Jesus on Compassion
About this series
Jesus was God-in-flesh. He was (and is) the purest, most loving and truth-filled human being the world has ever known. And yet what he taught, how he lived and the kingdom he inaugurated directly confronted the human culture in which he spent his years on earth. He was truly counter-cultural. And he is no less counter-cultural in every part of the world today.
To follow Jesus is to embark on a lifelong journey of counter-cultural transformation in which we can expect that being a disciple will lead us towards challenge, temptation and costly decisions at every turn. It’s to this that he calls every single person who follows him.
It’s a lifestyle:
That requires obedience to him above all else.
That will lead us into conflict with the world, the flesh and the devil.
That witnesses to the world of his greatness.
The goal of the first series this year - Just Jesus - was to spend time specifically focussed on the person and work of Jesus. And the goal this time is again to look at Jesus - how he was (and is) counter-cultural. So we’ll be speaking about Jesus - showing how his teaching and actions were counter-cultural in his day and then applying it to our day.
About this talk
Matthew 8:1-4, 5-13, 28-34
Matthew 8 immediately follows the Sermon on the mount along with Jesus highlighting the cost of following him. This chapter shows Jesus having authority over sickness, over nature and over demonic powers. Chapter 7 finished with, “the crowds were amazed at his teaching, because he taught as one who had authority, and not as their teachers of the law” and now he is seen to have wide ranging authority in his actions of power too. All three of these actions are things Jews knew only God could perform, so Jesus is doing more than performing miracles - he’s also disclosing who he is as the Son of God.
Central to these miraculous actions in chapter 8 is his compassion for those who are suffering. Jesus is often recorded by the gospel writers as having compassion. For example in Matthew’s gospel:
9:36: “When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.”
14:14: “When Jesus landed and saw a large crowd, he had compassion on them and healed those who were ill.”
20:34: “Jesus had compassion on them and touched their eyes. Immediately they received their sight and followed him.”
In each case the word translated “compassion” means ‘to be moved in the inward parts,’ just as we might say today, ‘his heart goes out to her.’ And in each case, Jesus not only feels for people, he does something for them. As we see frequently in the gospels, and here in Matthew 8, Jesus seems to especially have compassion for those who were outcast, marginalised. So here we see Jesus:
vs 1-4: healing a man with a disease that made him a social and religious outcast, touching him in the process.
vs 5-13: healing the servant of a Gentile, an officer in the occupying force.
vs 28-34: healing two demon-possessed men, who were living in tombs, where others had tried to chain them many times (see the parallel passage in Mark 5:1-17).
In Jesus’ day
Church historian Philip Schaff says, ‘The old Roman world was a world without charity.’ And William Lecky, an Irish politician and writer, in the 19th century commented: ‘The active, habitual, and detailed charity of private persons, which is such a conspicuous feature in all Christian societies, was scarcely known in antiquity.’ Compassion wasn’t much known in the ancient world.
Judaism certainly held the concept of compassion to be a good one, as it reflected what the Scriptures taught about God. Because he was compassionate toward people, they should be too. However, that didn’t extend into practice too widely - the outcasts were still left out, the unclean were still kept at a distance and Gentiles were to be avoided.
In our day
There is a sense in which compassion has gained some credibility in our day. From crowdfunding platforms to regular appeals for those who are suffering, including for example, in the UK, the annual Red Nose Day, raising money for good causes has become a positive part of modern life. And yet compassion is lacking in so many other areas: how the homeless are regarded and treated; how people express criticism and judgement in online platforms; how little care is given to neighbours in our individualistic society; how the unborn and elderly are often regarded.
Because every person is created in the image of God and because of God’s compassionate love for us, the challenge is to reflect this in our daily interactions with both friends and strangers.
Audio only
