Ep #15: Stewards care about and for the Vulnerable

Episode Transcript

Austin
Thanks for joining us again on the Second Half Stewardship Podcast. We're really glad you're here. As we dive in today we're going to be continuing our conversation about God owns it all, specifically looking at that God cares about and for the vulnerable and therefore is stewards we should care about and for the vulnerable. In our last episode, we talked about how corporate worship forms and aligns us as the people of God, focusing on the kingdom of God.
And if we're not doing that within corporate worship, with the body of believers that are around us, then we're going to be formed by the culture’s views of worship, which are often counter to the Church's view and the scriptures view of what worship is. And so as our hearts are formed to worship God and look to eternity, we want to look to His word yet again and see what does it mean to care about and for the vulnerable.
And if he owns our time, what does it mean to spend our time well, as a people of faith that care for the vulnerable? So as we think about God owning it all and that we are stewards in this vision of justice, we look to Scripture and we see that God over and over and over again cares about those who are the most vulnerable that have the least amount of power the poor, the migrant, the orphan, the widow and God really longs for his people to take care of those that are in the most need, because he sees that in those people flourishing it shows that he is a God of compassion, that he is a God of justice, that he is a God that cares for the people that are the at the most risk.
And so we as Christians get to reflect that reflect that character of God by moving into and moving to care for the vulnerable. I think about Micah 6:8 in particular when we think about this quartet of the vulnerable and Micah 6:8 says “He,” speaking of God, “has told you, O man, what is good and what does the Lord require of you? But to do justice, to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God.” So, Spencer, as we think about caring for the vulnerable, what is our culture do how does our culture approach caring the vulnerable?

Spencer
I think we go a lot of different directions here, and none of them really help us to engage the vulnerable in perhaps the way that we see in biblical wisdom. You know, one way that we get inundated with all of these different images of what's going on around the world and how catastrophes, natural disasters, political set ups that are against really the vulnerable in so many parts of the world.
They're really oppressing people and people are in need. And yet if we see images of that each day and we're inundated with what's happening in other parts of the world, we get desensitized not just to those images but even the people around us. Because we think, well, what can I really do with all of the things that are coming at me?
So there is this desensitization, this fatigue that we get. The other thing that I think that we see is that building relationships with people who are coming from a place of poverty can also can oftentimes be really challenging because there is a different worldview, there are a different set of assumptions. The needs can feel overwhelming. And so even if they don't express those needs, even if there's a level of maturity that they have, just walking alongside them can be challenging because it challenges our own presupposes, it challenges the way that we may use resources, even if there's nothing that's said.
So one of the subtle responses as we think about the reality of being inundated with images and with information, and then also the challenges of just practically walking alongside the poor is that we distance ourselves from the poor so often, and this can show up in the ways that we keep our distance socially, whether it's the groups that we decide that we're going to become a part of, whether it is the places in town that we live in, all kinds of different things can kind of put distance between us and people that come from a different socioeconomic strata.
And of course, where we live in the west, in Knoxville, Tennessee, we have a level of wealth just within our social context that many people around the world that's very, very uncommon to begin with that we need to recognize as well. So I find myself being able to rationalize my situation and saying, okay, well, maybe the government should take care of that, or a nonprofit should take care of that.
I don't have I don't have the training, you know, that I need to enter a particular area or a relationship. I can say that's not my mission. I can say it puts my kids in danger it puts my family at danger if I get too involved in these areas and there is some consideration of every one of those things.
So, we don't discount that. But we also recognize that we're subtly placing that distance. I'm finding that I place that distance in different ways between me and those who are vulnerable, between me and those who are in poverty.

Austin
It's much easier for me to choose a place to live that is good for me and for my family without consideration of is this good for our heart toward the Lord and our heart toward the poor. And I think because especially in the west, we get so individual focused, we lose sight of what is what is the global view of the church, what is the global call of the church, of the people of God to be a different people in the world?
And so the more I look inward, the harder it is for me to engage the poor. So today we're going to be looking at the Good Samaritan, the parable of the Good Samaritan, and we're looking at it from Luke 10:30-37, just to see how Jesus calls us to engage with the vulnerable. And so, this is coming off the heels of Jesus has sent out the seventy, and Luke says they've come back and they've talked about it and they're rejoicing in the Holy Spirit.
And Luke says that a teacher asked Jesus about how to inherit eternal life. And it's likely in response to when Jesus has sent the seventy out and they return in joy. So, this lawyer's saying, well, I want this. How can I inherit this joy? How can I inherit this eternal life? And Jesus says, okay, what is written in the law of Moses?
And a lawyer says, you should love the Lord, your God with all your heart, with all your soul, all your mind, and then love your neighbor as yourself. And Jesus responds by saying, Who is your neighbor? Or the lawyer asks Jesus, who is his neighbor? And so we get into the text. And since you want to dive into the text.

Spencer
‘Jesus replied, “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and he fell among robbers, who stripped him and beat him and departed, leaving him half dead. Now by chance a priest was going down that road, and when he saw him he passed by on the other side. So likewise a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. But a Samaritan, as he journeyed, came to where he was, and when he saw him, he had compassion. He went to him and bound up his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he set him on his own animal and brought him to an inn and took care of him. And the next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper, saying, ‘Take care of him, and whatever more you spend, I will repay you when I come back.’ Which of these three, do you think, proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers?” He said, “The one who showed him mercy.” And Jesus said to him, “You go, and do likewise.”’

Austin
So, what we want to remember about this parable, first and foremost, is it's in the context of a lawyer asking Jesus, how can I inherit eternal life and who is my neighbor? So, if we think about the parable in that context of what do we do to inherit eternal life? Well, we level with all our hearts, soul, mind, all my strength.
We love our neighbors ourselves with the lawyer responded. And then who is the neighbor? And the lawyers respond to the end of the parable. Well, the neighbor is the one who served the poor and the broken man. And the one that serves the vulnerable. So let's take a look a little bit deeper into this passage and just see what happens.
And there's an aspect of service that's intrinsic to being faithful and to eternal life. And so we see a man is going down a road and it's a dangerous road, and he is beaten, robbed, left for dead. I remember I saw a painting about this that just exhorted the humanity of the situation. It almost looks like a photograph of this naked man on a donkey being held up by the good Samaritan as he is being carried.
And there is just this level of he is incredibly destitute, being left for dead. And so the first person that passes by is a priest, and he sees the wounded man and he actively avoids them. And then we see a Levite and he sees a wounded man. And he again, he sees him and he moves aside and avoids him.
And these are both religious leaders that in that day should have been modeling the great commandment to love God and love neighbor. And they probably had things in the back of their mind, well, if I touch this bloody man that I'm going to be unclean. If I'm unclean, then I can't serve. But there's still always this call to serve the poor, to serve the vulnerable.
And I think there's this movement by these priestly leaders away from that call and into a different call that they've forgotten that one of their central calls is to love God and love neighbor. And so finally the Samaritan comes to the man's rescue, and he's the one that models the great commandment by loving and serving. And he bandages the wounds with supplies that he has on him, items that he has bought himself probably for himself.
He chooses instead of using the things that he bought for his own good, he's going to give them to someone in need. And then he allows the wounded man to ride. And who knows how long It could have been hours It could have been days. And then he pays the innkeeper.
It's incredibly generous. And it just takes an amount of time and energy that as I look at myself, I think I don't serve the poor in this way. But it is very illuminating to me of how far am I actually willing to go to serve my neighbor. And so, the Samaritan displays this neighborly love and what I think is really interesting is we don't know anything about this wounded man.
We don't know what background he comes from. We don't know if he's an Israelite. We don't know he's Samaritan. We don't know anything about this. Does that change how we view the priest and the Levite? Not necessarily, but I think it illuminates that. Does it matter who the broken and the poor are? If God has called us to love and serve them, we need to be wise. But there's not any insight into who this person is. What are some of the thoughts that you've got from the passage, Spencer?

Spencer
Well, it again, we talked about it being a dangerous road. It's incredibly inconvenient and we think about taking a journey. If I think I'm driving, you know, over to North Carolina, for instance, a seven hour trip with our family to see my wife's family. I'm not going to stop for somebody on the side of the road, in all likelihood.
It's incredibly inconvenient. Just looking at my own heart. How often am I presented with situations that are inconvenient to me that I just say I have something else that's going on. And I don't even have the cover that the religious leaders had. They had priestly duties. They had things that they actually needed to do.
They hid behind that. They didn't understand what God's pecking order of commands and laws were, and they weren't really grappling with that. But I see that in my own life as well. When I'm asked to do something more, when something arises out of the ordinary, so often I will make an excuse there. So, he takes his finances and he puts them in play.
He takes his time, which I think for many of us is even more of a challenge. And is available. And it's an open-ended type of situation. He pays upfront. But then he says, I will cover whatever is needed thereafter. So, a lot going on there. But the incredible hospitality has to be challenging to us because that is how neighbor is defined. it is defined within the context of really the most vulnerable.
Not necessarily that the man was impoverished coming into that experience, but when he was half dead, he was as impoverished as you could be. He was as low as you could be on that road. So just a few thoughts there.

Austin
As I think about our response to this passage, I think it's one that we interact with quite often. As we read through the text and I think it's one that we can become, just like you were saying, desensitized to, oh, it's just the Good Samaritan we know, okay, we need to serve the people that are broken.
But I think as I respond to that, you know, in our neighborhood and in neighborhoods that I've lived in the last ten years, we have people that come and that have needs. And they don't come when I'm ready for them to come. And I need to always be checking my heart because Jesus does call us to care for the vulnerable.
He calls us to care for the sick. He calls us to care for those in need often. This is one vignette of Jesus calling us to care for the vulnerable. It's not an isolated event. If we look across Jesus ministry, there's constantly him going to the most vulnerable. And I think, again, if I look inwardly, my response is often, well, I can do a little bit, but I don't want to be I don't want to be inconvenienced.
I don’t want to be inconvenienced like Good Samaritan when I have a neighbor that knocks on my door at 11:00PM asking for a sandwich. I don't care that you're asking for a sandwich. It's 11:00PM. I have kids that are in bed, like, please don't ring my doorbell. But they have a need and I can fill that need. But it causes my heart to realize my tendency and often my first thought is to myself and not asking has God called me to care for this person? Maybe not this person specifically, but God has called me to care for the poor. And am I going to really be inconvenienced by making a sandwich at 11:30PM? No, but I don't like it, right? I don't like getting up from my bed and having to put my clothes back on to answer a door.

Spencer
And there is wisdom here that we can have that conversation with that friend that says, Hey, you know, come at 7:30PM, not 11:30PM, you know, But there are situations, you know, we had a call this week at 2:00AM. from a lady that was outside and needed a ride and needed a place to stay because it was getting cold.
And you just say, okay, there are things that are legitimate that are incredibly inconvenient for us. It's not I think that's the messiness. Oftentimes that we get into that we say, well, I'm not going to be able to stay in control of the situation. I want to be in control of this. And if somebody has my phone number or if somebody can knock on my door and I respond and I don't just keep them at arm's length and then I develop a relationship with them.
It all gets to be more messy. And yet Jesus is really highlighting and lionizing this guy who it's as messy as it comes with the Good Samaritan. He really stops everything in his life, helps this man. Now, he may have had other things that he needed to do, so he leaves him with the innkeeper, but then he comes back and I think what an amazing example there and it really, I think to operate out of that, I think even okay, I've got to have a different orientation to life. I've got to see that I am incredibly loved. I'm taken care of and so now I can be hospitable to others. There may be legitimate things that I have to, like the Good Samaritan, go and do some other things for a time. But I can have a heightened level of hospitality far beyond where I would normally begin from, as I have my perspective reframed as a steward.

Austin
And I think as we continue to be open-ended with the Lord and say, God, I want to be a steward of my time. I want to be a good steward of the resources that you have so generously provided me. We have to be willing that at times he's going to inconvenience us, because if we are being willing stewards to serve the poor and wanting more opportunities, then when the opportunity arises, I can't say no I want to distance myself. If I've asked for that, if I've invited that from the Lord and I think I need to be constantly aware that my heart's posture, if I'm longing for Jesus to move in my life, to shape me, to be a person that cares for the vulnerable, that he's going to put the vulnerable in my life, it's not going to be the way that I want it to be at all times.

Spencer
I think about God calling us to a supernatural life. We need the Holy Spirit. So, if everything that we do, you could say, well, that's out of that person's just natural energy, natural acumen, then are we really exhibiting anything that is God given? And in some way he has given us everything He has given, giving us our lives, but really he gives us the Holy Spirit in an amazing way to provide wisdom and energy, to be able to do some of these things.
And yet when I'm given the opportunity, often times I say, No thanks, you know. So we want to grow in that area of being open. Now, obviously, you've got to have sleep on some level and we trust that God is a loving father and that, you know, we're not going to have five nights in a row that we've just got to be out, you know, cruising around, taking people to one place to another, because he does care for us.
He wants good things for us in our in our lives. But there's an invitation, I think, oftentimes that I keep at arm's length. If I'm being honest here.

Austin
What I think the beauty, if we look both to the early church but also to the nation of Israel, there is this call and this modeling of a lifestyle corporately within the church. So, it's not only on my shoulders to take care of the vulnerable. It's on the shoulders of the church. As we look at the early church, whether it's an Acts or we look at Israel through the law, there's always the call to care for the vulnerable collectively.
And I think that's another challenging thing for me as I think about living in the West, as I look at those news pieces that talk about the poor in the developing world. I see needs of human trafficking that are abounding currently. And I get overwhelmed, desensitized by that, rather than saying, God, who have you raised that is doing this work and how can I enter that?
Or if I look at it on a local level of some neighbors that we collectively know, you and I and several other families in the neighborhood, that we can say, Hey, I see that you're doing something for this person. I'm doing something. Let's band together to love on this person well, and I think we will lose sight of collective call to care for the poor.
It's not just on my shoulders. We need to walk as the body of believers. And that's where I think the beauty and the challenge of the early church in that they shared their resources and gave to the needy and they lived countercultural it with the poor. They didn't live in whatever wealth they had, they did divest it.
I think it's so challenging that Acts say there was not a needy among the body of believers, and that's because people were actively willing to divest of themselves for the good of the church and for the good of the body of believers. Now it's a smaller and more localized body. But just the challenge of there was not a needy person among them.
That hits me, and it should hit me really hard. And, you know, as I think about what are what are our next steps stewards? It's okay, am I thinking about this just in myself? Am I thinking about this collectively? Am I just trying to take it all on? Or am I engaging with my brothers and sisters in Christ to live counterculturally?
Because that is the call as we live counterculturally. It shows a different picture of who got is to the broken world around us, and that's what we want to see as we look towards eternity, is that we are modeling Christ’s kingdom come.

Spencer
Well, and you talked about eternity there. I think one of the things we look back to the Old Testament, the New Testament alike this is not just, hey, let's let's do this stuff because God told us to and this is drudgery. There is a sense of joy that we can gain in the present time, but we can also look to the reward of heaven in the future.
And whether we look at the Old Testament or the New Testament, it the Bible uniformly talks about how God will bless those who take care of the poor. We see that in Psalms, we see it in Proverbs. We see it in the Torah, we see it in the New Testament. The Bible is full of talking about God's blessing, reciprocating what we do in this time.
And that's unique in the ancient world. You look at you look back at the Old Testament time, what the Jews thought about blessing the poor, you know, the ancient world so much about reciprocal gifts. So you give something to someone, there's an expectation they're going to pay you back. Sometimes just an honor, but oftentimes it's a quid pro quo in material circumstances.
And so one of the beautiful things about what God says in the Bible, in the Old Testament and then repeats often in the New Testament, is that we are looking to a reward because God will reciprocate, even if that poor person can't reciprocate, even if they don't even say thank you, even if there's nothing that's there. God sees that and he loves that and He will bless us, be it, you know, in the present time or be it in the future in heaven.
So I think we can look forward to that. And so often I'm just having in my mind's eye what I'm laying down in that moment or the inconveniences or the lack of sleep or whatever it might be. I'm not really looking to that reward and being excited about that. In a meaningful way, you know, Jesus says in Luke 9:23 and following, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it. For what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses or forfeits himself?”
And I come back to that because that is denying himself and taking up his cross daily. And yet the reward in the end is so worth it. It's intimacy with God in the present time. It is being able to walk with him in eternity and being blessed in some way, shape, or form in heaven for what we've done on Earth right.

Austin
We just finished a book by Michael Blue called “Free to Follow” in the very last paragraphs of the book. He says, What is it that you know, at the end of our lives, when we go into eternity, we see clearly for the first time how much different this life will look. And let's start now laying down what we have at the feet of Jesus, laying down our time, laying down our resources, our wealth, and giving back to the Lord and saying, God, honor this time, honor these resources.
I want your kingdom come and your will be done. And we will clearly see when we come to eternity what little this life and these things that we think are so important right now. My $20 that are in my pocket, that should go to me. But what about the future eternity that we will enjoy God forever? May I be inconvenienced by the poor or may I lay down my life for the migrant, the widow of the orphan, and choose to serve those that God had so just so strongly said these are people that I care about, may I not run from them.
So, we want to finish with a quote from Craig Blomberg, and he says, “It goes too far to say that one cannot be rich and be a disciple of Jesus. But what never appears in the gospels are well-to-do followers of Jesus who were not simultaneously generous and almsgiving and in divesting themselves of surplus wealth for the sake of those in need.”
So as I think about that, I think it's just a challenging way to close. It's not that you can't be rich and be a disciple of Jesus, but your wealth needs to be matched with generous giving and divesting of yourself from surplus wealth for the sake of the poor, it goes hand-in-hand.

Spencer
It's almost like we see the biblical example is those who are wealthy become maybe less wealthy, you know, over time. Just because they are actively giving so much away. They have enough. The Lord has given them enough, but they're really on the hunt to say how can I bless people around me, they have a sense of what their brothers and sisters need. So challenging for all of us. I hope that is challenging for you as we go forward.

Austin
As always, feel free to share this with a friend, talk about it with them, wrestle with these things together and we'll see you next time.

Spencer
Take care.