3/27/60

Scripture: Matthew 9: 10-17; 35-38.

Do you like crowds of people? I have known people who like to ride the subway or elevated trains of a big city because they are fascinated at watching other people.

One of my grandmothers particularly enjoyed being driven down town to the shopping district of the town where they lived, on the evening when stores were open for business. She liked to sit in the parked car and just watch people coming and going; see the purposefulness of some as they walked into a store intent on their purchases; watch the satisfied expression of others as they carried away their parcels; speculate on the interest of those who walked along in leisurely fashion doing what she called "window-shopping." She liked people, anyway! She had always been eager for the neighborhood gatherings of folk at the church, or at houses during the years of their somewhat lonely time of pioneer farming in South Dakota.

Some folk like to be where others are because they are gregarious and much interested in the experiences, the opinions, the emotions of all people. Some like crowds for the very anonymity they feel when being "swallowed up" and unrecognized in a large mass of folk.

Seat mates on a crowded train may fall into conversation, though utter strangers to each other. And sometimes one will unburden an unbelievable amount of comment, largely because that one has found an ear, willing to hear, and yet probably in no position to tell all in the usual circle of friends or acquaintances.

Two women spend a couple of hours as seat mates on a train coach. One of them has a splitting headache and talks freely of some of the frustrations and annoyances she has, to this other person whom she never expects to see again. At length she finds that the headache has cleared up and she feels unburdened and better because of the conversation.

Perhaps you like to be a part of a crowd, sharing its mood, while you attend a ball game, attend a political rally, or watch a parade -- entering into the spirit of the people, enjoying the occasion. You may feel benefited by your own private devotions, the worship toward God which you enter into alone at home; and yet want very much also to join in the mood and the trust of others in corporate worship on Sunday morning at church.

And then there is another way of seeing a crowd of people. When you see some crowds, being quite divorced from the mood of those folk, it may be quite a different experience. One can see a side of human nature that is unattractive and shocking to good taste.

While others stand in line, patiently waiting their turn for service, someone manages to shove into a place near the head of the line.

You may see signs of moral confusion in some folk, even shocking ugliness in human nature. And you react; perhaps with curiosity; possibly with caution; it may be with contempt. There may even be good reason for any one of these reactions.

But Jesus appears not to have reacted these ways to the crowds around him. There was a great deal of human misery and perversity in the in the crowds of folk who besieged him. There were the fickle, the undependable, even the crafty. There were those with pet peeves and "axes to grind." Some were just as ugly of character as their 20th century counterparts.

But Jesus did not fear them. He did not despise them. He did not seem to mind their dogging his footsteps. On the contrary, the gospel writers have left us with the well-documented impression that Jesus was extraordinarily understanding of the people in those crowds, and that he had compassion upon them.

Matthew tells us that, "when Jesus saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd." [Matthew 9: 36] That is a different attitude from the feeling of the Greek sage who admitted to his school only those boys who were sons of the elite. It was different from the attitude of the Roman poet who frankly hated and shunned "the vulgar mass" of people. It was different from those Jewish religious leaders whose disregard for common people is dramatically pictured in the priest and the Levite of his story of the good Samaritan. [Luke 10: 30-37].

It is dramatically different from that of the sea captain of 40 years ago whose ship plied its trade to oriental shores. In addition to first class passengers who occupied the ship’s state rooms, there was a large number of humble Filipino folk who were riding steerage for a port where they hoped to get new jobs. One of his first class passengers stood for a few minutes on the bridge beside the captain looking down on the forward lower deck where the Filipino laborers were getting along as best they could during the voyage. The passenger commented on the crowded conditions of the folk in steerage and how difficult it would seem to be to have to travel in that fashion, cooped up in too small a space, uncomfortable, fed a poorer menu, and some wretched with sea-sickness. The captain had only one contemptuous comment as he looked down there on that crowd --- "cattle!"

Well, it is clear that Jesus loved the common people. He welcomed their presence when they came to him with their problems, their diseases, their perplexities. He attended their modest feasts, visited their humble homes, ate with them in defiance of social and religious taboos. He never left them for long, except to withdraw for the renewal of prayer and meditation. Even then, he often took with him his more intimate disciples.

Jesus had grown up in a home of the common people. He was at ease with the well-born and the powerful, the highly-trained and the privileged. But he was equally at home with the inarticulate and the humble, and perhaps happiest in speaking and ministering to their need. He was the object of very sharp criticism leveled at him because he kept company with publicans and obvious sinners. He could be seen with corrupt officials, and would talk with those women who eked out a hard living by easy virtue.

This "guilt by association," to which his critics subjected him, was as vicious a propaganda device then as it is now. And Jesus neither avoided nor denied it. On the contrary, he defended and commended it. When the objectionable character of some of his friends was pointed out to him for the "umpteenth time" he finally consented to comment: "Those who are well," he said, "do not need a physician, but those who are sick."

Jesus chose his friends according to their need of him rather than for his need of them. He loved the people who obviously needed the things he could give them -- healing, courage, the assurance of forgiveness. His time seemed too valuable to be spent much upon men who were too well fed to realize their spiritual starvation, or too well educated to realize that the wisdom of man is sometimes folly with God.

Of course there were exceptions. Jesus had no class prejudice, and he did not close his heart of mind to anyone. He freely gave himself and his time to Nicodemus, though he knew that Nicodemus was not ready for him. He loved the grace and poise and charm of that young man. His heart ached when he saw that the young ruler’s possessions were being allowed to shut Nicodemus away from God’s kingdom. [John 3: 1-15]

Jesus had some heart-warming experiences with other prominent people. Zacchaeus was a small-town tycoon who had long suffered the contempt of his fellow citizens. Probably he had come to despise himself. Then Jesus singled him out. And despite his ill-gotten wealth Jesus made Zacchaeus feel like an honest man again. Zacchaeus responded with repentance and restoration; with the surrender of his pride of station and with all his heart. A ruler of men, he became a servant of God. [Luke 19: 2-10]

But Jesus was, for the most part, with the crowd. His disciples were mostly tradesmen, workers, civil servants from the humbler walks of life. The sick and the morally diseased came to him for healing. The poor came needing nourishment. And Jesus had compassion on them. What was this compassion like?

1) For one thing, the compassion of Jesus was not condescending. Woe to us if our compassion to others, whether the nearby needy neighbor in the same town, or the stranger in the distant refugee camp, be tinged with condescension. The Devil has a field day with us, taking hold of some objective bit of good, (like a relief offering in One Great Hour of Sharing), and poisoning it with the spirit of condescension. The more pleas we hear in behalf of stricken people and the more we respond to them from a safe and comfortable distance, the more we are tempted to feel that there is something divinely ordained about our prosperity!

When Jesus said that we would always have the poor with us, he was being realistic. He was not saying it to absolve us from social responsibility, nor to salve our consciences concerning social injustice. It is not a happy attitude if we hold the word "welfare" in disrepute because of differences of opinion as to how the fullest life may be assured for the most people.

2) The compassion of Jesus was not condescending; nor was it sentimental. When Jesus saw that people were hungry and their provisions gone, he provided bread. But he had no illusions about saving the world by economic means alone. One of the major delusions of one great power on earth now, is the assumption that if the material needs of all the people are met, we shall have a paradise on earth. Some religious teaching has misled people into thinking that material welfare does not matter. When that viewpoint has been used, consciously or unconsciously, religion has been an "opiate of the people." It is true that Jesus taught his followers to seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness. But he did not leave out the assurance that these other needs, in their rightful place, shall also "be added unto you."

We have a terrifying example of materialistic sentimentality in our own country with more food to waste than others have to eat; more clothing and fabrics to discard or give away than many others have to wear; more gadgets to junk than others have to use. But are we happier for it?

The compassion of Jesus was not condescending. It was not sentimental. (3) Nor was it cheap. This is a penetrating criterion of our compassion. It is one thing to give a small sliver of our income to help meet human needs through our church or through any other institution. It is another matter to give the "widow’s mite" (whether that be one dollar or ten thousand dollars) since it is measured not in terms of currency but in terms of sacrifice. But even the widow’s mite is not the acme of compassion. We can give more than we can spare; more than what we really need for ourselves; more than anything we merely own. We can, like Jesus give ourselves! That is Christ-like compassion.

If we really covet the compassion of Jesus, there are certain disciplines by which we can grow into it.

1) For one thing, we can put ourselves imaginatively into the place of another being. (Recent writers are using the word "empathy" to describe this process.) As a rule, we cause as much evil or miss as much good, by thoughtlessness as by any purposeful design. We are so full of our own problems and ambitions that we do not understand, let alone feel, the desires and needs of others. We lack the "educated heart."

Jesus possessed an extraordinary measure of this kind of understanding -- this "empathy." When a woman who had come to the well of a Samaritan town, found him and asked him for theological information, Jesus immediately knew that this was not her real need. She did not really care how precisely to worship God correctly. She was really concerned with her own promiscuous life that made it impossible for her to worship God at all! Understanding this, Jesus was able to help her resolve the discord in her soul into a new harmony with God.

2) Another discipline is to "love the unlovely." Jesus once told a typical crowd that if they loved only their own loved ones, they were not doing anything remarkable. Even the worst of men are apt to love mother or father, brother or sister with a kind of extension of their own self-love. The real test of love is to love people who seem to repel us. It is a severe demand to love those whom we fear and hate. But Jesus must have had this in mind when he enjoined us to "love our enemies."

This goes for those who may hate us. It also goes for those who may be less than fashionable or socially acceptable who come to the place of worship. We have to "re-learn" continually that the church is not an exclusive club for those sinners whose sins are fashionable and socially acceptable -- but for all sinners standing in need of grace -- couth or uncouth, employed or unemployed, shaved or unshaven, Pharisee or publican. It may well be that God cares as much for a sincere, penitent outcast as an attractive, respectable hypocrite.

3) Still another discipline is to take the item marked "good works" from the bottom of our priority list and put it at the top. This is not to say that a "daily good turn," dutifully remembered and faithfully recorded is especially commendable. Indeed, it may be somewhat artificial. And it does not appeal to our Protestant insistence that the just live by faith rather than by an enumeration of good acts.

Nevertheless, as a discipline in order to make a beginning in shaping attitudes, it is a good discipline to purposefully do at least one thing each day that will help someone else without giving us any credit, or publicity, or even undue egoistic satisfaction. For, when we do perform such an act, at least we do something to implement the discipleship which we profess rather than just thinking about it.

When Jesus saw the crowds, he had compassion on them. He could have left it at that. No one forced him to take up their cause, to make their concern his concern, to expose himself to their illnesses or disease, to share their poverty or live their burdened life. Jesus could have lived and let live, just as we like to do. He could have been a respected teacher and spiritual guide with a secure station in life and a prominent listing in the "Who’s Who" of Palestinian history. In fact he was urged to be like that.

But Jesus did not confine himself to his own station or nation. He made himself a one-man minority, and died without a champion, on a cross. He went to that cross, knowingly and deliberately, for Peter and for Judas and for us! He went away beyond any "live and let live" formula or attitude.

He gave his all, even his life, that we might live and help others to live.

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Dates and places delivered:

Wisconsin Rapids, March 27, 1960

Waioli Hiuia Church, January 20, 1974