Who Are We Called to Help?
Who do we understand, who doesn’t scare us, and whose plight makes us sad?
I think one of the reasons that God put each of us on this earth is so that we can be of service to other hurting people. I like how theologian Shane Claiborne puts it: “When we throw our hands up and say God why don’t you do something? He says, I did. I made you.”
But I don’t think we can help the entire world, for two reasons. First, that’s a quick route to burnout. Second, we aren’t gifted to help everyone. There are some groups of people in the world who I feel peculiarly qualified to help. There are other groups who, even though I see their suffering and I can sympathize with their pain, I don’t have the first clue as to how to help.
So how can we find the groups whom we’re called to help? I think asking three questions can help us to find these people.
Who Was I Before I Was Saved?
For non-Christians, an easy translation of this idea is: “Who was I when I was at my worst?”
This question comes straight from the Apostle Paul, who suggests that “Each person should remain in the situation they were in when God called them” (1 Corinthians 7:20 NIV). I think one of the reasons that Paul urges us in this way is that, having spent time in this situation, we’re best equipped to understand the pains and desires and struggles of other people who are still in said situation.
For example, before I found God I was a pretty pissed off young man. I had a rough childhood and I was mad at God and at the world. Additionally, I felt like my anger had no place or outlet in modern society, and so I bottled it up until it was corroding my bones. I remember reading fantasy novels in which a character had been mistreated until she wanted to burn the world to the ground, and thinking that yeah, she was pretty right.
Spending my teens and 20s this way gave me some insight into how to help other struggling young men. I know what it’s like to feel like society hasn’t given me any tools to channel my anger, which gives me some insight into how to help young men who don’t know what to do with their fury. I know what it’s like to feel like God must hate me based on the situations that He put me in, and so I understand how to help young men out of that false belief. I know what it’s like to see the world as a dangerous and unjust place, which helps me know how to walk other folks who feel that way into the safety and justice of life with God.
As they say, it takes one to know one.
Who Doesn’t Scare Me (But Who Scares Other People)?
This insight comes from a friend of mine. She grew up with drug-addicted parents. After she found God she built a life as a very successful addiction coach. Why, of all the people she could have helped, did she choose addicts? Because, unlike most of us, she wasn’t frightened of them. When a client blows up at her, she doesn’t take it personally; she just realizes that their brain is craving a fix it’s not getting, or that they’re being forced to confront deeper wounds for the first time.
In Batman Begins, the crime boss Carmine Falcone tells a young Bruce Wayne that, “You always fear what you don’t understand.” I think the inverse is also true: when we truly understand someone, we’re no longer afraid of them. When we’re not afraid of them, we can much more easily help them.
Whose Suffering Makes Me Sad?
This question comes from theologian Jamie Winship. Jamie says that sadness is an expression of love, and as such it’s from God. He recommends that we ask, “Lord, what did You make me to be sad about in the world?”
When we hear an answer to that question, Jamie says, “This is where your passion will be. This is where it will be directed.”
I know the plight of certain people groups weighs on my heart a lot more than the plight of others. I don’t think that makes me callous, though (well, I hope not). It’s just that we can’t care equally about everyone, and if we try we’ll burn out. Instead, I think the heavy weight that the plight of certain groups of people has on my heart is a sign that I’m supposed to help them.
I see this when it comes to bridge-building. Objectively, there are bigger problems in the world than an adult child cutting off contact with her parents over their political views, but something about that situation tugs at my heart strings. It makes me sad on a deeper level than other problems do. I take that sadness as a signpost that God’s inviting me to do something about that problem.
Who do we understand, who doesn’t scare us, and whose plight makes us sad. I think a lot of times all three of those questions will point us to the same group or groups of people. Those are the folks whom I think God might be calling us to help.
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