“The LORD will surely comfort Zion and will look with compassion on all her ruins; he will make her deserts like Eden, her wastelands like the garden of the LORD. Joy and gladness will be found in her, thanksgiving and the sound of singing.”[1]
Again and again and again the Old Testament Scriptures record that the compassion of God is the motivating force that compels him to turn Israel’s misfortune into fruitfulness and celebration. When King David commits adultery with Bathsheba and murders her husband Uriah, stealing Bathsheba for himself, he appeals to God’s unfailing love and great compassion[2] to erase his mortal offenses. In the Gospels, Jesus has compassion on the multitudes because they are like sheep without a shepherd.[3] They are essentially lost, alone and Fatherless, and he heals all of their sick.[4] Jesus has compassion on two blind men outside the walls of Jericho, touching their eyes and restoring their sight. He is filled with compassion for an alienated leper, reaching forward to touch him and declaring, “Be clean!”[5] These are just a few examples amongst a vast selection.
Why does Jesus feed the multitudes, the 5000 and the 4000? Compassion![6] In the parable of the servant with literally thousands of lifetimes of debt (10,000 talents), why does his master forgive his balance and set him free? Compassion![7] Why was the Samaritan acknowledged as being a good neighbour to his Jewish enemy? Because he had compassion[8] upon him, caring for his wounds and providing food and shelter. Compassion is the spark that triggers the heart of God. The compassion of God is the high-octane fuel that ignites and compels his miracle-working zeal. He can’t help himself but unreservedly reach out in love and action, with a capacity stretching far beyond natural human ability or inclination. Such is the outworking of James’s ‘faith without works is dead,’ for when Godly compassion is flowing then faith without action is impossible!
In contrast, our natural inclination tends toward judgement. We are indifferent to a homeless person begging on our high street, concluding that they are lazy and should get a job. We fail to see the work-place incident that left them partially disabled and largely unemployable. On the evening news, we hear of a sex worker who has been robbed, raped and murdered, concluding that it’s a consequence of their own immoral choices. We fail to see that they were taken from their family and trafficked as a child. We judge on face-value, usually neglecting to see the back story, failing to consider their painful journey and its consequences.
Henry Nouwen comments:
“Compassion can never coexist with judgment, because judgment creates the distance, the distinction, which prevents us from really being with another…”
He goes on to say;
“Compassion is the basis of all ministry.”[9]
In short, judgement closes our hearts and causes distance, whilst compassion opens our hearts and allows us to draw near to and enter into our neighbour’s pain and brokenness. Then, we are the good Samaritan, a genuinely compassionate neighbour.
A few years back, my wife Nia had an illuminating experience in the area of intercession. She felt Father leading her to pray for children who had been trafficked for the purpose of sexual exploitation. In these times of prayer, in the Spirit, she would often literally find herself in the room with such an individual. She experienced their despair and hopelessness, and her heart would be moved with compassion as she would pray for them, calling down comfort, reassurance and hope, reaching out with her own heart to hold and embrace them.
On one such occasion, this intercessory journey took an unexpected turn. As Father led her to pray, instead of finding herself in the presence of a vulnerable child, she found herself in a room full of adult men. She quickly realised that these were the traffickers, the very ones who had been imprisoning and exploiting the children she had been interceding for on many previous occasions. She sensed Father asking her, “How would you like to pray for these men?” Instantly, the anger that had been brewing below the surface overflowed in outright indignation. A torrent of fury poured out of her heart towards this group of men, that they should get what they deserved, she even wished they might ‘burn in hell!’
In the midst of Nia’s angry rant, she heard a soft gentle voice speak, a voice so tender and utterly contrary to all the judgemental emotions she was experiencing. From a place of deep love and compassion, the voice said, “But Nia, they are my children, I love them too…” His love for these men was so tangible and present in that moment that it completely broke Nia. In her own words, “I was a basket-case”, wailing like a baby in the face of such profound love and compassion. “It was as though I was the sinful one, not the men, and I simply couldn’t be angry with them anymore.”
Nia’s perspective of justice was utterly bankrupted in that moment. It was as though Father was enveloping her into and saturating her with his own love and compassion for these broken men. A vast divide was exposed between her own perspective of justice and her experience of God’s justice and mercy in the moment. Ever since, something has shifted within her: “I realised that I didn’t need to judge anybody!”
God’s operating system is utterly otherworldly, it is totally foreign to our broken mindset. It’s not Microsoft Windows or Mac OS, his love and compassion only begin where ours finish. Truly the foolishness of God is wiser than man’s wisdom,[10] and the tenderness and compassion of God only begin where ours end. In terms of compassion, our highest peak is the ditch at the bottom of his lowest valley. I find myself questioning whether I have even begun to understand the true dimensions of his compassion, or if I’m still just scratching around an edge or a corner.
When we do assess the actions of others, our measuring stick is usually cut from the wrong timber, from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. It focuses upon what they have or haven’t done. What is right and what is wrong? What is good and what is bad? What is righteous and what is unrighteous? That measuring stick will always lead to death.[11] Something dies within us and also within those whose performance we find wanting. In contrast, God’s measuring stick is cut from the Tree of Life and focuses upon who you are, calling forth from within our true eternal destiny and identity. We are his beloved children.
In the parable of the prodigal son, where Jesus is explicitly unveiling Father’s love in action, we read;
“While he [the prodigal] was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; he ran to his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him.”
Compassion provokes action. The compassion of the father in the parable induces a spontaneous reaction, his heart bypassing any need for mental assessment. He can’t help himself. He runs, he throws, he kisses, he restores, he celebrates – with total disregard for anybody else’s opinion and with his own outlook being defined by who his son is, NOT what he has or hasn’t done. In that moment, his motivation is not to evaluate his son’s successes and failures. It’s a broken-hearted longing for restored intimate union. His faith is fully invested in the transformation of his son’s heart by pure love, a love which naturally procures change and transformation of behaviour. This is what the Scriptures refers to as the fruit of the Spirit, the natural outworking of divine love poured liberally into a human heart.[12]
“But what about justice?!” I hear you cry. “God is a Holy God!” Well mercy triumphs over justice,[13] and mercy is always unjust! The guilty go free and the innocent pay the price. Our own discomfort in the face of Father’s lavish disregard of our failures is what C.S. Lewis refers to as ‘the intolerable compliment’.[14] It is his compassionate presence in the midst of our most dire filthy brokenness, seeking to lovingly restore and transform us from within. Such mercy offends every legalistic bone in our bodies; yet, he declares:
“I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.”[15]
The parable of the workers and their wages similarly offends our self-righteous ego. Those who have been toiling in the vineyard for 12 hours, through the heat of the day, are paid the same single denarius as those who have only been working in the cool of the evening for only the last hour.[16] As if to compound the offense and add insult to injury, those who arrived last are paid first! What kind of mathematics is that? Well, at the end of the day, 50 years of carefully practiced Christianity offers no advantage over 5-minute abject failure Christianity! Each will receive their one denarius – one complete measure of all that it means to be compassionately embraced, kissed and clothed with the death and resurrection of Jesus. His compassion is far more than a feeling or an emotion. It’s his very nature, his fabric, substance and foundational reality.
“I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.”
At different points in my Christian journey, I have found myself naturally addressing God by various titles. Initially, the name of Jesus was my singular focus, along with all its derivatives: Lord, King, Saviour etc. Later, the Spirit of God became another focus, and then of course Father. With the latter, even how I related to him as my Father has been an evolutionary road of growing intimacy. It has transitioned at different times from our Father to my Father, from Father to Abba, to Dad, to Papa as I have become increasingly free in our relationship. Even more recently, as Nia and I have had time and space to explore the stillness and silence of contemplative prayer, it has not always been one or the other of the Trinity that we have experienced. Instead, they have met us corporately as manifest pure Love – peaceful, all-embracing, all-knowing, profoundly comforting, deeply compassionate. They are united pure Love.
When Jesus approached the town of Nain, a widow emerged accompanying the dead body of her only son. In that moment, she would have been beside herself with grief, feeling utterly alone, abandoned and forsaken. She had lost both husband and son. We’re told Jesus’ “heart went out to her”, that literally the depths of Jesus’ heart and soul were bent towards her; for compassion is far more than shallow sentimentality. Sentimentality is emotion without responsibility; an emotional experience which requires no action or response. By contrast, genuine compassion always moves the heart towards tangible action. It initiates a desire for an alternative future.
Jesus, perfectly rooted and established in love, filled to the measure of all the fullness of God,[17] is Godly compassion personified. Outside Nain, he reaches towards the coffin, halts the funeral procession, commands the dead son back to life, returning him back to his utterly shocked mother – who by the way, is now beside herself with joy! A funeral becomes a crazy dance party. Compassion is the spark that triggers the heart of God, the high-octane fuel that ignites and compels his miracle-working zeal. He can’t help himself but reach out in love and action, with a capacity stretching far beyond natural human ability or inclination, literally transforming mourning into dancing. Today, his invitation is for us to forsake our high-minded opinions, to be united with him in his compassionate essence and action.
“The LORD will surely comfort Zion and will look with compassion on all her ruins; he will make her deserts like Eden, her wastelands like the garden of the LORD. Joy and gladness will be found in her, thanksgiving and the sound of singing.”[18]
[1] Isaiah 51:3
[2] Psalm 51:1
[3] Matthew 9:36; Mark 6:34
[4] Matthew 14:14
[5] Mark 1:40-41
[6] Matthew 14:14, 15:32
[7] Matthew 18:27
[8] Luke 10:37
[9] Henri Nouwen, The Way of the Heart: Spirituality of the Desert Fathers & Mothers.
[10] 1 Corinthians 1:25
[11] Genesis 2:17
[12] Romans 5:5
[13] James 2:13
[14] C.S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain
[15] Exodus 33:19; Rom 9:15
[16] Matthew 20:1-16
[17] Ephesians 3:17-19
[18] Isaiah 51:3
Replenish 