God’s Word to You is hand out or hand up
Our world is full of people in need in some degree. It always has been and always will. Jesus said;
Matthew 26:11
For you always have the poor with you, but you will not always have me.
The thing is there are all types of poor people. Some fall to tragedy and lose all they have. Some are limited physically or mentally to what they are able to do. There are also those who are capable of working but decide to con others into giving to them.
Our challenge is one I like to compare to the words Jesus shared in n Matthew to everyone who chooses to follow and serve Him.
Matthew 28:18-20
18 Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
One thing we as a country fail at is making disciples. I know on some of our mission trips at first it seemed I needed to just reach more people and I prayed going to the airport to leave Venezuela that I hadn’t. My focus the first two trips were I just need to tell them and have them pray. The trap for many on those trips was to fall into the trap of just get them to pray. But that’s not the plan of Christ.
Imagine being born n the middle of the street and your mom leaves you to fend for yourself. Folks, our country has a lot of baby believers in that situation. Go hear this amazing preacher and have an emotional event and go down and pray to be saved and that’s it. Let’s see how ,any will be saved at the next service.
But there is no real discipleship.
The same goes for fighting poverty. Our country has spent trillions in the last 60 or more years fighting poverty. The focus has turned into just give them money, clothes and food. The challenge is what are we really accomplishing?
Making a baby believer and just getting them to pray and then going to the next lost person is similar to feed the next person in line. We, instead, should reach out to the baby believer and help them grow just as our best way to fight poverty is to reach out and help them grow.
Discipleship is a hand up. To investing in a life. It’s replicating a growing believer. Giving a hand up to the poor is the same. We need to invest time with the person and help them become someone who can help someone else.
The real challenge is it’s easy to give a small donation and feel good about yourself instead of giving a piece of your life and truly invest in someone else, isn’t it?
Be His. Make disciples. Even among the poor.
me n’ God love ya