I was on a plane traveling the other day and just as we are about ready to take off, here comes a lady with a child in hand and carrying a lot of stuff. The woman sitting next to me offered to help the lady by holding her child until she could get settled. I did not think much of it at the time, but when we landed and got off the plane the woman next to me offered to help the lady again by carrying something. I noticed that there must have been at least 10 men around the lady with the child and not one of us offered to help.
As I was walking to get my bags I thought to myself why didn’t I offer. It would not have been any trouble to offer to carry something off the plane for her, so why did I not offer. I started to think and I have no real reason as to why I did not nor a reason as to why people in general do not offer to help their fellow neighbor. If you are thinking they are not my neighbor, you are wrong. Everyone you come in contact with is your neighbor.
As I continued to think about this some more, I came up with a few excuses such as:
- it would take too much time to help
- what if something happened then I would get blamed
- she did this to herself by bringing all this stuff on board, why should I be expected to help
- why should I help her when no one offers to help me
- I have too much of my own stuff to help her
What do all of these and probably every other excuse you can think of have in common? It is all about me and not about someone else.
Then I started to think of these verses:
Matthew 25:31-46 New International Version (NIV)
The Sheep and the Goats
31 “When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his glorious throne. 32 All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. 33 He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.
34 “Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. 35 For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, 36 I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’
37 “Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? 38 When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? 39 When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’
40 “The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’
41 “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. 42 For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, 43 I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.’
44 “They also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?’
45 “He will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’
46 “Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.”
and what these verses meant to me. I believe it is saying while you cannot get into heaven by doing good deeds, if you are a Christian and Christ is Lord over you then you will do good deeds. You will do it because you want to please Christ and you know that Christ who gave his life for you would do whatever he could to help those that were in need. This is not the same as supporting the person for the rest of their lives. All of the actions are helping, not supporting and if you think the two are the same you are mistaken. I will help my kids when they are done with college and move out of the house, but I will not support them.
When most people help, they seem to expect something in return. Did Christ really expect anything or did He do it because He loves all of us? I believe He did it out of love and is expecting us that claim to follow Christ to behave exactly as He did.
That is no easy task especially with all the negativity these days towards Christianity and the driving force that makes us think it is all about us and meeting our own needs. Now that is not true of everyone, but I do believe that is true for a very large percentage of people, even those that claim to be Christian.
So I invite you to help someone out just because. If they say thank you, great and if they do not, still great. You did not do this for man but for God and Christ for if you do this for man, then the reward you received from them is your reward.
God bless you.