Matthew 25:31-40
“When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his glorious throne. 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. He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.
“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. 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, 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.’
“Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’
“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.’ "
This is the first of our six exercises in imagining a world with “more...” and this week we’re going to be stretching our imaginations to envision a world with more Compassion. I don’t think any of us could argue that there is not a crying need for more compassion in our world today.
In grazing through my somewhat random collection of sources while preparing this message I found a quote from Forbes Magazine, of all places, from last year that asked this question: What is empathy vs compassion? This is how the question was answered:
That’s an interesting distinction, and I’m not entirely certain I’d agree with it 100%, but while the author of this piece seemed to be leaning towards saying empathy is the better of the two, to me it’s pretty clear that what Jesus is talking about here in our scripture today is compassion, rather than empathy (at least by this article’s definition). So, imagining a world with more compassion means a world where we do something about the sufferings of others, not just say, “oh, that’s too bad, I’m so sorry,” and pass on by.
When we talk about a world with more compassion, we can think as large as the whole world coming to care for others. Or we can mean our church body doing more. Or we could mean just one person – our own self – adding compassion to our interactions with the rest of the world.
Perhaps the hardest part about expanding compassion in the world is believing that we can actually make a difference. Are we convinced that whatever we might do would be too small to make any difference? After all, I’m only one small non-entity – so are you. What difference can we make? Maybe we need to revamp our thinking.
In our story from Matthew we just heard Jesus himself praise those who simply gave a drink of water to one who was thirsty. You can’t get much smaller than that – and yet Jesus praised those people and I don’t recall him ever saying that any one of us was expected to change the whole world all by ourselves.
Yes, working in a food bank is great, gathering warm coats in the winter is great, making a large donation to a worthy cause or a homeless shelter—all of these are great—truly--but so are the smaller gifts.
A friend of mine who is going through some tough times right now, recently shared on-line that a person – so far anonymous – regularly sends her cards with messages of encouragement, but those simple cards mean the world to my friend, lifting her up when she needs to be reminded that someone out there cares.
I can testify to how this kind of thoughtfulness can fill you with hope. Years ago when I was going through chemotherapy, a couple—friends of ours—regularly sent me cards. The cards were snarky and a little bizarre--and they made me laugh. I’ve never asked which of them picked them out, but whoever it was spent a lot of time carefully picking out those odd cards with a warped sense of humor that made me laugh out loud at a time when there wasn’t a whole lot to laugh about in my life. I looked forward to those cards.
Big things matter, small things matter—compassion comes in so many colors, shapes, and sizes. Imagine our world filled with compassion. A world, say, where no one is ever left hungry Can we even stretch our minds to an idea that big? Can we move our stake out that far?
Compassion, not just for those we know and love but for those we’ve never seen or spoken to. Compassion for those on the other sides of those ridiculous political wars we have going on all around us. Compassion, even for those who hate us—maybe they need it more than anyone else. And don’t forget a little compassion for ourselves. Many of us are going through hell right now—unemployed, juggling jobs and children, caring for someone sick or aging, depressed and feeling like we are out of options. Can we maybe even scrape up a little compassion for our own exhausted selves?
Compassion doesn’t need to be a thing we do—it is mostly an invisible movement within ourselves—a change of attitude. Taking things we’ve always thought were just “how it is” because the people who raised us seemed to think that way, or the people we call friends—taking those ingrained ways of seeing the world and judging with a clear heart whether or not they are really true.
Actually taking the time to look at our ingrained biases and changing them if we discover they are not true. Learning to see other human persons as they are, not as those inherited biases say they are: Brown-skinned people are not dangerous. Immigrants trying to build a safer life for their children are not here to rob you. All unhoused people are not drug addicts.
There are so many ways we classify people – just at a glance – knowing nothing about them. We see the clothes they wear, the jobs they work, we hear their regional drawls – but do we ever just see people – God’s beloved children? Imagine if we—all of us--learned to see and respond to each other with compassion, the way Jesus did.
Just imagine it—let your imagination run freely...all the ways this world could be so different. Think about it during this coming week—let your imagination run wild. Most of those ideas won’t stick, but think about if even one did? How could one change in attitude change the world if multiplied by the millions of people who live here?
And the King will reply, “Whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.”
In grazing through my somewhat random collection of sources while preparing this message I found a quote from Forbes Magazine, of all places, from last year that asked this question: What is empathy vs compassion? This is how the question was answered:
- ‘Empathy and compassion are very different. They are represented in different areas of the brain. With empathy, we join the suffering of others who suffer, but stop short of actually helping. With compassion, we take a step away from the emotion of empathy and ask ourselves 'how can we help?”
That’s an interesting distinction, and I’m not entirely certain I’d agree with it 100%, but while the author of this piece seemed to be leaning towards saying empathy is the better of the two, to me it’s pretty clear that what Jesus is talking about here in our scripture today is compassion, rather than empathy (at least by this article’s definition). So, imagining a world with more compassion means a world where we do something about the sufferings of others, not just say, “oh, that’s too bad, I’m so sorry,” and pass on by.
When we talk about a world with more compassion, we can think as large as the whole world coming to care for others. Or we can mean our church body doing more. Or we could mean just one person – our own self – adding compassion to our interactions with the rest of the world.
Perhaps the hardest part about expanding compassion in the world is believing that we can actually make a difference. Are we convinced that whatever we might do would be too small to make any difference? After all, I’m only one small non-entity – so are you. What difference can we make? Maybe we need to revamp our thinking.
In our story from Matthew we just heard Jesus himself praise those who simply gave a drink of water to one who was thirsty. You can’t get much smaller than that – and yet Jesus praised those people and I don’t recall him ever saying that any one of us was expected to change the whole world all by ourselves.
Yes, working in a food bank is great, gathering warm coats in the winter is great, making a large donation to a worthy cause or a homeless shelter—all of these are great—truly--but so are the smaller gifts.
A friend of mine who is going through some tough times right now, recently shared on-line that a person – so far anonymous – regularly sends her cards with messages of encouragement, but those simple cards mean the world to my friend, lifting her up when she needs to be reminded that someone out there cares.
I can testify to how this kind of thoughtfulness can fill you with hope. Years ago when I was going through chemotherapy, a couple—friends of ours—regularly sent me cards. The cards were snarky and a little bizarre--and they made me laugh. I’ve never asked which of them picked them out, but whoever it was spent a lot of time carefully picking out those odd cards with a warped sense of humor that made me laugh out loud at a time when there wasn’t a whole lot to laugh about in my life. I looked forward to those cards.
Big things matter, small things matter—compassion comes in so many colors, shapes, and sizes. Imagine our world filled with compassion. A world, say, where no one is ever left hungry Can we even stretch our minds to an idea that big? Can we move our stake out that far?
Compassion, not just for those we know and love but for those we’ve never seen or spoken to. Compassion for those on the other sides of those ridiculous political wars we have going on all around us. Compassion, even for those who hate us—maybe they need it more than anyone else. And don’t forget a little compassion for ourselves. Many of us are going through hell right now—unemployed, juggling jobs and children, caring for someone sick or aging, depressed and feeling like we are out of options. Can we maybe even scrape up a little compassion for our own exhausted selves?
Compassion doesn’t need to be a thing we do—it is mostly an invisible movement within ourselves—a change of attitude. Taking things we’ve always thought were just “how it is” because the people who raised us seemed to think that way, or the people we call friends—taking those ingrained ways of seeing the world and judging with a clear heart whether or not they are really true.
Actually taking the time to look at our ingrained biases and changing them if we discover they are not true. Learning to see other human persons as they are, not as those inherited biases say they are: Brown-skinned people are not dangerous. Immigrants trying to build a safer life for their children are not here to rob you. All unhoused people are not drug addicts.
There are so many ways we classify people – just at a glance – knowing nothing about them. We see the clothes they wear, the jobs they work, we hear their regional drawls – but do we ever just see people – God’s beloved children? Imagine if we—all of us--learned to see and respond to each other with compassion, the way Jesus did.
Just imagine it—let your imagination run freely...all the ways this world could be so different. Think about it during this coming week—let your imagination run wild. Most of those ideas won’t stick, but think about if even one did? How could one change in attitude change the world if multiplied by the millions of people who live here?
And the King will reply, “Whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.”
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