Some of us "have a heart" for the poor, the hungry, putting together backpacks of food for the "reduced-lunch" kids for days when school isn't in session. We contribute food to Cornerstones, run food drives in the summer when food banks typically run low, or volunteer at the homeless shelter or the hypothermia shelter. Or we collect money in various ways to help. Some of us go on mission trips to foreign countries to help the poor there--often in even worse shape than the poor in this country. Some of us use our building skills to help build homes for the poor.
Some of us mentor at-risk school children, trying to help bridge the gap between what the parents cannot do at home and the overworked teachers are trying to do at school.
Some have a heart for people who are hurting, offering rides to medical appointments or fixing meals or visiting people in the hospital. Some of us have a heart for the poor in spirit, calling them, dropping them cheery notes, visiting them often, inviting them to our activities. Some of us have a heart for the downtrodden, ablaze for setting aright the injustice in the world.
Wherever God has started a blaze in my heart, I have to follow it. But while I'm following that blaze, I have to be careful about other people in my path.
I must be careful that whatever blaze I am following does not become a personal vendetta. No matter how good the cause, no matter how wonderful it will be to help others, no matter how important it is to change things, if I do it without love, it is nothing.
To change the way society thinks is hard. Change, real change from the heart, takes truth, grace, and time. As I read in "Changes that Heal," truth and grace are a delicate balance. Truth without grace hurts. Grace without truth does not produce the change of heart that is necessary to progress.
And along the way, I need to remember to encourage the fire in others, as they do me.
May God's grace, peace, truth, and light be with you always as you mature in your faith.
Now there are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit. And there are differences of administrations, but the same Lord. And there are diversities of operations, but it is the same God which worketh all in all. But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man to profit withal. [1 Corinthians 4-7, KJV]
Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing. [1 Thessalonians 5:11, NIV]
“The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’ [Matthew 25:40, NIV]
And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing. [1 Corinthians 13, KJV]