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Kingdom Compassion
We live in a world of such dichotomies, of such extremes.
Our weather seems extreme: Year-round snow in the Antarctic, year-round sun at the Equator. Our politics feel polarized, especially after a presidential election. Even the personalities in our families run the gamut: the same household may have an extreme introvert and a gregarious, life-of-the-party type.
But nowhere in our life together do the differences seem more stark than in our standards of living. This week, the Philadelphia Inquirer had a story that described the conditions in a remote region of Haiti, a country that has been devastated by four tropical storms in August and September. In this region, 26 children have died in the past four weeks. Another 65 have been treated for severe malnutrition. The storms that tore through the island nation destroyed most of the agriculture, leaving a population that was on the brink of hunger in the best of times now utterly decimated. A doctor with the aid group Doctors Without Borders states that the conditions in Haiti are “extremely, extremely fragile and dangerous.” Children cannot get access to the most basic of life’s resources: food.
In that same day’s newspaper, was a full-page ad for a local department store, advertising its weekend sale. The woman pictured in the ad had on an opulent fur coat. Splashed across the ad was copy noting the once-a-year sale price on a one-of-a-kind coat. The message was clear: this coat will give you status, will mark your place in the world as one who has money, will give you the respect of others. The fact that the coat would keep you warm and protected from the elements was never mentioned. The ad takes for granted having another of life’s most basic resources: clothing.
Rich and poor. In our own community are the extremes of poverty and wealth. Our school teachers and healthcare workers can attest to the challenging, life-threatening conditions that poverty creates in families. Our real estate agents can also share how opulent wealth creates an alternative world where the rich are insulated from the trials of real life. A scan through the newspaper or a quick viewing of the evening news will show how life and death, wealth and poverty coexist and how we don’t even blink an eye at the dichotomy, just as the advertising managers and the news editors didn’t notice the disparity between starving children in Haiti and fur-coat clad women in Philadelphia.
Jesus knew about the disparities between rich and poor. Especially in his day, homeless, blind beggars lived at the gate of the temple, which was filled with food, rich people, and the most learned members of the community. Rich young rulers came asking to join his band of homeless wanderers, but went away sad when told they had to sell everything they owned and give the money to the poor. Jesus saw both sides of live at the margins: the margins of destitution and despair, and the margin of wealth and greed.
He wanted his friends and followers to understand how much God cared for the least, the last and the lost. One day he told a parable, a story about two sets of people who lived with opposite actions. People from all around the world were mixed together, and the son of man, the ruler of the cosmos, was separating them into two groups. One group he called sheep and one he called goats. The sheep were action-oriented folks. They were always going out of their way to buy fair trade coffee and get locally-produced food so family farmers here and around the world get a fair wage. They helped villages in Tanzania get water tanks so the residents didn’t have to carry buckets of water three miles each way. They welcomed people with addictions and mental illness who have no place to go. They started a clothing closet for unemployed men and women who needed dress clothes for an interview. They went into prisons and taught Bible studies and English-as-a-Second Language classes. They visited the elderly who were confined to their homes, bringing a bit of the outside world to them. They were busy folks! The Son of Man, Jesus, gave these sheep the royal treatment and welcomed them into heaven where they could worship and praise God forever. Sounds like a good place to me. It’s easy to find ourselves among the sheep. It’s a fun place to be.
The other folks were more apathetic. They were called the goats. And even though they had good intentions, their actions never seemed to materialize. They walked by the homeless woman asking for a little change when they were in a hurry. They left the water running while they brushed their teeth, using up a precious resource. They were more worried about getting their carpet dirty than inviting the new neighbors over for a cup of coffee. They held onto their extra winter coats in case they would need them in the future. They figured people were in prison for a reason and got what they deserved. They always meant to go visit their Aunt Martha in the nursing home, but the weekends were just too busy. They were shocked, just shocked, when Jesus sent them not to heaven but into the eternal fire. That doesn’t sound like such a good place. But you know what, I find myself among the goats just as much as I do among the sheep. And that’s not such a fun place to be.
Both groups asked Jesus the same question, “When, Lord, was it that we saw you? We don’t remember you coming before us and asking for a cup of coffee, a handshake, a hamburger, or a visit? We would surely remember that!”
Episcopal priest Barbara Brown Taylor says, “Sheep and goats alike, they thought that he occupied one space at a time just as they did, and that the way they behaved in his presence was all that really counted. Meanwhile, that left them lots of free time for being with the other people in their lives, including the ones who did not count--the little ones, the least ones, those on the margins of life --the waitresses, the door-to-door magazine salesmen, the nursing home residents, the panhandlers, the inmates, the strangers at the grocery store. This Jesus who is everywhere, counts everything done for them as if it had been done for him, and everything not done for them as if it had not been done for him." What matters, she says and God will say, is "how we behaved when we thought God was not around." Not just in church, but in everyday encounters with others, all children of God. We are called to look at each other and see Christ...." We are called to live with kingdom compassion, recognizing the holy in everyone, treating all people as if we are encountering Jesus himself.
Kingdom compassion defined the difference between the sheep and goats. The sheep went around serving and loving and helping with no expectation of reward, with no desire to get anything in return. They served out of pure love. The goats, not so much. They probably had excellent excuses. I’m sure they weren’t bad people. But in the end, the goats looked at the people around them and waited for the important people to come before doing a good act. The sheep, they just waited for any old person to need a helping hand. And in the face of any old person, or young person, African, Asian or Latin American person, handicapped or able-bodied person, they found Jesus.
Even in a world of extremes, we are not always all sheep or always all goats. We go back and forth between the two camps. Sometimes we are moved to action, other times we are paralyzed by fear. Even though this parable is about judgment – the depiction of being eternally separated from God is pretty clear – it’s also about hope. Because the only difference between those welcomed into heaven and those who were shut out was an action made out of love to one of the least powerful, most forgotten, most neglected member of society. When we act with the compassion of Jesus, we are one step closer to being led wholly and completely by the shepherd, the Lord, the king.
During this week when we celebrate the abundance we have been given, where is God calling you to look with kingdom compassion? Where is God challenging you to find Jesus and serve him? We don’t have to have a lot of money or time or physical ability to reach out in love. When we advocate on behalf of the hungry people of the world with a letter or a phone call, like Bread for the World helps us to do, we are serving Jesus. When we share a kind word with genuine interest and care with the people who clean our businesses, collect the carts at the grocery store, and care for our aging relatives, we are serving Jesus. When we participate in the Christmas Miracle Offering to bring water to a village in Tanzania, we are serving Jesus.
We have been given much, and as Jesus reminds us in Luke 12:48-49, From everyone to whom much has been given, much will be required; and from the one to whom much has been entrusted, even more will be demanded.”” Jesus gives us then a direct challenge: in a world of dichotomies, of extremes, what are you going to choose: to be a goat or to be a sheep? Do you want to follow the Shepherd or be dismissed by the king?
As we enter the season of Advent, we enter a time to prepare for the birth of Christ. How will you prepare your heart to welcome him? I invite you to write one way you will serve Jesus out of love between now and Christmas. You may place your prayer offering to God in the basket up front or in the back and take a piece of wool yarn. Tie it in a prominent place this Advent season. May it remind you of your calling to be sheep, to be Jesus’ servant, to choose the lost, the lonely and the least. And by doing so, to minister to the king of kings and lord of lords. Amen.