I’ve never been able to establish its provenance, but my favorite Tolstoy quote is this one: “Everyone thinks of changing humanity, but no one thinks of changing himself.”
Jesus taught that obedience to God requires that we serve other people. It is how we fulfill his command to love our neighbors. Love is more than feelings, as John points out: “Let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth” (1 Jn. 3:18). Love’s foundation is faith: we believe in a God who promises us the time, wisdom, resources, and anything else we need to complete the work that love asks of us.
But if we seek to walk the path that love marks out for us, we will encounter daunting challenges – not just difficult tasks, but challenges to our concept of who we are and what we can call our own.
A verse from Proverbs has haunted me ever since I first read it many years ago: “If a man shuts his ears to the cry of the poor, he too will cry out and not be heard” (Pr. 21:13).
It’s easy to justify myself based on a literal rendering of that phrase. I don’t remember hearing poor people cry out for help and ignoring them. But then, I’ve always lived in safe, affluent neighborhoods. I don’t have regular contact with poor people in the normal course of my days, whether at my place of work, when shopping, or out for a walk.
What does it mean to shut your ears to the cry of the poor if you live in an environment whose very structure keeps the poor at a distance? Just because I don’t hear their cry doesn’t mean that poor people aren’t out there. At some point, I realized that if I am to hear the cry of the poor, then I need to go where they are.
For several years I served as a board member for a provider of services to homeless people in my home city. It was a great opportunity to use my talents and skills to help people in need.
However, I also learned that it’s important for me to serve people directly, and in ways that may not use my professional skills. For years I served on teams that prepared and served meals in a soup kitchen. Many of the faces I saw were not the stereotypical faces of homelessness that may come to mind – drug-wasted, toothless, and prematurely aged. Instead, they looked as capable, energetic, and intelligent as any other group in our society.
They looked like me.
As I learned more about homelessness, I came to see that the difference between those who end up in a shelter and those who don’t often doesn’t depend on talent, hard work, or accomplishment. More often, it hinges on whether a person has a support network. Do they have someone who will help them get back on their feet when they stumble? My work with the homeless came on the heels of my wife Penny’s extended illness and bone marrow transplant. I knew how much the apparent stability of our home had depended on the support we received from our extended family, our church family, and others.
We all stumble; we all experience challenges that are too great to overcome on our own. We are all vulnerable and often we don’t see our vulnerability until it’s too late. At the same time, all of us have an inherent dignity that is to be respected and defended.
It is natural for prosperous people to think well of themselves and justify their privileges as a reward for their hard work and “clean” hands. However, we are no better than our brothers or sisters in the shelters across the land. Spending time at the shelter, serving people who have no choice but to acknowledge their need and seek assistance, helped me to remember the weakness embedded in human nature that I, too, carry. When I hear the cry of the poor, I remember my own vulnerability.
Humbling ourselves is not equivalent to self-abasement. Rather, when we humble ourselves, we see in their true proportions those things that are bigger than we are. This is true of God. It is also true of the immense, beautiful, variegated, suffering world in which he has placed us, and where he gives us the opportunity to serve. And, as we see these things in their true proportions, we have another vantage point from which to see ourselves, our motives, and our actions.
Our life choices may seem perfectly appropriate and fully obedient to biblical teaching within the context of our circle of personal relationships, which is likely constituted by people with similar backgrounds and other shared resemblances. However, those choices may be less adequate when viewed from a broader perspective.
I could pose some questions for you, but I’d much rather you reflect, and see what questions you pose for yourself.
It’s easier for me to turn away from these kinds of questions than to turn towards them. I remind myself of a verse we have examined before, something the writer of Hebrews repeats three times: “Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your heart.”
Let me close with a promise: “Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up” (Galatians 6:9).
in others lives, no matter who it may be, I believe we are always on the outside looking in.It is up to us individually and/or collectively to extend ourselves in which ever way may be comfortable (or not) to follow in His footsteps. Love thy neighbor, a work in progress?
Loved your post! So true and always needful of such remembrance!