Compassion

October 17, 2014

Compassion

Filled with love and compassion, he ran to his son, embraced him, and kissed him.

Luke 15:20b

Over and over again we read in the Gospels that Jesus had compassion for people. Compassion is the heart of Jesus’ parable of the Prodigal Son. I am quite convinced that compassion is the foremost emotion Jesus has for all people.

Within the realm of our fallen sinful nature, our reaction to people who do wrong to us is to want revenge, retribution, punishment, our interpretation of appropriate justice. Generally, mercy doesn’t make the list of our responsive emotions. However, Jesus is different as he models life for us as God’s new creation. Jesus’ first response is compassion.

There was a minister who encountered a crisis of faith and gave up. He left the church and abandoned his family. He ended up alone in a ramshackle old trailer in the middle of winter. His small electric heater quit. In disgust he yelled out, “God, I hate you!” then fell to the floor weeping. The minister would later testify that there in that trailer, in his darkest hour, he sensed God reply to his curse, “I know; it’s okay.” Then this shattered man heard Jesus weeping with him. Soon after that experience, the minister left the trailer as the prodigal returned home.

In your brokenness, in your darkest hours, when you have sinned against God and others, what do you hear? Do you hear Jesus condemning you, or judging you; or do you experience the savior of your soul weeping with you? Whether-or-not you have a discernable experience of God’s presence with you, the truth is that God is always for you; the lover of your soul keeps track of all your sorrows. He has collected all your tears in His bottle, and He has recorded each one in His book. (Psalm 56:8)

I am not sure which causes God’s tears to flow the most: our brokenness that causes us to do dumb and hurtful things; or our deafness to His tears of compassion for us.

Sē’lah

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(Selah is a word that appears in the Book of Psalms that I often use as the Complimentary Closing in my correspondence. Its meaning, as I use the word, is to pause and think about these things.)

These meditations are written by Alex M. Knight as he seeks the life in Christ as his way of life.  The meditations are published on the BLOG, http://seekingthelifeinchrist.blogspot.com/ and they are also distributed on the Constant Contact email server. You may subscribe to this email service by sending an email to: amkrom812@gmail.com. The BLOG is also available on Amazon Kindle, by subscription.

Publications by Alex M. Knight:

·        Seeking the Life in Christ, Meditations on the New Testament and Psalms has been published and is now available at Amazon.com in paperback and Kindle.

·        The second edition of  First Think – Then Pray is available on Amazon Kindle.

·        Meditations on The Story of My Life as told by Jesus Christ has been released as an e-book on Amazon Kindle.

Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2007. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188.