RLC Blog Buzz: To Suffer With

If compassion means, “to suffer with”. How do we attach ourselves to the suffering of the poor? What does that look like and how do we implement in our lives?

When Jesus landed and saw a large crowd, he had compassion on them and healed their sick. Matthew 14:14

Jesus called his disciples to him and said, "I have compassion for these people; they have already been with me three days and have nothing to eat. I do not want to send they sway hungry, or they may collapse on the way.
Matthew 15:32

A man with leprosy came to him and begged him on his knees, "If you are willing, you can make me clean." Filled with compassion, Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man. "I am willing," he said. "Be clean!" Immediately the leprosy left him and he was cured.
Mark 1:40-42

These are just a few examples from scripture of Jesus' compassion for others. Nearly every passage I could find related to compassion, specifically Jesus having compassion, told of him helping the people he felt compassion for. This tells me we are on the right track! When Simon and I feel compassion, we do what we can to help those people. This weeks blog buzz is related to suffering of the poor and how we deal with it. Simon and I have a special place in our hearts for the poor of Ethiopia. The poverty experienced there is something most people in America can not even grasp. We feel lead to do something and we are actually doing it! I have had millions of times in my life were I have said to myself, "I should donate money to this or that because I believe in the charity." Or, "We should volunteer to help with this or that outreach program our church is doing." But I have rarely done anything the help. It seems to me, Jesus' example of compassion shows us that you not only have to feel "deep sympathy or pain" (Webster's definition), but you have to do something to help the people you feel the compassion for.