I live in a town where the median income is 98,000. I teach at a school where students take off a week to go on a Safari in Africa. I’m surrounded by excess. Yet God keeps whispering, “Remember the poor.”
It is easy, when you are surrounded by worldly prosperity, to forget those around us who are in need. We can easily take the position, there are so many resources here in America, poverty must be the result of bad choices. But poverty is often generational or caused by unforeseen circumstances. Nonetheless, God never asked us to determine why people were in the situation they are in, He just commanded us to help.
Think about this. God gave Israel a land flowing with milk and honey aka a prosperous land. Yet he also said to them, “The poor will always be with you in this prosperous land.” That tells me that while America is prospering, there is still the poor amongst us and God cares about those who are poor.
Some may read this and feel hopeless. If the poor will always be among us and the problem will never be eradicated, why try? But I believe God is saying, “You will always have opportunities to be my hands and feet. You will always have opportunities to be generous, kind, loving. You will always have opportunities to carry my love.
Others may read it and discard it as Old Testament. But God, who is the same, yesterday, and today, has a heart for the poor, the fatherless, the widow, the foreigner. God loves the underdog. I want the heart of the Father. I want to love and care about who He loves and care about.
So, to do what God has called me to do will take me outside of my beautiful neighborhood with perfectly manicured lawns, outside of my workplace where most parents biggest concern is if their child will get an A, outside of my comfort zone. It will cause me to be intentional. It will cause me to pause my pursuit of the American Dream for a moment and help someone along the way fulfill their dream of eating and providing for their children.
“Carry my love,” was His command to me and carry I must.
“For the poor will never cease from the land; therefore I command you, saying, ‘You shall open your hand wide to your brother, to your poor and your needy, in your land.’”
Deuteronomy 15:11 NKJV