Jesus went through all the towns and villages, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the Good News of the kingdom of God and healing every disease and sickness. When He saw the crowds, He had compassion on them.

When Donna moved in next door we should have suspected something. She didn’t really move in. She didn’t have boxes and possessions it was just Donna leaving a failed relationship with some clothes and few things. She was friends with the lady across the street who we suspected of dealing “meth.” (meth-an-phedoine- speed) We all suspected that Donna might be a user herself. We ran in two different circles, but she was my neighbor and I was bothered by my father’s saying, “There go I but for the grace for God.”

I kept watching her and her friends. At times I had sorrow for them- how could they waste their lives like that? At times I had contempt for them –what they were exposing the children to, and by the working of the Holy Spirit I was brought to have compassion for them. Jesus had died for the likes of them as much as He died for me….Donna, did you know? Donna, do you know how much God loves you?… Donna, did you know that my Jesus could fill the holes in your heart and in your life? Donna did you know?

Armed with a loaf banana bread I went next door. Guardedly, she answered the door. It was the first of many times I’d bring her homemade things to eat. After a few visits I began to bring her pages out of things like Portals of Prayer. Over time she’d visit on the front porch with me for a moment two. She let me tell her about my Jesus and His compassion for her. Even though her other friends came and went and I had good reason for my suspicions about what happened at her house at night and on weekends, I kept on trying to care for her because Jesus in His compassion had cared for me.

We’ve all seen our Donnas: some stand on street corners and hold up signs, some live in low rent housing and some live in better houses than ours. In our sinfulness we often look down our noses at the “likes” of them. Some of us don’t like them because they are a drain on our resources- “all they do is take and never give back.” Some of us have contempt for them because we believe, “we’d never be like them; if that were me I could rise above it all.” We are often filled with disdain and judgment for the crowds of the Donnas in this world,……. and When Jesus saw the crowds, He had compassion on them because they were like sheep without a shepherd.

I could see my Donna in the crowd: filled with hurt and disappointment that she covered up with “meth.” In that crowd were others, some addicted to alcohol, food, gambling, pornography, or greed. There were those addicted to arrogance, unforgiveness, stubbornness, or self-centeredness. In that crowd were those who’d been neglected, abused, bullied and abandoned; those who were sick and diseased, and those whose hearts had been crushed and stomped full of holes. Jesus saw them and He saw us, and He had compassion on us all.

Where I came from next door, Jesus came from heaven. He saw the wretchedness of our sin. He saw how sin had wreaked havoc on our lives. As bad and hard as all this was and is, Jesus had stood at the edge of a place that was worse- a place that exists just beyond death, a place of deep darkness for those who find themselves separated from God - a place called Hell where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth that goes on for eternity. He saw all the suffering of this life and beyond, and He had compassion on us.

He came for us and to us. He took up our humanity, our struggles, and our sins. He came healing diseases so that we would know He wasn’t just a street preacher but God in flesh appearing. He died for the sins of all of us at the cross and rose again to give us real assurance, comfort, and peace.

Assurance that comes from a God, who came from heaven for us, lived and died for us, and was so powerful that He rose from the dead for us, comfort that comes from hearing the Words of God. Peace that comes from His promises connected to baptism and the Lord’s Supper and a peace that comes from His Words of forgiveness. Just prior to His ascension back to heaven He commissioned us to do as He had done, telling us Whatever you do for the least of these my brothers you have done for Me.

We are commissioned to be Jesus with skin on to those around us, to be the hands, feet, and lips of Christ We are to live lives of deep compassion. A wise man once wrote: Compassion is not a snob gone slumming for a day or two. Anyone can salve his conscience by an occasional foray into knitting for the less fortunate, serving soup for the hard-pressed for a day, or donating spare change to a collection kettle. BUT, did you ever really take a trip down inside the broken heart of a friend or neighbor? To feel the sob of the soul- the raw, red crucible of emotional agony? To have this become almost as much yours, as that of your soul-crushed neighbor? Then, to sit down repeatedly and silently weep with and for them? This, my friends, is the beginning of the compassion we are called to live out. (Swindol p.107)

We are called to live out our faith not to complete it or to somehow show our worthiness of it. We are called to live out our faith so that it might not grow cold. We are called to live out our faith that we might be drawn closer to our Jesus. In doing so, we are brought to treasure the things that our Lord treasured- people from all walks and stations in life.

We are commissioned to share with them what has been shared freely with us- hope, grace, and mercy. We are called to tell them of a Jesus who loved them enough to die for them. This we do not because we have to but because we get to. We have been chosen to be the hands and feet of Christ to a suffering, lost, and dying world. We are called to serve them and minister to them- washing even their feet if necessary as He first washed ours.

My visits to Donna’s continued over the next six months. She turned down my invites for coffee and never followed through on her intention to visit church. She gave me a card shortly before she moved thanking me for my kindness. Assuring me when she got to her new town that she would get involved with a church and give Jesus a chance, and she left.

I wondered from time to time how she was doing. One day, I got a letter in the mail, a “true confession” if you will. Despite all her denials at the time, she admitted that she’d lied to me. She had been doing drugs, as if I didn’t know. She said it was strange, however, that invariably when she was thinking about doing drugs or she had just taken them I’d show up. It was almost as if Jesus had sent me to call on her, to call her back. She thanked me for coming, for sharing Jesus, and for showing care and concern in a world that is often cold and lonely and for sharing Jesus. She assured me that her life was better, that she was getting help, and she’d reconnected with her Jesus.

As I read her letter I was reminded of the words from the 40th Psalm: He lifted me out of the slimy pit, out of the mud and the mire. He set my feet upon the Rock and gave me a firm place to stand. He put a new song in my mouth. Donna, it was Jesus who came along side you to lift you up, to give you hope and a future. Look to Him for He loves you.

I don’t know where Donna is today. I know that demons of drugs and disappointment still stalk her. I do know that Jesus is more powerful than those demons, and He loves her. I pray that He has given others the chance to be His hands and feet, to minister to her and look after her.

As I write this I have to pray for God’s forgiveness. Oh, to some I’ve made it sound like I was a saint, but I was not. Time and time again I did not take the opportunities that were there for me to share my faith, to share my Jesus, but it is in my Jesus that I find my forgiveness and the inspiration to try again: to feed the hungry, to invite the stranger in, to cloth the naked, to look after the sick, and visit the imprisoned…to show compassion to those in need of Jesus.

Will you pray with me? God, create in me the desire to be your hands and feet to have a compassion from the depths of my soul to come along side those who are lost, hurting, and in peril, to rejoice with them, to feel the sob of their soul, and to minister to them by and with Your Word. Help me to see the many ways I may serve others and the church.

Amen