When we first went to Nicaragua, we asked the people there what they needed. Many of them told us they needed a medical clinic—because they are poor. We didn’t fully comprehend why we, as missionaries, whose intentions were to evangelize, preach and teach, were being asked to build a medical clinic. We later came to understand the reasoning behind this request. This is one message that the people there continually stress and want us to know: “that they are poor.” You can learn many lessons from the poor, and we did. One lesson we learned was the lesson of compassion. When people are extremely poor, they feel desperate, and they often react in desperate ways. Their requests for help never end, and it can become emotionally draining. Though we could not meet all the needs, the compassion of Christ was kindled in our hearts, because we understood from where they were coming, and through God’s Word, we were refreshed, and we could help to refresh them. Jesus said, “You will always have the poor with you,” and Don often adds in his preaching, “but they do not have to suffer if we help.” Paul said, they have given us an opportunity to minister. Approximately 70% of the earth’s population live in dire poverty, so there are numerous opportunities for those who want to help.
Wherever Christ went about teaching on the Kingdom of God, he healed the sick and relieved their suffering. When they needed food, he fed them. Because He ministered to their physical bodies, they believed His message. They trusted Him because he helped them in their immediate need. As followers of Jesus, we can do no less.
The words of Jesus in the
following 2 passages have significance for our mandate to do humanitarian
missions: Matthew 9:12:
“It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick.”
Matthew 4:4: “Man
does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of
God.” Although these
Scriptures contain a spiritual lesson, Jesus here acknowledges 2 basic physical
needs for a human being to survive—the need for food and the need for a
doctor when one is sick. These
are 2 basic needs that often go unmet, or are inadequately met, among the
extremely poor. I would like to end
with the following passages from Deuteronomy.
From these passages, we could see the U.S. as a type of “promised
land” among the nations of the world today, and as blessed people living in a
blessed land, we have a mandate to help the truly poor, the majority of
whom are found in under-developed countries.
I am proud of the U.S., for we are a giving nation, and as long as there
are people in dire need, we must continue to do so.
From Deuteronomy Chapters 8 and 10:
“For
the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land—a land with streams and
pools of water, with springs flowing in the valleys and hills….when you have
eaten and are satisfied, praise the Lord your God for the good land he has given
you. Remember the Lord your God,
for it is he who
gives you the ability to produce wealth.
What
does the Lord your God ask of you but to fear the Lord your God, to walk in all
his ways, to love him, to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and with
all your soul…. He defends
the cause of the fatherless and the widow, and loves the alien, giving him
food and clothing.
And you
are to love those who are aliens,
for you yourselves were aliens in Egypt.”