**Disclaimer: This piece was written pre-deconstruction of religious beliefs and faith system. Many of these beliefs inform the sentiments of the writing and are not in alignment with my values. As this is a part of my journey and an extensive blog over years, I have chosen not to remove a majority of my posts written on faith. Please as a reader, take this into consideration and take what works for you, leave what does not. I also apologize for any harm my words from this past perspective may cause to any readers.**
I'm curled up in my bed, down comforter layered with a fleece blanket and another knit one on top. I have a wool one wrapped around my shoulders. After complaining a little, as is my good American right and duty, our landlord visited the attic to discover no insulation in our 1950's house. The basement where my roommate sleeps is warmer than my room!
A few weeks ago I caved and bought a space heater. One that has a timer setting so I can schedule it to heat up my room a bit in the morning before my alarm. $30 for a wee baby space heater!
At work, we're gearing up for our partner churches to help pack and give away wool blankets with toiletries, and a few warm items wrapped up in the middle to homeless people. We call these, Homeless Care Kits.
It was quite sobering when nearly a year ago I started working for this amazing organization. I learned about things I'd been pleasantly ignorant to before: one being the pain of homelessness. But I'd also never truly paid due attention to the way God's love was meant to intersect that pain, just as it does all others. I spent the first few weeks at this job, learning about what the bible says about how we ought show compassion to all, and especially the "the least of these," as Jesus called them.
The most startling realization was in Matthew 25. Here He tells us that if we do not do these things, we have ignored Him; we have not fed, clothed, or quenched the thirst of our Savior. This passage couldn't be more clear, I dare someone to try and water it down (though not really, if you read it that way, keep it to yourself) and yet we have so many other concepts in the bible we'd rather hang our hat on. Jesus clearly laid out, both in word and by example what compassion looked like.
Compassion doesn't resemble judgment. Nor does it resemble fear for our supposed safety. It does however get referred to here as an act of the righteous - biblically meaning those who are in right standing with the requirements of God. That means Jesus was saying, this is part of what it means to be in right standing of me.
The beauty and the tension is that it still needs to be done from the heart. Serving and giving needs to be done out of love. Jesus isn't saying it's the righteous who do this because He wants us to fall in-line out of obligation. See, in the Old Testament, based on our standing with God being measured by the old Law, we would've had to do things to earn that standing. Flash forward to Jesus telling us this, it was shortly before His atoning death where mere acceptance of His sacrifice is now the mark of our righteousness in God's eyes. That righteousness should then inform our actions, compelling us to show compassion to the ones that society rejects and overlooks, this by love not penance.
We're too busy trying to battle the worries of the world with our own might, slapping the label of 'Good Christendom' on it, in spite of the very contradictory nature that Christ himself lays out toward such Pharisaical ways.
I can't say I've mastered it, and I can't say I'm void of my own blind spots, but I do think this generation is in need of a reality check with what Christ called us to. Since my heart came alive to Jesus' sacrifice, I've never been able to see it as anything other than an act of love. Love was defined to the fullest in those hours.
Kind of makes one question, what are we living and dying for? And is it what we've been called to?
