Godliness or Christ-likeness (Point 4/5)

 

Godliness or Christ-likeness (Point 4/5)

4. Believers must touch people through their physical needs.

On the day of Judgment, God judges one’s heart and not his religious affiliation. Jesus explicitly lays down the proceedings when He comes in His glory: those who feed the hungry, who tend to the thirsty, who show hospitality to strangers, who clothe the naked, who visit the prisoners will enter into eternity life. While those who do not will go away into eternal punishment (see Matthew 25:31-46).

Jesus fulfills the people’s spiritual needs by first addressing their physical concerns. Jesus has compassion when He sees the physical needs of the people. When Jesus sees the masses that are left in the wilderness without food, He feeds them (see John 6). When Jesus sees the sick, He has compassion on them and heals them. Even though He knows that many will eventually desert Him, He meets them at their point of need.

Jesus teaches us that physical needs are legitimate needs that must be met. In fact, it is through the works of love that the fruit of faith can be seen and experienced. James 2:14 says,

What use is it, my brethren, if someone says he has faith but he has no works? Can that faith save him? If a brother or sister is without clothing and in need of daily food, and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and be filled,” and yet you do not give them what is necessary for their body, what use is that?