by Justin Schaeffer

I had the pleasure of joining one of our community groups last night led by Ryan Matheson and hosted by Steve & Lindsey Rikalo in Edmonds.  They’ve invited me to teach through an 8 week curriculum about Biblical Compassion.  It was such a blessing to come up the stairs into a bustling apartment full of 20+ followers of Jesus enjoying a meal and fellowship together.

After Ryan prayed for me, I gave the group a brief introduction to the idea of Biblical Compassion that I borrowed from Tim Keller, pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in NY, NY.  The basic premise was that Biblical Compassion is found in deeds that meet felt needs.  Because sin has entered into the world, mankind has experienced spiritual, psychological, social, and physical alienation.  This alienation results in many felt needs.  Since these felt needs are a result of sin and we as the church are agents of God’s kingdom and Jesus’ message of redemption, meeting felt needs is a natural  ministry of the Church.  Of course we know that man’s spiritual alienation from God is his greatest need and can only be remedied by Christ.  But we also know that someone needs the Holy Spirit to believe and understand that.  However, one does not need the Holy Spirit to know that they are thirsty, depressed, a victim of greed or oppression, sick, etc…  Meeting these felt needs is a great opportunity for us to point to the Kingdom of God and ultimately their need for its King.

The main point of the class was not to define Biblical Compassion though, it was to look at where our motivation should come from for doing deeds that meet felt needs.  What better place to look than the story of the Good Samaritan in Luke 10:25-37.  We discussed the Lawyers desire to justify himself by asking “and who is my neighbor”.  We discussed his desire to do the minimum to meet the requirement of the law and how terribly that misses God’s heart of radical, sacrificial compassion.  The most respected religious leaders of his day who he would look to as an example (The Priest and the Levite) were impotent to help the beaten man on the side of the road because of the Law and in the end it was compassion that prompted the Jew’s hated enemy to help him.  In Jesus’ story compassion triumphs over the Law.  For a an awesome look into this text and many of the ideas we discussed I’d highly recommend listening to this sermon on the Good Samaritan by Matt Chandler of the Village Church.

We then discussed several questions surrounding motivation ending up with my favorite question and the question I’d put to you as you read…

Do you love Jesus?  If so…why?  What about Him do you love?

It was a huge blessing to hear the answers of those in the group.  There are many motivations that might work to inspire us to serve those in need, but the only proper and lasting motivation that is not based in guilt or pride is our love for Jesus in response to and empowered by His initial love for us.  As I mentioned at the beginning of our class, Biblical Compassion is very much a Spiritual Discipline.  If you love Jesus, if you want gulps of God, if you desire to be close to Him, to see God in your hands…serve others out of a worshipful, thankful response to God’s immense love to you in your spiritual poverty and resourceless state.  2 Cor. 3:18 says that we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.  Pastor Steve pointed out in a Men’s Prayer devotion that the word “beholding” can also be translated reflecting.  As we reflect the glory of our God by reflecting His character in compassion and justice, we see Him.  As we see Him we are transformed into His image.  What an invitation!  It is so easy to feel guilt when talking about serving those in need.  Cast off guilt!  There is no condemnation in Jesus Christ!  This is an invitation to all of us to experience the beauty of God by reflecting His character and living out His kingdom, His riegn in our lives.