The Lutheran Hour
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"Capacity for Compassion"
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Text: Mark 6:30-34
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Grace, and mercy, and peace to you from our Lord Jesus whose leadership and compassion for us, enables us to care for one another. Amen.
Do you remember the song from the 60s, “What the world needs now is love, sweet love. It’s the only thing that there’s much too little of.”
Well, I do agree that we need real love in this world, but that’s the problem.
This world needs love, yes, but we need the kind of love that God brings. We need a compassionate love that flows from truth as well as from heartfelt care and concern. We need Jesus, God’s compassionate love in action for us all.
When you read the Bible, dear friend, you are reading a story about compassion, God’s compassionate love in action for the world, for you. That compassion isn’t merely a feeling or a call to action; it’s a Person, Jesus Christ in action for you, for all.
Do you see how different He is than all other leaders and teachers in this world? He comes with wisdom, compassion, righteousness, love as a gift from God for you as only God can give it!
In our lesson today, (read Mark 6:30-44 for the whole story), there you can see such compassion in His actions, you can see it in His words, you can feel it from His heart, you can see it in His eyes, if you will.
Someone once asked the comedian George Burns what it took to be a successful actor. Burns said, “The key is sincerity–once you’ve learned how to fake that, you’ve got it made!”
Well, you can’t fake compassion-at least, not for very long. People can eventually tell if your compassion is real or not.Psychologists at the University of California at Berkeley have even conducted an experiment to find out whether compassion is something that can be recognized by others. Dr. Kelly McGonigal writes about it in Psychology Today. Here’s how it worked. Researchers first made a series of brief video clips that showed various people listening to someone describe a traumatic experience. Test participants who watched the video clips were then asked to pick out those listeners who they thought seemed to be the most compassionate, just on the basis of how they looked as they listened to the speaker talk.
Here’s what the test found: people tended to agree as to who seemed to be the most compassionate listeners, based on several common visual clues.
For example, they associated compassionate listening with body language that showed the listener was totally engaged with the speaker, with what he or she was telling them. Dr. McGonigal called it “listening with their whole body.”
Compassionate listeners also made gestures that showed they were connecting with the speaker, with what they were hearing. They smiled. They nodded their heads. They didn’t interrupt. They didn’t send text messages!
And, finally, they made eye contact. Compassionate listening is face to face; even eye to eye.
This experiment illustrates what a glimpse of compassion might be. But it also suggests how often our sinful human nature is blind to the real needs of others. As sinners, even our best efforts are insufficient for the task of compassionately loving others as God demands.That’s why Mark says, “Look into the eyes of the Jesus of our lesson today.” For, in this world there is only One whose eyes are always full of compassion; there is only One who is constantly vigilant to do what is right and best for you; there is only One whose compassion was full of love, justice, mercy, peace, righteousness, and eternal life for all!
“When Jesus landed and saw a large crowd, He had compassion on them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd. So He began teaching them many things.”
The Bible is clear. We need a deeper, eternal resource for compassion, a more enduring one than merely our best efforts for the moment.
For real compassion is doing what another needs, no matter what the cost to you. It’s speaking the truth, the truth of God’s Word, in love to bless another. It’s hanging in there with someone when others would have given up on them long ago.
We need that kind of compassionate love, but as sinful, selfish people, there’s always a limit to our service; there’s always a compromise to truth when compassion puts us in a tight spot.
The text describes the people then as well as people today, that we are “like sheep without a Shepherd.” Without a connection to the God who creates us and redeems us, there’s an aimlessness to this world, there’s a brokenness to this world, and compassion, real love for the sake of others, seems like a pipedream.We can see that in our day too, can’t we? Just look at what’s going on in marriage and family these days. If the family was anything to society in the past, it was the first place that people tried to do what was right for others. If a husband and wife won’t take care of themselves and their children, who will?
But today, even the marriage bond itself seems trite. A recent PEW Research Center Report says that barely half, 51% of adults are married today, the lowest percentage ever. It went on to say that cohabitation, that is living together without being married, is the preferred arrangement between men and women. It was further reported that a shocking 80% of 18-29 year olds preferred living together, rather than getting married.
Even worse are the statistics about single parent families, children growing up without fathers or mothers. In almost every demographic, such brokenness is on the rise with 50, 60, even 70% of some communities having fatherless or motherless households.
Brokenness, heartache, people living in uncommitted arrangements for their own sake and not even for the sake of their own partner or children; the world needs compassionate love, but sinners, left to their own devices, seem to always choose what is only best for them when it really counts.
That is the exactly the opposite of what real compassion would do!
So, our lesson today reminds us that real compassionate love is something that had to come into this world so that this world might again know love, joy, and peace.
It was a compassion from heaven itself, come looking for you. Christ’s compassion for you and me is a heavenly one, right here on planet Earth right now for all who trust in Him.
I love how the Bible describes it. The Word in the Greek is splanchano! (Out of one’s guts! There for all to see.) This kind of love has real heart and real soul! It is His conviction, as well as His heartfelt feeling. It is His unselfish care and concern for people who ultimately can’t take care of themselves when it comes to real love, real mercy, and real peace.
And it’s more than a heartfelt feeling in action for you. It’s compassion rooted in truth, rooted in righteousness and holiness.
Don’t you find it interesting that the first thing that the compassionate Jesus did when He pours out His heart in service to the people of that day was to teach them?
He focuses not merely on their physical needs, but their lack of knowledge. He taught them who God is, who they were, what sin is, its destruction, temptation, and power, their personal accountability to God, and the real possibility of forgiveness, fresh start, and eternal life! That’s compassion!
That’s the point of heavenly compassion. When you receive that kind of compassion from this Jesus, your Savior, the One who loves you deeply and does what you need done so that you might have His life and salvation; when you know that, my friend, it will change your life.
Mark draws our attention to Jesus in his report. It’s almost like he is saying, “Look at Him, see His eyes, see His heart, here’s real compassion from God for you!”
And here’s even more good news. Yes, in Christ there is real compassion for you! But also, in Christ, here’s God’s capacity for compassion in you for others.
When I said that the world lacks real compassion, I meant it.
But that doesn’t mean that there isn’t such love and grace, compassionately working in this world. It’s here, but it’s here in the lives of those who have been touched and redeemed by the compassionate Lord Jesus Christ.
You can have capacity for compassion because Christ’s gift to you can be shared. When you receive such a heavenly, compassionate love by faith in Jesus, it can live boldly in this world through you, too. As the Bible says, “He who is forgiven much, loves much.”
Just knowing Him can do all of that. When you see His compassion in action for you, when it comes into your life through His gifts of Word and sacrament, there is a love for you in this world that defies explanations and expectations. Then and there, lives can change, lives can be changed.
It happened that way one afternoon at a gathering of folks at a ball game. A man’s life was changed because he got a glimpse of heaven in the middle of a minor league baseball game. It was Saturday, August 7, 1993, Grant Field in Dunedin, Florida. The hometown Bluejays vs. the Ft. Lauderdale Red Sox, 2200 fans, Bluejays with a 4-0 lead, and Dennis Gray, 23, a pitcher in the groove that day, pitching a one-hitter through 6 innings. Then suddenly, the ump yells, “Time out.” A young, mentally challenged boy ran out on to the field, came to the pitcher, and asked for the ball; Gray gave it to him and he threw a strike.
The organist played like a musician in sync with the preacher in a sermon, played a short riff. The people roared and the stadium rose to give him a standing “O”; but the boy wasn’t there for the bows, he wasn’t there for himself, he was there for the joy of the game; for the heaven of the moment.
He suddenly turned again to the pitcher, tugged on his mitt, gave him a deep from the guts kind of smile, and then gave the pitcher a big hug.
That’s when Dennis Gray lost it, he said. Right there, at that moment, he began to cry. He said, “It was like that boy was in heaven.” Dennis lost his composer for the moment. He immediately walked the next two batters, gave up a double; when Coach Dennis Holmberg came to the mound, Gray still had tears in his eyes. Later, he not only reclaimed his composer, but from that moment on, all the things he did in this world suddenly took on new meaning, new purpose. He said, “Meeting that boy that day gave me a totally different view of life.”
You might say that merely getting a glimpse of heaven, gave him a whole new capacity to live life differently. When you meet a little heaven on earth, life can change like that. Suddenly, love’s work seems easier; suddenly, compassion seems the normal way to look at others, to look at life. Suddenly the dog-eat-dog world is transformed into a world that is merely a backdrop to demonstrate the things of Christ, the things that last, even more clearly.
When you meet the Lord of heaven and earth as your Savior, the One who loves you with a compassionate love, it changes everything. Our purpose for living, changes. Our reason for working, changes. Our challenge to love and forgive becomes an opportunity to let heaven itself shine brightly here on earth for all to see.
Our faith in Christ causes us, even in an unfair, oppressive world, to say, “Look into His eyes. He’s the One who fed the 5000 with a few fish and loaves; He’s the One who healed the sick and literally raised the dead to show you that nothing in this world can separate you from the heavenly future that He has in store for you; He’s the One who said that our ultimate need was to know God again as our Lord and Savior, so He provided real forgiveness and mercy, on the cross of God’s righteous judgment for our heartless, dispassionate humanity, so that compassion and mercy might actually be possible again for you and for those whom you love.”
And here’s another promise for you today! When you share Christ’s compassion with others, even through the hard work, you’ll not only bless others, even you will be blessed as well.
In an article in Campus Life Magazine a young nurse writes of her pilgrimage in learning to see in a patient the image of God beneath a very distressing disguise.“Eileen was one of her first patients, a person who was totally helpless. A cerebral aneurysm had left her with no conscious control over her body. As near as the doctors could tell Eileen was totally unconscious, unable to feel pain and unaware of anything going on around her. It was the job of the hospital staff to turn her every hour to prevent bedsores and to feed her twice a day with food that looked like a thin mush through a stomach tube. Caring for her was a thankless task. ‘When it’s this bad,’ an older student nurse told her, ‘you have to detach yourselves emotionally from the whole situation…’ As a result, more and more Eileen came to be treated as a thing, a vegetable.
“But the young student nurse decided that she could not treat this person like the others had treated her. She talked to Eileen, she sang to her, she encouraged her, and even brought her little gifts.
“One day when things were especially difficult and it would have been easy for the young nurse to take out her frustrations on the patient, she was especially kind. It was Thanksgiving Day and the nurse said to Eileen, ‘I was in a cruddy mood this morning, Eileen, because it was supposed to be my day off. But now that I’m here, I’m glad. I wouldn’t have wanted to miss seeing you on Thanksgiving. Do you know that this is Thanksgiving?’
“Just then the telephone rang, and the nurse turned to answer it, she looked quickly back at Eileen. ‘Suddenly,’ she writes, Eileen was ‘looking at me with piercing eyes, crying. Big damp circles stained her pillow, and she was shaking all over.
“That was the only human emotion that Eileen ever showed any of them, but it was enough to change the whole attitude of the hospital staff toward her. Not long afterwards, Eileen died. The young nurse closes her story, saying, ‘I keep thinking about her… It occurred to me that I owe her an awful lot. Except for Eileen, I might never have known what it’s like to give myself to someone who can’t give back'”
When Christ’s compassion is in action through you to others, that’s a heavenly blessing let loose in this world for all, even you, to receive and share!
Mark tells it to us today, look into the eyes of this Jesus, the Christ. In Him, there’s God’s compassion for you. When you come to Him by faith, dear friend, His heavenly compassion will change your life. And, in Him, by the very power of His Spirit, with the truth and wisdom of His Word, there is an eternal capacity for compassion that we have to share with others.
In Christ, there’s real capacity for compassion, depend on it.
Amen.
LUTHERAN HOUR MAILBOX (Questions & Answers) for July 22, 2012
Topic: Don’t Need Church At All?ANNOUNCER: Now, Pastor Gregory Seltz responds to questions from listeners. I’m Mark Eischer. Our listener, today, is having a tough time sharing his faith with the neighbor. He gives us some background on him. He says he’s a police officer. He’s very much involved in the community as a volunteer. He’s a good guy. He says he believes in God, but he’s not a Christian and he says he doesn’t need the baggage of the church. So, how do you share Christ with him?
SELTZ: Mark, this attitude comes up a lot today, doesn’t it? People say things like, “I believe in God,” even, “I believe in Jesus,” but I don’t like being part of any church.
ANNOUNCER: Would you say that’s a new thing or has it been part of the church’s history in the past?
SELTZ: Well, it’s certainly not something new. Already in the New Testament, the writer of the Book of Hebrews in chapter 10:25, he has to encourage some believers to gather together as the “body of Christ.” So even then some believers didn’t sense how important it was to come together in worship, to study, and to serve.
ANNOUNCER: In other words, you can’t be a Christian alone, all by yourself. But in the case of our listener’s neighbor, he doesn’t see the need for Jesus or for fellow believers. What do you say to him?
SELTZ: First and foremost, he needs to see the uniqueness of Jesus for his life. For that to happen, he has to feel that “his faith in a generic” god isn’t enough to live this life faithfully and lovingly for others. You need to somehow get him to see that his faith in God isn’t sufficient for the real issues he has or will have in his life, maybe not today, but someday.
ANNOUNCER: And how does one do that?
SELTZ: Well, you start by being inquisitive and respectful. Ask him sometime, “What are the issues; the challenges that keep him up at night, that cause him to toss and turn?” Then ask him how “his faith in God” helps him deal with such things? The goal is to get to really know him and then to help him see the need for faith, not just faith in oneself or in a generic god, but the God of the Bible who is not only Lord, but our Savior.
ANNOUNCER: So, the Good News of Jesus is often poorly received until after people feel the bad news of life without Him.
SELTZ: Exactly. I’d ask him questions about what is God supposed to do when even our good works need His forgiveness, or when our best efforts don’t even measure up to our own standards, let alone His perfect righteousness. As a policeman, he knows that even temporal lawlessness must be punished when people don’t do what is right and just.
ANNOUNCER: So, hold him to God’s standards and see how he deals with that.
SELTZ: Yes, and when he doesn’t even measure up to those, you then have an opportunity to talk not about religion, but faith in Jesus Christ, because Christ came to meet God’s standards for us, to save, to redeem, and to give us His abundant life to folks just like Him, and just like you and me.
ANNOUNCER: All right. Getting back now. What about that struggle he has with church people, that baggage he talked about?
SELTZ: Well, here again I would point him to Christ first and tell him that the uniqueness about Christ’s Church is that “everyone who goes there, goes there because they need Him, not because they are something special in themselves. They go to receive His forgiveness, His strength, and courage that can only be empowered by being in the presence of His Word among His people.
ANNOUNCER: What else can you say about the uniqueness of the church?SELTZ: Well, I would try to get the person to see that the uniqueness of the church is that it is full of sinful folks, who somehow, miraculously by faith, can somehow begin to love and encourage one another. In fact, the uniqueness of going to church is that by the power of the Holy Spirit, you can learn to really love people you might not have otherwise even liked because of how Christ loves you.
ANNOUNCER: So, then, reflecting Christ becomes a whole different way of loving people, doesn’t it?
SELTZ: It sure is, And when you begin to love people that way, you are reminded again and again, that you personally need to know how much you are loved by Christ to love others in this way in His Name. That kind of life can’t do without Christ. It was never meant to be a life lived alone.
ANNOUNCER: Thank you Pastor Seltz and we thank our listener for that question. It’s helping us to recognize the personal opportunities we have to demonstrate our faith and to share that love that we didn’t deserve and couldn’t earn. This has been a presentation of Lutheran Hour Ministries.
Music Selections for this program:
“A Mighty Fortress” arranged by Chris Bergmann. Used by permission.
“Holy Spirit, Ever Dwelling” by Paul Manz. From Hymn Improvisations, vol. 2 by Paul Manz (© 2002 Paul Manz)
“How Can I Keep from Singing?” arr. Robert A. Hobby. From Thine Is the Glory by Robert A. Hobby (© 1997 MorningStar Music Publishers)