they followed Jesus for sure. Mark eight tells us that Jesus said, I have compassion for these people who had been following him out in the desert areas. They have already been with me for three days and they have nothing to eat. This is what God has called us to do to put on or clothe ourselves with compassion to live out the feelings of care, concern and empathy in action to benefit those we love, others that we are concerned for or just when we encounter a need.

9:28 Most of us have compassionate feelings when we see loss, hurt, need. To take the next step, to put feet to our empathy, to do something in response to where our compassion. Now personally, I'm usually too busy or distracted or tired, but God has given me some opportunities by sponsoring children with compassion, by taking time in the moment to pray for a need that someone has expressed, to listen as a friend pours out her heart, to share my abundance of flows and things with those who have less.

10:14 I've been giving many of my late husband's clothes to a rescue ministry or as I hopefully did with a man named Robert a couple of years ago. Steve and I stopped at a McDonald's halfway on a long journey home. As we reached the door, I saw a bike that was covered with camo, backpacks and blankets. Then inside, I saw who it belonged to. He was finishing a cup of coffee. His name was Robert. He was a Vietnam vet and he was also covered in camouflage. I gave him some money more than he usually received, but far less than he needed.

11:00 But then I gave something really important, a listening ear, some visibility, a little dignity. He told me his story even as people coming in stared. One unfair, hard luck situation after another. I believed him. Why would I think he was lying to me? I left him with a prayer and a blessing and I hope I was wearing some of Jesus' style of compassion. And yes, Jesus also calls us to put on compassion with our prodigals.

11:41 I know they've caused much pain, cost us a lot of money, embarrassed us, refused to make good choices, and in many other ways hurt us and even rejected us. Often, they're just rebellion, but even then, they're often underlying issues that have caused their responses and reactions. We would be wise to seek to understand what might be behind their choices and behavior. Our compassion might open the doors of understanding, discovering causes or just promoting healing in family relationships.

12:26 I know it's easy to be angry and push them away and say, you did it, that's the last time. And in many ways, we help them decide to withdraw from us. And yet Jesus says, have compassion and treat them with compassion and look for ways to show compassion. So my question is, what about you? Are you wearing compassion? It's God to reveal to you words and ways to wear the compassion of Jesus in lots of situations in your life, but especially with your prodigal.

13:16 You might be surprised how it might be the beginning of some changes. Next week, we will look at kindness. God bless you.