Jesus' Cause

When Tom did a class on “Jesus’ Cause” a few years ago, I groaned because it sounded as if we were looking for something to do.  However, as I sat through the class, I began to wonder, “What is Jesus all about?  If I were to reduce Jesus to a word, what word would best describe Him?”  The word I came up with was “compassion.”

When I took out my Strong’s Concordance and looked up the word compassion, I was surprised how little the word was mentioned.  I was even more astonished about how infrequently the word was mentioned in the Gospels.  I concluded in my mind that Jesus’ heart for people was a commentary on the few times the word, “compassion” was mentioned.  One such time was when Jesus fed the five thousand men (Matthew 14:13-21, Mark 6:32-44, Luke 9:10-17, John 6:1-15).

In Mark 6:34, Mark tells us, “When Jesus landed and saw a large crowd, He had compassion on them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd.  So He began teaching them many things.”

I don’t watch soap operas or Reality TV because I have a front row seat in every day life.  I watch people make bad choices and bad decisions and I kind of know how it’s going to play out.  I’d be content to sit in the audience and not be part of the drama, but there is tension in my life because my Example had “compassion and taught them...”

When Jesus saw the crowd, Matthew said that Jesus, “had compassion on them and healed their sick” (Matthew 14:14).

My focus is usually in the wrong place.  I read verses like this and tell myself, “I am not God.  I can’t do miracles.  I don’t have the resources.  What can I do?”  I hear myself in what Jesus’ disciples say, who later told Jesus, it’s getting late.  Send the people away.  Let them fend for themselves.

I think that Jesus is revealing not only what God can do with what we have, but He is also revealing the heart He wants to give us.  We can do great and wonderful things for the LORD, but if we don’t have His heart, it’s not worth anything according to Paul in I Corinthians 13.

 According to Mark, before the feeding of the 5,000, Jesus’ disciples had come back from a very successful mission trip.  They must have been very excited as they told Jesus everything that happened.  They must have been super charged up when Jesus said to them, “Let’s go on a retreat” because of the crowds.

I think I know how the disciples felt when they arrived at their destination only to find the multitude already there.  However, Luke says that when Jesus saw the multitude, “He welcomed them…”  As a disciple of Christ, I would not be happy, but as part of the multitude, that’s Good News!