When the poor and needy seek water, and there is none, and their tongue is parched with thirst, I, the Lord, will answer them.” Isaiah 41:17.
Bono once addressed the National Prayer Breakfast and said, “its no coincidence that in the scriptures, poverty is mentioned more than 2100 times.” He went on the say, “You know the only time Christ is judgmental is on the subject of the poor, ‘As you have done it unto the least of my brethren, you have done it to me.’
Now I’m not sure Bono is quite right about the only time Christ was judgmental. I seem to remember he had a few choice words for the Pharisees, but the point about poverty dominating the scriptures is well taken. Taking care of widows, orphans, poor, and the marginalized is part of everyone’s call, in whatever way we can.
On my sabbatical and since, I have run across a lot of people who were impoverished or had it thrust upon them. Poverty and marginalization robs an individual of dignity. Part of the Lord’s work is to aid those who are poor and marginalized by restoring their dignity and by creating opportunities to “seek water” for themselves and “shelter” from the desert of marginalization.
When you come across someone living in poverty or who is marginalized, how will you “answer him/her?”
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