Let me share something I’m finding out firsthand.
 
Most do not have the capacity to care about your dilemma …that YOU brought on yourself… until they find themselves facing that very dilemma either through firsthand experience or through a loved one.
 
Why?
 
Because they do not understand all that one faces in it. They do not understand the “why” behind it:
Why would someone commit such an act to get themselves into the mess they are in?
 
Many can find some sort of compassion for those facing cancer or illness although they may not have experienced it.
 
But when it comes to someone making serious mistakes and awful decisions regardless of their past, mental illness, family dynamics, drugs or alcohol, and just the downright sin dilemma itself, they cannot or simply will not relate.
Truth is, we all need God to make us right with Him. Period.
 
Even if your sin was as simple as a lie.
 
Guilt is guilt and we need the shed blood of Jesus Christ to make us right with Him.
With all that, I can share the examples in the Bible where some sat on the seat of the scornful:
The adulteress whom the “self-righteous” wanted to stone.
 
Oh my, but Jesus had the answer: “Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.”
 
There were no accusers left standing there that day.
 
And let’s not forget the Samaritan woman who went to the well for water. She was considered an outsider by many in her day, but not by Jesus! When Jesus was finished speaking with her, she was able to run to those in her community and give testimony that LED THEM back to the One True Messiah!
 
We could continue to dig into many in the Bible who were scorned or shamed by their lives and Jesus was always in defense of the brokenhearted and the outcasts.
 
He says, “visit…” The jailed…
 
“Fight” for the injustices of the oppressed.
 
Yes many are those who YOU and I have even deemed worthless by society’s standards.
 
But let God get a hold of that person’s heart and watch out society. The very person we deemed an outcast or too far gone may be the very person who reaches you in your crises. I’ve seen it. You can’t tell me otherwise.
There are still some who will read this because they are so tainted with their own bitterness and hate that they will scoff at this.
 
But there will come a day, you will have no other choice to own up to that hate because it’s eating you alive.
I had no idea what our supposed criminal justice system looked like on the outside until I found myself looking at it through the eyes of someone on the inside
.
Even when are very own family was broken because of his and another nameless individual's choice. Yet, my love for this person couldn’t watch the injustices without fighting with all that I have in me…even now. I have seen the depths from which this person…my son…. Came from, and see God using him even now. Who was I to cast the first stone when I had so many failures that God redeemed me from.
 
I had to look inward and examine myself, knowing I too would stand before a holy God to give account. I had to get out of the seat of the scornful and become the hands and feet of Jesus to him, those like him and many others that are within my reach and ask God to do the miraculous through me.
 
No longer can I stand idly by and say, “That’s not my problem.”
 
Or
 
“They shouldn’t have gotten themselves put there.”
 
That’s society’s response and while some of that may be true, I still have a God given responsibility to honor and obey God’s Word with what I know He commands of me, and whether you like it or not, so do you. I pray God stirs us to truly love like Him.
 
I repeat what my Pastor (Pastor Jay of the Home church) so eloquently stated, “Love conquers all.”
 
God’s Word gives no excuse to stand by and watch suffering when we have means to do something. Please understand me, this is not condoning sin or wrongdoing. Because we know God doesn’t tolerate sin.
His motive:
 
“For God so LOVED the world, that He GAVE His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” John 3:16
 
And yet, He gave … while we were in our very sin, to redeem us from that sin, leaving us forever changed.
That should be our motive, to reach those in places that would otherwise not even know the name of Jesus Christ so that they too can find freedom from the sin and the bondage that put them where they are to begin with.
 
Ask yourself today what is the one thing that I can do to help others who cannot help themselves, nor help me in return.
 
And just…do it.
 
It doesn’t have to be huge or some life-changing endeavor. Just some small act to lighten the load of another…. You won’t regret it.
 
———Scriptures———
 
“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised" (Luke 4:18).
 
“For I was an hungred, and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me in: Naked, and ye clothed me: I was sick, and ye visited me: I was in prison, and ye came unto me. Then shall the righteous answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungred, and fed thee? or thirsty, and gave thee drink? When saw we thee a stranger, and took thee in? or naked, and clothed thee? Or when saw we thee sick, or in prison, and came unto thee? And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.
Matthew 25:35-40
 
Isaiah 1:17: "Learn to do right; seek justice. Defend the oppressed. Take up the cause of the fatherless. Plead the case of the widow."
 
Psalm 82:3-4: "Defend the weak and the fatherless; uphold the cause of the poor and the oppressed. Rescue the weak and the needy; deliver them from the hand of the wicked."
 
Proverbs 31:8-9: "Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, for the rights of all who are destitute. Speak up and judge fairly; defend the rights of the poor and needy."